are we not human?

I'm watching the Sunday morning talk shows with my family and I cannot believe what I'm hearing. I'm not sure if Tim Russert was any good on Palestine, but the new guy is complete bollocks. And Stephanopolous asked more hard hitting questions about Blagojevich than he did on Gaza. I didn't realize that insulting the Senate and the President-elect was a bigger crime than killing innocent civilians. On in a universe where Palestinians are seen as sub-human, as animals in a cage called Gaza, is shooting random rockets an obvious invitation to a "shock and awe" type bombing campaign and a full-out ground invasion. That kind of verbal presditigitation and treatment is saved only for animals. Spot bit a little girl? Let's "put him to sleep". Spot misbehaves and runs away? Let's put up an "invisible fence" so he gets an electric shock if he tries it again. Palestinians have done something unprecedented, said Shimon Peres this morning on Stephanopolous' show, they've begun to use mosques as places to organize. Ohhhh! So THAT's why you destroyed the masjids. I get it. They totally asked for it.

The only person who had the guts to talk about Palestinians like they're human was Katrina vanden Heuvel who is the Editor of the Nation magazine. She's my new hero. I just subscribed even though I have no money and I'm trying to save for a mid-February girlfriend beach vacay. And she was the only one to call out the democrats, the talk show hosts and the other commentators for their bullshit focus on who to blame and punish in the Blagojevich scandal at the expense of ANY discussion of who to blame and punish for the Wall Street and Sub-prime mortgage scandal and for the war in and occupation of Iraq.

I used to be in favor of the one-president-at-a-time protocol, but this is ridiculous. And really, it's been a policy invoked when it's convenient. It's almost as though Israel is taking advantage of this lame duck limbo. Bush doesn't feel the need to say anything and Obama has a free pass to remain silent. How far is Obama going to take his measured distance from the appearance of being sympathetic to Muslims? His absolute denial of the existence and experience of Muslims as Muslims anywhere in the world is not change, it's more of the same.