Tuesday, August 10, 2004
This Ain't No Disco. This Ain't No Country Club, Either.
This is L.A.
...So I'm sitting with my fiddle at the Celtic Arts Center, in North Hollywood/Burbank somewhere, on Laurel Canyon Boulevard, getting set to play in a seisun, and some woman who doesn't know I was in Iraq tries to convince me that Iraq was a secular society, and Saddam was a secular, pro-woman ruler, and his society was marked by a comparatively egalitarian distribution of wealth, with a definite middle class, had Jews in his government, and "the best health care and education in the world."
"Umm, no he didn't. What are you talking about? Pro-woman? The guy employed state rapists. How 'pro-woman' can he be? Education? Once you get out of Baghdad, Most Iraqis have about a sixth-grade education, if that."
"Well, that was before the sanctions. The sanctions ruined all that. Also, it was the sanctions--it was U.S. interventionism, that unleashed the hostility between the religious sects, and the regionalism."
Me: "You gotta be kidding me. The sanctions were in place only from 1991. Saddam slimed Halabja in 1988. And Sunnis have been merrily slaughtering Shia for centuries. The Saudi Wahabbis used to go rub out entire Shiite villages for sport more than a century ago."
Ah, it's a good thing it came time to play some tunes.
My tolerance for stupidity is not what it once was.
Splash, out
Jason
...So I'm sitting with my fiddle at the Celtic Arts Center, in North Hollywood/Burbank somewhere, on Laurel Canyon Boulevard, getting set to play in a seisun, and some woman who doesn't know I was in Iraq tries to convince me that Iraq was a secular society, and Saddam was a secular, pro-woman ruler, and his society was marked by a comparatively egalitarian distribution of wealth, with a definite middle class, had Jews in his government, and "the best health care and education in the world."
"Umm, no he didn't. What are you talking about? Pro-woman? The guy employed state rapists. How 'pro-woman' can he be? Education? Once you get out of Baghdad, Most Iraqis have about a sixth-grade education, if that."
"Well, that was before the sanctions. The sanctions ruined all that. Also, it was the sanctions--it was U.S. interventionism, that unleashed the hostility between the religious sects, and the regionalism."
Me: "You gotta be kidding me. The sanctions were in place only from 1991. Saddam slimed Halabja in 1988. And Sunnis have been merrily slaughtering Shia for centuries. The Saudi Wahabbis used to go rub out entire Shiite villages for sport more than a century ago."
Ah, it's a good thing it came time to play some tunes.
My tolerance for stupidity is not what it once was.
Splash, out
Jason
Comments:
Great quote by the way.
Pretty funny story too. Just realize, people are ignorant, they form opinions on the biased media.
Welcome home too. You are my hero!
xxxooooooo
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Pretty funny story too. Just realize, people are ignorant, they form opinions on the biased media.
Welcome home too. You are my hero!
xxxooooooo
# posted by 
: 10:59 PM
: 10:59 PM
