Future Yale Department Chair Army-of-Juan Cole comes completely, jaw-droppingly unhinged today. Go check it out before he "Winston Smiths" it (note - gruesome pictures of wounded soldiers).Yes, the Anna Nichole Smith of the blogosphere has gone wild again. The post is vintage Cole, entertaining, rude, stupid, uninformed.Actually, first, go check out the Christopher Hitchens piece that triggered Cole's frothing scenery-chewing, then go over to Juan's site and snicker.
However, Anna/Cole does blurt out the name of one interesting organization, Gulf2000. He begins his post with this:
I belong to a private email discussion group called Gulf2000. It has academics, journalists and policy makers on it. It has a strict rule that messages appearing there will not be forwarded off the list. It is run, edited and moderated by former National Security Council staffer for Carter and Reagan, Gary Sick, now a political scientist at Columbia University.Gulf states, Saudi-sponsored Columbia University, Jimmy Carter, Juan Cole, journalists and policy makers...sounds like the typical wretched hive of scum and villainy.
A quick google search proves that it is. It also proves that Cole's accusation, that Hitches violated Sick's "strict rule" is baseless. If you do a search for Gulf2000, you'll see that their articles and emails are quoted extensively.
In fact, a post from Gulf2000 was quoted by Juan Cole himself, on his own site.
[Just scroll down to the post that begins with *Here's my post from Gulf2000 today:..]
Gulf2000 seems to be an alliance of paid and/or unpaid marketing/academic/oil/publicity types promoting the interests of the Gulf states. Judging from statements made by Gulf2000 members, their membership is made up of Gulf-state sponsored academics, ex Aramco and State Department employees, Arab haters of Israel, the usual. It's no surprise that Cole is a member.
One interesting note: the Iranian blogger, Hoder, who has received numerous death threats over the years, reported this back in January 2005:
"Someone is spreading my email to Gulf2000 project mailing list about my project to get Iranian-born Israelis blogging about their daily lives, as if it's been a secret email and I'd be embarrassed by it being publicized."The world needs to know more about Gulf2000.
It "seems" to be a standard listserver for academics with an interest in the Persian Gulf region, and it's standard practice for there to be a policy against distributing the contents. The policies are in place so that people are free to discuss stuff in a more forethright fashion. I've been part of several technical ones with similar policies. And as the instance we're seeing here is a debate about translations of Persian, it doesn't exactly look like the Protocols of the Elders of Jihadism or something.
And whta's the point exactly about mentioning the Hoder incident?
You sure are seeing a lot of sinister secret cabals recently.
The point of mentioning the Hoder incident is to describe the activities of this group of 'academics with an interest in the Persian Gulf region'.
If anyone is trying to paint this group as a secret cabal, it's Cole. There's nothing secret about it - they're very clear about their goals; to market the Arab point of view and to promote friendship and good business relationships with the fascists in the Gulf. They don't have any problem with doing that, it's established American policy.
This in a post that's about 3 times longer than Hitchen's piece.
And finally, let's throw in some pictures of coffins and mutilations, just in case anyone still remembers the original topic.
Cole himself is a farce. The tragedy, paradoxically, is the people who fawn on him in his comments.
Cite?
And why would they allow Cole on to it after saying things like "...I personally despise everything Ahmadinejad stands for, not to mention the odious Khomeini, who had personal friends of mine killed so thoroughly that we have never recovered their bodies", and calling Ahmadinejad a little shit?
Which fascists is Cole supposed to be sucking up to?
From Cole: It has academics, journalists and policy makers on it. It has a strict rule that messages appearing there will not be forwarded off the list. It is run, edited and moderated by former National Security Council staffer for Carter and Reagan, Gary Sick, now a political scientist at Columbia University. The "no-forwarding" rule is his, and is intended to allow the participants to converse about controversial matters without worrying about being in trouble.
You obviously must have a conflicting statement from someone. Can you link to it?
You obviously must have a conflicting statement from someone. Can you link to it?
I did. The links above were to Sick's emails that were copied from the list and posted on the web.
If you google Sick gulf2000, you can get an idea of where the organization stands. Or you can go to their website.
Which fascists is Cole supposed to be sucking up to?
Oh, who knows, there are so many to choose from. Some Gulf states aren't too thrilled with Ahmadinejad right now. If he did get nukes, Saudis fear he'd use them on the KSA first. Sometimes Islamists work together, sometimes they don't.
I've tried to comment on his site, and my comments never appear. I never curse at him or anything, I just put up links that prove he's wrong. He's wrong often, and I tried more than a few times with no success.
I'd guess he a large part of his day deleting non-fawning comments.
Someone breaking a policy is not proof that there is no policy. Both listservers that I've been on had people who broke the policy. That doesn't mean that there isn't one. You wrote "There is no policy against distributing the contents" with such certainty that I thought there must be more to it.
Also, you said that their policy was clear, but the links you provided included nothing of the group's policy that supported your contention.
Lastly, none of the reproduced emails were from Gary Sick, so I'm not sure what that reference meant.
Oh, who knows, there are so many to choose from.
Then it should be child's play to name one, and link to evidence.
Your reading comprehension is usually better than this. I said:
"There is no policy against distributing the contents. Or if there is, everyone in the group (including Cole and Sick) violates it on a regular basis."
Cole posted his writings from Gulf2000 on his own site. And the posts that I linked to are:
From: Gary G Sick
To: gulf2000 list
They were posted by Clement Henry, who is another member of the group.
The idea that Cole is "sucking up to" fascists is yours. I said that Gulf2000 is composed of ex-Aramco employees and random academics whose purpose is to promote good relations with fascist Gulf states. We can debate about whether they are fascists or not, but the fact that this group is located in Columbia university and the fact that Columbia university is Saudi-supported are not debatable.
I thought this reproduced email from Sick about Giuliani's rejection of bin Talal's donation was interesting:
Date: Sat, 13 Oct 2001 08:27:41 -0400 (EDT)
From: Gary G Sick
To: gulf2000 list
Subject: Giuliani Nixes Saudi's 10M Gift
Date: Fri, 12 Oct 2001 22:08:05 -0700 (PDT)
From: saleh
Please read below and tell me if this is not New York politics. I really
doubt that mayor Giuliani's rejection of the donation was based on moral
stand. Many of you may not like it, but this act reinforces Arabs’ belief
of the power of the Jewish lobby.
Saleh Alkhatlan
Riyadh
:::
Oh, and here's another email from Gulf2000 that Cole reproduced on his own site
Now Cole, friend of Aramco and billionaire bin Talal, posted another rant against Hitchens, titled:
"Hitchens not Drunk, Only an Asinine Thief
I'm told Andrew Sullivan is saying that he was at Hitchens's house when Hitchens stole my private mail and published it without my permission, and that he was sober, and that I owe Hitchens an apology.
I am very sorry to hear this. Hitchens came drunk to my talk last year and was incoherent. I was making excuses for his shocking lapse of simple journalistic integrity by hoping that it was the outcome of besotted judgement. If Sullivan is correct, then Hitchens is just plain without any ethics..."
:::
Cole is such a waste of time...
Your reading comprehension is usually better than this.
I get confused when someone states an absolute and then immediately refutes it. But as I said, evidence of someone breaking the policy does not mean that there is no policy.
And I missed the email forwarded from Sick in you link, sorry about that.
Cole is such a waste of time...
My results may vary. I think he's a bit thin-skinned, and a bit pompous, but then again so it Hitchens. Unlike Hitchens, the man knows a lot about the Middle East.