8/27/24

 Tuesday, August 27, 2024

1979 Lord Mountbatten was killed along with three companions, two of them children, by the IRA when his boat was blown up near Sligo, Ireland

2008 Barack Obama became the first African-American to be nominated by a major political party for President of the United States

In bed by 9:10, awake around 4;00 and up at 4:20 to let Lilly out.into the warm, windy morning.  Heat index above 105℉ yesterday, high temperature today around 90° with dew points between 71° and 78°, stifling.  I let Lilly out again at 5:30, emptied and reloaded the dishwasher, and cleaned up the kitchen.  

Prednisone, day 107, 10 mg., day 12.   I took the 10 mg. at 5:20 a.m., applied diclofenac to the knee at 7 a.m., and took morning meds at 7:05.  I applied more diclofenac at 11 a.m. along with two Lidocaine patches.

“It became necessary to destroy the town to save it.” —AP correspondent Peter Arnett quoting a U.S. major on the decision to bomb and shell Ben Tre on February 7, 1968 after Viet Cong forces overran the city in the Mekong Delta forty-five miles south of Saigon during the Tet Offensive.  I thought of this infamous quote as I read the story in this morning's NYTimes "In Eastern Ukraine, Terrifying Bombardment and Near Total Destruction: Powerful guided “glide bombs” have helped Russia raze entire towns with ever greater speed."  "Glide bombs" are old, Cold War, Soviet-era, free-fall bombs, 500 pounds to 6,000 pounds, retrofitted to become  guidable 'smart bombs.'  They are being used by the Russians throughout the Donetsk region to completely destroy cities and towns.  They are much more destructive than artillery.  "A 152-millimeter artillery shell — which Russia fires by the thousands every day — contains a bit more than 13 pounds of explosive material. A commonly deployed glide bomb, the FAB-1500,  is packed with more than 1,300 pounds of explosives."  I remembered the stories of the utter destruction of Donetsk's major port city of Mariupol by the Russian Army before its occupation of the city in May 2022.  The areas in the Donetsk Oblast that have been and are being utterly destroyed by the Russian and Ukrainian militaries are claimed by both countries, but mainly I think as a matter of national pride.  They are occupied by native Russian speakers, not Ukrainian speakers.  Before the war at least there was apparently considerable identification by the inhabitants with Russia.  Putin thinks of these people as Russians, perhaps understandably, but the region lies within the internationally recognized borders of Ukraine and the region is, or was, economically important to Ukraine, i.e., worth fighting for.  But the war in Donetsk has been raging for more than 2 years now and much of the region is devastated and depopulated, reminding me of Ben Tre.  The slaughterhouse aspect of the fighting reminds me also of Gaza of course and of the inherent stupidity of war.  I can't help but think of Vietnam and what my own government did there in the name of "defending democracy."  

“There may be a limit beyond which many Americans and much of the world will not permit the United States to go. The picture of the world’s greatest superpower killing or seriously injuring 1,000 non-combatants a week, while trying to pound a tiny, backward nation into submission on an issue whose merits are hotly disputed, is not a pretty one.” —Robert McNamara in a memo to President Lyndon Johnson on May 19, 1967.

“I have asked for this radio and television time tonight for the purpose of announcing that we today have concluded an agreement to end the war and bring peace with honor in Vietnam and in Southeast Asia.”—Richard Nixon informing the American public in a nationwide address on January 23, 1973 that the United States had reached agreement with North Vietnam on the Paris Peace Accords.

“Today, America can regain the sense of pride that existed before Vietnam. But it cannot be achieved by refighting a war that is finished as far as America is concerned. As I see it, the time has come to look forward to an agenda for the future, to unify, to bind up the Nation’s wounds, and to restore its health and its optimistic self-confidence…. We, of course, are saddened indeed by the events in Indochina. But these events, tragic as they are, portend neither the end of the world nor of America’s leadership in the world.” —President Gerald R. Ford in a speech at Tulane University on April 23, 1975.

“During the day on Monday, Washington time, the airport at Saigon came under persistent rocket as well as artillery fire and was effectively closed. The military situation in the area deteriorated rapidly. I therefore ordered the evacuation of all American personnel remaining in South Vietnam.” —President Gerald Ford’s statement announcing the evacuation of United States personnel from the Republic of Vietnam on April 29, 1975.

What fools we are.  Stupid, wicked, destructive fools.   Homo vastator, homo extinctor, homo perditor.

Notes: Norm Finkelstein.  I watched a very interesting 90-minute interview of Finkelstein this afternoon.  One of the points he made more than once was that he never wanted to be rich and the Jewish kids with whom he went to high school, James Madison H.S. in Brooklyn, didn't pursue riches but rather academic or intellectual achievement.  His high school valedictorian was Chuck Schumer ('a terrible human being, but very intelligent).  Bernie Sanders went to the same school as did Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Norm Coleman and a number of Nobel Prize winners.  Most of the Jewish students wanted to be doctors, not for the money, but rather because doctors represented the people who were smartest, most accomplished academically, and intellectually, especially in science and mathematics.  

He was a student, perhaps at the Ph.D. level, of Noam Chomsky, for whom he has great respect and affection.  He says he doesn't believe life has any purpose or meaning ("ashes to ashes, dust to dust"), perhaps because of his parents who were survivors of the Warsaw Ghetto and concentration camps, but he notes that Chomsky professes a great love of life, that he finds life "very rich and meaningful."

"What amazes me most about watching the scenes unfolding in Gaza is how cheap life is when it comes to those people.  15,000 children buried under rubble.  Life is so cheap.  I can't, as Oprah Winfrey might say, I can't wrap my head around that, that people could be so indifferent to the magnitude of that horror.  I couldn't be indifferent to it, even if I could be convinced that every one of those children was going to live as meaningless as my own.  I could never be indifferent to that.  I can't even fathom it.  I can't fathom 15,000 children buried under rubble because of this madman, because of this mad society . . . it's probably a lunatic country.

Anniversaries thoughts.  First, getting Mountbatten was worth 2 dead English children to the IRA.  Getting Hamas fighters is worth 15,000 dead Palestinian children to the Israelis?  Second, electing Obama was the good news.  The bad news?  The costs, Tim Geitner, the Tea Party, Donald Trump, etc.