Muqtada al-Sadr

Time Magazine has not yet announced its Person of the Year for 2006, but here's a top candidate for 2007: Iraqi's fiery populist leader, Muqtadaal-Sadr. Sadr is a Shia, the group that had the most to gain by the U.S. invasion of Iraq and the overthrowing of the Sunni-led dictatorship of Saddam Hussein. Indeed, Hussein was responsible for the death of Sadr's father, yet Sadr has been fiercely opposed to the U.S. presence in Iraq from the start. Now, for better or worse, he's the probably the most powerful politician in a country that we have committed many American lives and a fortune in taxes to remake as a pro-American ally in one of the world's troubled areas. Listen to this Morning Edition piece (12/18/2006).

Musings

• What seems to explain al-Sadr's popularity? Why do countries in turmoil often turn to dictators (like Napoleon in post-revolutionary France), and away from democracy?
  
• Who do you think will be Time's Person of the Year for 2006, for 2007?

This is our last posting for 2007.
Check with us early in 2007 for new topics & musings.

Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid

From Day to Day (12/11/06). Former President Jimmy Carter's latest book, Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, is generating considerable controversy, perhaps even more than the author had expected. One point that Cater makes is hard to dispute: "There are constant and vehement political and media debates in Israel concerning its policies in the West Bank, but because of powerful political, economic, and religious forces in the United States, Israeli government decisions are rarely questioned or condemned, voices from Jerusalem dominate in our media, and most American citizens are unaware of circumstances in the occupied territories."

You can read an excerpt here.


Musings

• Apartheid is a key term in Cater's argument and it seems that even the suggestion that Israeli policy could be so labeled has been the source of much of the hostile reaction to his book. The issue has much to do with the status of Palestians living under Israeli occupation, directly in the West Bank and indirectly now in Gaza: whether or not their status is considered temporary or permanent, or perhaps even deserved (for Israel's own security needs)--a problem exacerbated by Israeli policy of supporting settlements (and hence Israelis with full citizenship rights) in the West Bank territories.
  
  
• Carter seems to have a deep moral sense regarding doing what's right, regardless of the political consequences. Someone who worked for Carter notes that he has "a tendency -- there's a moral streak, some would say moralistic streak -- where if he thinks he's doing the right thing, he's just going to do it no matter what." Carter often traces this part of his nature to his Southern Christian roots. Our current President, George Bush, is also seen as moralistic and religious, and has his own Southern religious connection, yet the two men seem like opposites. Who can explain it?

This will be the only post this week.

PTSD and the Army

From All Things Considered (12/4/2006 - 22:45) comes this extended piece on post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and U.S. soldiers serving in Iraq. Estimates are that 20-25 percent of the soldiers who have served in Iraq show symptoms of PTSD, including including depression and serious substance abuse--in other words, a repeat of the wrenching experience Americans had with the Vietnam war.


Musings

• The report focuses on the case of one Tyler Jennings, who describes getting hazed when colleagues found out he was having mental and emotional problems. Hazing, it turns out, can be seen as the rough-and-tumble male way of dealing with such problems: pound people until they either toughen up or break.
  
  
• The Army is still basically a man's world, one with little sympathy for emotional weakness, which in a twisted sort of way is seen as feminine or weak.
  

Auschwitz "Gypsy" Paintings

From All Things Considered comes this fascinating piece (11/30/2006 - 7:38) on a series of watercolor portraits of Gypsies, now known as Roma people, that a young Dina Gottliebova Babbitt painted in 1944, in the German concentration camp, Auschwitz.

Musings

• One fascinating part of this story is legalistic--namely, who is the question of rightful owner of the portraits? While it is hard to resist the claim that the Auschwitz Museum should return the paintings, the Museum's position is not without some merit.
  
  
• Another, equally fascinating issue involves the status of Gypsies, or Roma people, during the Holocaust, a topic touched upon in this Wikipedia piece on Auschwitz.