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January 30, 2006

Carla's Adventures in Blue Star Land

It was a quiet Sunday here yesterday. There was a fairly constant downpour for most of the day and I had all the housework done. So I ventured away from my usual blogreading and stumbled upon the Blue Star Chronicles.

I've butted heads with some rightwing women from time to time. I hold out hope that someday I'll run across one willing to drop the ad hominem and truely engage me, but that day wasn't yesterday.

Beth, the author of the blog, had some rancorous things to say about Hamas. Unfortunately among the rancor, Beth was unsurprisingly throwing facts out the window:

Hamas leaders say they won't renounce their violent ideology. Hamas Says It Will Not Change.

The U.S. administration and Israel are saying they will not deal with Hamas unless and until they denounce their committment to destroying Israel.
[snip]

Judging from this 'Martyr's Oath' and Hamas stated organizational purpose of destroying Israel and Jews, I think Mr. Carter's plan does not have a very good prognosis. I don't know that pumping enough money and power into a terrorist group will persuade them to stop bombing Israel. Besides, how much is enough?

Avoiding conflict creates unavoidable conflict. I would have thought that would have been obvious from his negotiations with Iran in 1980.

This over-the-top screeching seems like panic to me. Bush has been pushing for democracy in the Middle East. Republicans have what they asked for..why the gnashing of teeth? So being me, I tried to help bring a little rational discussion to the mix by explaining that Fatah lost because they are corrupt and because Hamas has in fact softened its stance on Israel, followed by 2 news articles backing up my statements.

I was somewhat politely engaged by commentor YankeeMom, who attempted to use a noncontexted part of one of my articles to claim that Hamas hadn't softened its stance.

Then I was subsequently attacked as a "Jimmy Carter clone" (I guess that's supposed to be an insult. Would that I could negotiate peace between Egypt and Israel, start Habitat for Humanity and be a wildly popular international figure. But I digress.)And that Hamas is exactly like the Nazis. Then scoldingly told that the US doesn't negotiate with terrorists.

Which of course we do (Iran hostages in the late 70s, Iran/Contra, and currently with the Sunni insurgency--who many on the right consider terrorists).

This back and forth continued for awhile..with Beth attempting to remind me that the only reason I get to have political speech is that her son is in the military. To which I kindly replied..no..I have political speech because its the law. And I find it unfortunate that she feels the need to use her son's service as a bludgeon.

So now I've made the front page of Blue Star Chronicles...without having one honest attempt to engage me on the factual evidence I cited.

But it killed a rainy, boring Sunday, I guess.

Posted by Carla at January 30, 2006 07:56 AM