On the occasion of Arafat’s death, I am going to share a very personal reminiscence. When my older daughter Zoë was about 14 months old, she could not talk reliably, but she could make her preferences known with gestures. Naturally enough, given the interests of very young children, she liked to pretend that various people (dolls, stuffed animals, photographs) were nursing. This was all well and good, until she presented me with a folded page from the Economist displaying side-by-side photographs of Sharon and Arafat, and then held them up to my breasts to suggest that I nurse them. It was a little difficult to explain why I was fine with the random dude in the Gulf Air ad, but resolutely opposed to nursing either gentleman in the Middle East Politics Article. Zoë’s political acumen has increased in the intervening years, however. (She is now 3). I tried to explain to her why I was so dismayed about the recent U.S. elections, telling her of the great powers of the presidency, the relative merits of the two contenders, and so on. She thought for a moment, and then said, “you think George Bush is too stupid to have so much wesponsibility?” Yes, child. Exactly that. Plus malice.
That’s pretty funny.
I read it first as “weapons_ability”
I think you have a budding poet.
Right now I’m picturing Sylvia saying “Zoë said stoo-pid! Thass a bad word!” And me or Ellen trying to explain that you’re allowed to use that word when talking about politicians or commercials but not when talking about your peers…
Right now I’m picturing Sylvia saying “Zoë said stoo-pid! Thass a bad word!” And me or Ellen trying to explain that you’re allowed to use that word when talking about politicians or commercials but not when talking about your peers..
Wow. That is one smart 3 year old.
I can see the next 4 years are going to get even shriller and nastier.
Fall 2001—our Juan, then not quite 2, points to picture of Osama on magazine cover and says,”That man—we have to fight that man.” He’s never said such a thing about Saddam, however.
Too bad a Zoe/Juan ticket couldn’t have run in this election.
My two year old niece can recognize George Bush. Whenever we see him on TV we have to yell “Swiper no swiping!”
There ya go, brainwash em young.
All that bush wesponsibility sneers reflects simply the condescending attitude of the cosmopolitan elite. I think it really is A Real Problem For The Left.
We were trying to explain our grumpiness to our just-turned-three year old. We’d already had to explain the Kerry bumper sticker. Now that we explained that Kerry lost and Bush won, our little literalist wants to take off the Kerry sticker and put on a Bush one….
You know it’s funny, but, precisely, because I have very strong political opinions, I try not to pass them on to my kid.
I want her to think for herself and come to her own conclusions.
Not sure that it works though…
Pollie: Oh, it works, at least in my case. My parents taught me to know right from wrong, to value intelligence and seek the truth, and to think for myself. Nonetheless, they remain stauch conservatives to this day.
Okay: Yasser Arafat, a reasonably significant figure on the world stage, has just died, so . . . let’s make fun of George W. Bush! Hey, yeah, we haven’t done that for, like, fifteen minutes! Or (to consider the neighboring post), Yasser Arafat has just died, so let’s talk about . . . Iyad Allawi, who, you know, was put in place by George W. Bush, whom we believe to be an incompetent thug — have we mentioned that?
Is there some sort of one-degree-of-separation game going on here that no one told me about? — i.e., let’s see if we can connect any and every current event to Chimpy Bushitler? Just for the record, I think the passing of Arafat is significant enough for readers of this site that somebody ought to post about it. . . .
Ahhh. Here’s a quite from dear old Yasser to lighten the tone even further.
“Have no mercy on the Jews, no matter where they are, in any country. Fight them, wherever you are. Wherever you meet them, kill them. Wherever you are, kill those Jews and those Americans who are like them - and those who stand by them - they are all in one trench, against the Arabs and the Muslims because they established Israel here, in the beating heart of the Arab world, in Palestine. They created it to be the outpost of their civilization and the vanguard of their army, and to be the sword of the West and the crusaders, hanging over the necks of the monotheists, the Muslims in these lands. They wanted the Jews to be their spearhead…”
Yasser Arafat, a reasonably significant figure on the world stage, has just died, so . . . let’s make fun of George W. Bush!
Look, Belle categorically refused to nurse Yasser Arafat! At the request of her very own child!! She’s done her part, buddy.
P.S. George Bush is like jello. There’s always room to make fun of him. Thx, bye.
Children are very perceptive! :-)
—Jordan
fowles.blogspot.com
Belle: the thinking alternative to Lileks.
The quote in JonJon’s post should be attributed Dr. Ahmad Abu Halabiya, not Yasser Arafat. Inappropriate. Inflammatory. Sloppy.
Yes, of course. Yasser was too busy bombing buses to spend time actually saying such a thing.
So, Your parents taught you to know right from wrong? Value intelligence and seek the truth? And to think for yourself? It doesn’t appear they did a very good job. In an era where innocent people are having their heads sawed off. Children are being shot in the back, TRULY peaceful Muslims trying to rebuild their country are being butchered on a daily basis by ARAB MUSLIMS with goals consistant with Arafat. We have independant thinkers like yourself, attacking W and supporting Sadam Hussein of all people. Arafat’s death came several decades too late. The future of the free world hinges on the outcome on the war on terror. And to read these panty waste oppinions of the leader who will finally stand up to them with the message that it is not okay to kill innocent people because you are pissed off at them churns my stomach. WAKE UP!!! Good men and women are fighting and being injured and killed to protect YOU from these terrorists. terrorists who would enter your house and saw YOUR head off if not for the protection that you take so easily for granted.
À Gauche
Jeremy Alder
Amaravati
Anggarrgoon
Audhumlan Conspiracy
H.E. Baber
Philip Blosser
Paul Broderick
Matt Brown
Diana Buccafurni
Brandon Butler
Keith Burgess-Jackson
Certain Doubts
David Chalmers
Noam Chomsky
The Conservative Philosopher
Desert Landscapes
Denis Dutton
David Efird
Karl Elliott
David Estlund
Experimental Philosophy
Fake Barn County
Kai von Fintel
Russell Arben Fox
Garden of Forking Paths
Roger Gathman
Michael Green
Scott Hagaman
Helen Habermann
David Hildebrand
John Holbo
Christopher Grau
Jonathan Ichikawa
Tom Irish
Michelle Jenkins
Adam Kotsko
Barry Lam
Language Hat
Language Log
Christian Lee
Brian Leiter
Stephen Lenhart
Clayton Littlejohn
Roderick T. Long
Joshua Macy
Mad Grad
Jonathan Martin
Matthew McGrattan
Marc Moffett
Geoffrey Nunberg
Orange Philosophy
Philosophy Carnival
Philosophy, et cetera
Philosophy of Art
Douglas Portmore
Philosophy from the 617 (moribund)
Jeremy Pierce
Punishment Theory
Geoff Pynn
Timothy Quigley (moribund?)
Conor Roddy
Sappho's Breathing
Anders Schoubye
Wolfgang Schwartz
Scribo
Michael Sevel
Tom Stoneham (moribund)
Adam Swenson
Peter Suber
Eddie Thomas
Joe Ulatowski
Bruce Umbaugh
What is the name ...
Matt Weiner
Will Wilkinson
Jessica Wilson
Young Hegelian
Richard Zach
Psychology
Donyell Coleman
Deborah Frisch
Milt Rosenberg
Tom Stafford
Law
Ann Althouse
Stephen Bainbridge
Jack Balkin
Douglass A. Berman
Francesca Bignami
BlunkettWatch
Jack Bogdanski
Paul L. Caron
Conglomerate
Jeff Cooper
Disability Law
Displacement of Concepts
Wayne Eastman
Eric Fink
Victor Fleischer (on hiatus)
Peter Friedman
Michael Froomkin
Bernard Hibbitts
Walter Hutchens
InstaPundit
Andis Kaulins
Lawmeme
Edward Lee
Karl-Friedrich Lenz
Larry Lessig
Mirror of Justice
Eric Muller
Nathan Oman
Opinio Juris
John Palfrey
Ken Parish
Punishment Theory
Larry Ribstein
The Right Coast
D. Gordon Smith
Lawrence Solum
Peter Tillers
Transatlantic Assembly
Lawrence Velvel
David Wagner
Kim Weatherall
Yale Constitution Society
Tun Yin
History
Blogenspiel
Timothy Burke
Rebunk
Naomi Chana
Chapati Mystery
Cliopatria
Juan Cole
Cranky Professor
Greg Daly
James Davila
Sherman Dorn
Michael Drout
Frog in a Well
Frogs and Ravens
Early Modern Notes
Evan Garcia
George Mason History bloggers
Ghost in the Machine
Rebecca Goetz
Invisible Adjunct (inactive)
Jason Kuznicki
Konrad Mitchell Lawson
Danny Loss
Liberty and Power
Danny Loss
Ether MacAllum Stewart
Pam Mack
Heather Mathews
James Meadway
Medieval Studies
H.D. Miller
Caleb McDaniel
Marc Mulholland
Received Ideas
Renaissance Weblog
Nathaniel Robinson
Jacob Remes (moribund?)
Christopher Sheil
Red Ted
Time Travelling Is Easy
Brian Ulrich
Shana Worthen
Computers/media/communication
Lauren Andreacchi (moribund)
Eric Behrens
Joseph Bosco
Danah Boyd
David Brake
Collin Brooke
Maximilian Dornseif (moribund)
Jeff Erickson
Ed Felten
Lance Fortnow
Louise Ferguson
Anne Galloway
Jason Gallo
Josh Greenberg
Alex Halavais
Sariel Har-Peled
Tracy Kennedy
Tim Lambert
Liz Lawley
Michael O'Foghlu
Jose Luis Orihuela (moribund)
Alex Pang
Sebastian Paquet
Fernando Pereira
Pink Bunny of Battle
Ranting Professors
Jay Rosen
Ken Rufo
Douglas Rushkoff
Vika Safrin
Rob Schaap (Blogorrhoea)
Frank Schaap
Robert A. Stewart
Suresh Venkatasubramanian
Ray Trygstad
Jill Walker
Phil Windley
Siva Vaidahyanathan
Anthropology
Kerim Friedman
Alex Golub
Martijn de Koning
Nicholas Packwood
Geography
Stentor Danielson
Benjamin Heumann
Scott Whitlock
Education
Edward Bilodeau
Jenny D.
Richard Kahn
Progressive Teachers
Kelvin Thompson (defunct?)
Mark Byron
Business administration
Michael Watkins (moribund)
Literature, language, culture
Mike Arnzen
Brandon Barr
Michael Berube
The Blogora
Colin Brayton
John Bruce
Miriam Burstein
Chris Cagle
Jean Chu
Hans Coppens
Tyler Curtain
Cultural Revolution
Terry Dean
Joseph Duemer
Flaschenpost
Kathleen Fitzpatrick
Jonathan Goodwin
Rachael Groner
Alison Hale
Household Opera
Dennis Jerz
Jason Jones
Miriam Jones
Matthew Kirschenbaum
Steven Krause
Lilliputian Lilith
Catherine Liu
John Lovas
Gerald Lucas
Making Contact
Barry Mauer
Erin O'Connor
Print Culture
Clancy Ratcliff
Matthias Rip
A.G. Rud
Amardeep Singh
Steve Shaviro
Thanks ... Zombie
Vera Tobin
Chuck Tryon
University Diaries
Classics
Michael Hendry
David Meadows
Religion
AKM Adam
Ryan Overbey
Telford Work (moribund)
Library Science
Norma Bruce
Music
Kyle Gann
ionarts
Tim Rutherford-Johnson
Greg Sandow
Scott Spiegelberg
Biology/Medicine
Pradeep Atluri
Bloviator
Anthony Cox
Susan Ferrari (moribund)
Amy Greenwood
La Di Da
John M. Lynch
Charles Murtaugh (moribund)
Paul Z. Myers
Respectful of Otters
Josh Rosenau
Universal Acid
Amity Wilczek (moribund)
Theodore Wong (moribund)
Physics/Applied Physics
Trish Amuntrud
Sean Carroll
Jacques Distler
Stephen Hsu
Irascible Professor
Andrew Jaffe
Michael Nielsen
Chad Orzel
String Coffee Table
Math/Statistics
Dead Parrots
Andrew Gelman
Christopher Genovese
Moment, Linger on
Jason Rosenhouse
Vlorbik
Peter Woit
Complex Systems
Petter Holme
Luis Rocha
Cosma Shalizi
Bill Tozier
Chemistry
"Keneth Miles"
Engineering
Zack Amjal
Chris Hall
University Administration
Frank Admissions (moribund?)
Architecture/Urban development
City Comforts (urban planning)
Unfolio
Panchromatica
Earth Sciences
Our Take
Who Knows?
Bitch Ph.D.
Just Tenured
Playing School
Professor Goose
This Academic Life
Other sources of information
Arts and Letters Daily
Boston Review
Imprints
Political Theory Daily Review
Science and Technology Daily Review