reed writes

Yesterday I wrote about Dr. Carlo Sprenger’s theory (pt. 1)on how to bring about peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians.

Dr. Carlo Strenger

The good professor advocates what he calls “therapeutic diplomacy”, which would presumably put the two “patients” on a “couch”; they’d confess all of their past mistakes. Then they’d come to their senses, reach a consensus individually on what transgressions they may have committed in the past and then hug one another and get on with their lives.

Easier said than done. (more…)

Carlo Strenger, the chairman of the clinical graduate psychology programme at Tel Aviv University, is the author of “The Designed Self.”

Dr. Carlo Strenger

Professor Strenger advises U.S. Middle East envoy, George Mitchell, to pursue what he (Strenger) calls “therapeutic diplomacy” to reach some sort of compromise solution to the Israeli-Palestinian impasse.

It’s a long shot and it might worth trying…but how to proceed? The challenge is daunting.

( You can see professor Strenger’s thesis here.  My variation will follow).

In the meantime, former U.S. President Jimmy Carter is of the opinion that Israeli policies in the Occupied Territory of The West Bank and the blockaded territory of The Gaza Strip amount to a form of Apartheid.

His allegation is, of course rejected by most Jewish groups and by Israel’s allies, including Canada. The Province of Ontario legislature, for example, has passed a resolution condemning what has come to be called “Apartheid Week”, an anti-Israel protest movement, supported by students and faculty at The University of Michigan in the U.S.

This one-sided movement is doomed to failure, if for no other reason than it divides rather than unites. The very name evokes anger and outrage.

The foundational problem of what is, by any stretch, a profound and ongoing crisis, is the inability of both Palestinians and Israelis to come to terms with their own history either separately or together, a point made by the professor from Tel Aviv.

Professor Strenger maintains that neither side has had the moral strength to admit its respective mistakes and shortcomings. Until that happens he suggests, no road to a lasting peace can be opened.

At this increasingly crucial point in time, there is tremendous suffering, fear and anger on both sides. And both are in desperate need of assistance…and… perhaps a measure of what psychologists call “tough love.”

In the case of nations, the “tough love” should originate with the world body known as The United Nations. But the U.N. seems paralyzed when it comes to the Mideast.

Professor’s Strenger contends that all efforts at peacemaking will undoubtedly fail, because those who are in a position to help, assume that there is some rationality on both sides.

But as we have seen from very recent history…

• the firing of Palestinian rockets into Israel,
• the Israeli assault on Gaza,
• the Hamas refusal to recognize The Jewish State,
• the assasination of a Palestinian leader in a foreign country by Israeli Secret Agents,
• the assasination of a peacemaking Israeli Prime Minister by an Israeli Jew,
• the ongoing expansion of illegal Israeli settlements,
• the failure of the U.N. to implement its own resolutions,
• the angry rhetoric from both sides and much much more…

there is no rationality and the dearly-hoped-for peace settlement appears to be more elusive than ever.

As this untenable situation wears on – and wears down the patience of those on both sides of the divide – the situation becomes much more volatile day by day.

While professor Strenger’s suggestion is apt, there is little precedent for the application of “therapeutic diplomacy” by any of those who wish to help bring about peace, with the exception of George Mitchell’s successful negotiations between two enemies in Northern Ireland.

Clearly, when it comes to the Middle East, the parties cannot solve this problem by themselves. So the solution must come from outside the region and from outside government…at least to begin with.

Tomorrow: In an attempt to pick up where Dr. Stenger leaves off, I propose a place to start.

Invasion and/or Assassination As An Official Policy Will Always Come Back To Bite You.

Ask America

Way back in 1961, the CIA Deputy Director of Plans, Richard Bissell laid plans for an invasion of Cuba in order to unseat Fidel Castro.

The invasion did not spark a popular uprising by the Cuban People and Bissell’s plan to organize the murder of the Cuban Leader failed as well.

The depths to which government officials can sink is illustrated by Bissell’s plan.

He recruited members of U.S. organized crime – specifically Sam Giancanana, among others to poison Fidel, in the hope that Castro’s death would enable the invasion to succeed.

The murder plot failed, but President John F. Kennedy had been “had”

JFK Trapped by the CIA

If Kennedy had cancelled the invasion, there was the real possibility that the CIA force of angry Cuban exiles might take over the government of Guatemala and so the invasion of Cuba went ahead. It failed dismally. It was denounced by Kennedy and forced the resignation of the Director of The CIA, Allen Dulles.

In the end, Castro’s forces captured hundreds of the CIA-sponsored invaders and eventually traded them for 50 million dollars worth of medical and other supplies.

All of this is contained in a recently-released top secret CIA report on the CIA fiasco.

Texas Congressman Dr. Ron Paul

The report contains damning evidence of an American shadow government, which operates in secret, following illegal policies with unlimited funds and – according to American politician Dr. Ron Paul – threatens American democracy. There is now a growing group of Americans who are calling for the dissolution of the CIA itself.

• When a government attempts to make policy by unlawful means, whether by invading another country or murdering political leaders, the door is opened to disaster.

We’ve seen it in Central America, in the Caribbean, in Iran, in Afghanistan, in Iraq and the new revelations about The Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba shows us the roots of this failed approach to foreign policy. Congressman Paul believes that Israel is treading on dangerous ground.

More from Dr. Ron Paul, a U.S. Congressman from Texas in this video.

The Magic but Deadly Mineral

Asbestos was once called the “magic mineral”, a unique resource that would bring wealth and prosperity to Canada.

It was woven into clothes, building insulation and coffee pots. It was even mixed with children’s play dough and, at one point, had roughly 4,000 other applications.

What Canadians didn’t realize at the time was that we were setting the scene for a yet-to-be-discovered cancer epidemic.

Workers at a Canadian Asbestos Mine

In the 1960s and ’70s, Canadian asbestos miners started coughing up blood; suddenly the the glitter was gone. Canada has spent the last 20-plus years trying to rid our homes, schools and offices — including Parliament Hill — of the dangerous dust.

Our hospitals are still dealing with the after effects. Many occupational health clinics register one new patient a day with asbestos-related cancer, such as mesothelioma, something I have just learned about from an American colleague, Barbara O’Brien.

Worldwide, about 125 million people are exposed to asbestos at work and at least 90,000 die each year from asbestos-related diseases, according to the World Health Organization.

Many of the people suffering from asbestos-related cancer are Americans…something that we here in Canada should recognize…because we sold the stuff to them.

American journalist Barbara O’Brien writes on the topic of cancer caused by asbestos, because so many Americans are suffering from it. One of its names is “mesothelioma”.

As we all know, the United States Congress is struggling to reform the way in which the country’s health care is delivered.

Canadians who suffer from asbestos-related disease are treated free of charge by the Canadian universal healthcare system; American sufferers are not so lucky.

This is a recent article by Ms. O’Brien on the subject as she tries to shed light on the continuing problem

WOULD HEALTH CARE REFORM HELP YOU

Many obstacles and stumbling blocks remain in the way of health care reform. The House and Senate bills will have to be merged, and then the House and Senate both will vote on the final bill. We don’t yet know what will be in the final bill, or if the final bill will be passed into law. Passage will be especially difficult in the Senate, where it will need 60 votes to pass. It is still possible that after all this angst, just one grandstanding senator could kill the whole thing.

But just for fun, let’s look at what conventional wisdom says will be in the final bill and see if there is anything in it that will be an immediate benefit to people with  cancer (mesothelioma) and other asbestos-related disease.

It is likely that the final bill will provide additional funding for state high-risk insurance pools. Currently more than 30 states run such pools, which are nonprofit, state-sponsored health insurance plans for people who can’t buy insurance because of pre-existing conditions. The biggest problem with such pools is that, often, the insurance they offer is too expensive for many who might need it. Both the Senate and House bills provide $5 billion in subsidies for state high-risk pools to make the insurance more affordable.

Under the Senate bill, beginning in 2014, private companies would no longer be able to deny coverage to adults with pre-existing conditions, nor could they charge higher premiums for people with pre-existing conditions. Until then, the state high-risk pools could provide some help.

Closing the Medicare Part D coverage gap — also called the “doughnut hole” — is another potential provision that could help some patients with asbestos-related disease. The “doughnut hole” is the gap between the coverage for yearly out-of-pocket expenses provided by Medicare Part D and Medicare’s “catastrophic coverage” threshold.

For example, in 2009 Medicare Part D paid at least 75 percent of what patients paid for prescription drugs up to $2,700. After that, patients must pay for all of their prescription medications until what they have paid exceeds $6,154. At that point, the catastrophic coverage takes over, and Medicare pays for all but 5 percent of the patient’s drug bills. The final health care reform bill probably will provide for paying at least 50 percent of out-of-pocket costs in the doughnut hole.

You may have heard the bills include budget cuts to the Medicare program, and this has been a big concern to many people. Proponents of the bill insist that savings can be found to pay for the cuts, and that people who depend on Medicare won’t face reduced services. But this is a complex issue that I want to address in a later post.

The long-term provisions probably will include many other provisions that would benefit patients with asbestos-related disease, including increased funding for medical research. Although there are many complaints about the bill coming from all parts of the political spectrum, on the whole it would be a huge benefit to many people.

— Barbara O’Brien

You can read more on this subject by clicking here.

This is partly about interacting with people who read my stuff. I answer all my mail personally. I think it’s only fair. (Besides, I don’t have a secretary).

Recently I received an email from an acquaintance of mine who criticized me for an article I had written for a little magazine in Kincardine Ontario Canada.

It’s called Marketplace  Magazine and my friend took issue with my call for a public inquiry into the Afghan detainee issue. He’s a prominent businessman in the area, so I won’t mention his name.

My response to his rebuttal

My friend started off by saying that it had been a long time since we’d seen each other and he wondered if I remembered him. Anyway, it’s all here in my response. (My friend’s points are indented and in red).

As a Libertarian by nature and a Conservative by history I thought I would give a rebuttal to your Liberal “Window” in January’s Marketplace (Kincardine).

Dear ____

Thanks for writing. (more…)