JERUSALEM: The sage of Salem pitched his tent at what has become tortured ground: hatred, Crucifixion, razings, SIEGES, endless bloodletting, madness…

Be all that as it may, meanwhile:

In other news…

02^nd October 2009:

Friday: One of those rare mornings wherein I’ve actually slept most of the night; up soon after sparrows, having hit the pillow about nine last night, so tired I couldn’t keep my eyes open: simply because we had done a drive to Charlie Gees for Janny’s medicines, on to Bilby Yarns in Myaree, then to Melville to visit an emotional Mum. Most of the hour and a half there I just held her hand as we talked. Her health is troubling to her a lot, and understandably so. Back at our local major shopping centre we got petrol and groceries, but all this was enough to exhaust me.


Last night I did manage to watch The 7.30 Report however, and I'm glad I did: The More O'Kerry (O'Brien) Volume: Kezza looked very smartly attired, and he had an on-screen interview with Noel Pearson of the Cape York Institute from Cairns, about his ideas for Aboriginal education as delineated in his essay 'Radical Hope' to be published in the Quarterly Essay. Mr Pearson was minus a tie, but in his tropical neck of the woods who could blame him? I was struck by the sense he talked, far more sense than I notice in general from his contemporary representative brethren; I've written of my special interest in his ideas and approach here before, but that July entry concerning a Leigh Sales' Lateline interview with him hasn't yet found it off my computer to be uploaded as a post. In particular, what an astute criticism and observation Mr Pearson gave tonight when he said “And for example, the idea that education for Aboriginal people should be culturally appropriate - now the problem with that concept, I soon came to discover, was that culturally appropriate education seemed to suggest that an Aboriginal Wik child or a Yolngu child shouldn't study Shakespeare, for example, because Shakespeare may not be culturally appropriate…

In my view we should be producing Aboriginal children who may choose to be experts in Russian literature, or in classical music. You know, the Aboriginal children have an entitlement to the best of the world's culture, and at the same time they can keep their own culture and languages as well.”

That was wisdom: what a stupid idea, doubtless from some ivory towered coterie of academia, is this 'culturally appropriate education'; not only would such a retarded idea hold back aspiring Aboriginal children, if universally applied without discrimination it would also deny a German child learning an Aboriginal language such as the Noongar dialect Pindjarup, if he or she so wished.

Yes, that was wisdom, as was his backing of the concept of 'No Excuses Schools'. More power to this enlighted gentleman, Noel Pearson. Another treasured interview from Aunty in my archive: thank you Kerry O'Brien.

Anyway, back to this new morning: I watched a recording of Lateline while having a bowl of mandarins, yum yum: The (Leigh) Sales Graph: Quite a departure from her usual hairstyle last night, Ms Sales’ having chosen a pulled back coiffure, with a very dark green or black blouse with a ruffled neckline, to create a very elegant look, helped greatly by subtle make-up (see if you agree with me here). Again the program’s early reportage was all misery, with the terrible human suffering and housing and infrastructure damage from the Indonesian and Samoan earthquakes. The interview Ms Sales conducted with the International Institute for Strategic Studies’ Mark Fitzpatrick was of keen interest to me, for if ever there was an issue encompassing almost the gamut of the worst of the human condition, the Middle East’s Islam versus Judaism one is it, and let us not forget that therefore it also is pregnant with endless opportunities for demonstrations of the best of the human condition.

Mr Fitzpatrick is either normally a serious fellow, or it was the gravity of the subject, for he sombrely gave very insightful assessments of the problems engendered by Iran’s obvious pursuit of a nuclear weapon capacity; his 26 years in the U.S.A.’s State Department doubtless enlightens his opinions significantly. Maybe – and it’s a longshot – it was early in Brussels, and he was still waking up; the sunlight angle on the skyscraper behind him suggests it wasn’t long after sparrows; he also appears to have forgotten to comb his hair, although his suited apparel was crisp.

Ms Sales reciprocated Mr Fitzpatrick’s graveness, remaining subdued and serious herself, while managing a series of relevant questions, and she allowed him to expound at length on these queries; it was an informative interview, and I think the gravitas on both sides of the Ultimo screen was entirely appropriate. I think Iran will push the matter as far as possible, and its leadership is stubborn and stupid enough to go all the way. The primitive mindset infecting the leadership, plus that of a significant proportion of the population (mitigating this is the global connectiveness of their substantial youth cohort), made a million times worse by the saturation of their neuronal pathways with the dogmatic belief that God is backing their behaviour, is an extremely dangerous combination, making a peaceful resolution almost impossible.

The President of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has publicly trumpeted the annihilation of Israel, thus ensuring his place in deep history in company with the very smallest of leaders of our times, and of course it would not be hard to find significant numbers of hardline Jews who hold similarly abhorrent views regarding Palestinian Arabs, and both general groups invoke God’s support: what hope of any enlightened demonstration, any time soon, of the most reasonable outcome, that of the civilised sharing of the region between Palestinians and Israelis?

One thing I’ve said here before needs repeating: you must understand what your enemy respects. Chamberlain thought Hitler respected a piece of paper, which he waved around above his head; the West in recent decades has been demonstrating a lack of understanding of what it’s enemies respect; Israel still seems to have a good understanding, and Mr Fitzpatrick makes no idle observation when he concluded his reply to Ms Sales’ final question “What chance do you think there is that Israel will attack Iran?”, “…prospects for military action I think are real and they’re worrisome.” And if this occurs, much of hell most likely will break loose, and a lot of lives will be lost and maimed, at least in the region, not to mention the damage to property and environment, when the cascading counteractions instantly begin. The critical mass of maturity essential for a peaceful transition to mutually respectful co-existence simply does not exist yet among either the national leaderships or the populaces. Hatred and stupidity are a bitter and destructive mix. The time is long overdue for the lingering glacial momentum of thousands of years of petty yet brutal and ugly mortmain to be given the burial it deserves.

I did a google search for a biography on Mr Fitzpatrick that would shed light on his birth nationality, to no avail, but me suspects I might have detected some Canadian clinging to his vocal cords or thereaboots.

For the rest of this Friday I did small shifts of work in the far back corner of the backyard, preparing for the fence repair work that needs to be done when the nibs return shortly from their Macedonia homeland holiday. It exhausted me, although it wasn’t a lot of actual work.

By daylight’s end I was in no fit state to do anything much, so I barely got through My Beloved, Stateline, and The Collectors – thank heavens for Aunty – and by nine o’clock the palliative pagan put me to bed.

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