I haven't commented about the whole Larry Franklin/AIPAC alleged spying because I had two major deadlines yesterday. But in a few words here's my take: wait and see. If Franklin or anyone else is guilty as charged then they should be punished accordingly. But it's not like the FBI hasn't screwed up before. This story stink to high heaven, but we shall see.
By the way, it's funny how certain people who go to great lengths to presume the innocense of accused Muslims in the US have already decided that Franklin, AIPAC, and Israel are all guilty. Yes, I'm looking at you Dr. Cole.
Unforunately, something like this was bound to happen -2 buses exploded in Beersheva, killing 16. The great Hamas has taken responsibility. Among the dead is a 3 year old boy; I wonder if he counts as an example of one the "targets" that Juan Cole was talking about when describing Hamas (More on the odious Juan Cole in another post).
As an aside, my fiancee's cousin, who lives in Beersheva, has been staying with us. When he saw the news on CNN, he watched for a bit, discussed how it's rare for Beersheva to be hit, and just moved on as if it were normal. He didn't even try to call anyone. I don't know if his non-chalance is because he's Israeli, or because he's who he is.
The Venn diagram is a useful tool to visualize the intersections of various sets. As such, I'd like to see Venn Diagrams of the following:
1. The intersection of the set of people who support stem cell research and the set of people who detest genetically modified foods.
2. The intersection of the set of people who decried the interim Iraqi government'd banning of al-Jazeera for a month and the set of people who shrugged off or even rationalized Venezuelan president Chavez' intentions to extert government control over the media in his country.
I, for one, would find these diagrams to be quite illuminating.
I just want to extend my belated condolences to Damian Penny on the loss of his grandfather.