Breathless

Arnon, I enjoyed reading your reports from Iraq the past few weeks. Although I don't think I completely agree with the end of the last piece.

Nice photo selection with today's rather sad entry... They are showing the movie at the Moma this weekend, by the way.

Don't let hope mislead you

She's beautiful. I think she was found in a parking lot, in a car, some ten days after her death. Gary was her second marriage. The paparazzis got on her nerves. You can learn a little more about her from Gary's White Dog.
They have a son, so it means these two depressants experienced some hope sometime in their life.

cool suicide note, dude

Maybe he would prevent the public to put the blame on her.

Eva

Thanks. With what exactly did you disagree this time?
You might be interested to know that a longer article by me on my stay in Baghdad will probably appear next Friday in “Cultureel Supplement” of NRC Handelsblad.
Also my article on salon.com might be of interest to you:
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2008/06/03/iraq_dispatch/index.html
Last but not least in my article on salon.com about Israel some of your early criticism was taken into account. (I let the female soldiers utter their clichés.) See:
http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2008/05/15/israeli_army/

Neria

Actually Herbert Hoover and the FBI hounded her and launched a smear campaign against her because she supported the Black Panthers. Depressed, she attempted suicide while pregnant. She survived but her baby died soon after birth. This seems to have started the downward spiral.

It seems that life isn't always something to live for.

Indeed, her beauty was captivating. Perhaps that was also her bad luck.

Carlos

I know all that :) They still have another child, from what I have managed to find out. Life never worth living, all in all the pain is way too weighty than the joy. I agree with Grunberg's protagonist, Beck, that what keeps you here is the habit. One gets used to eveything.
I was enchanted by her for a long time. I asked my hairdressed to give me the same haircut but he didn't know who she was. I was expecting to find a biography, it made sense to me that it should have been written. I wonder where her depression comes from. Gary's literature supplies much more clues about his, she, on the other hand, has been left a mystery.
Beauty can indeed become a curse, maybe more often than what people are willing to admit, but without a serious biography I cannot accept your suggestion that her beauty lead to her depression.

Carlos

I just came across this line in Hamlet: "Custom hath made it in him a property of easiness." This is how Horatio explains the gravedigger's indifference (Act 5, scene i)

Arnon

First , I was glad to see in the salon.com version of your article about the IDF that the women soldiers you interviewed had been given 'a voice'. You're not exactly quoting them extensively but this is an improvement, although the deletion of the qualification 'cliches' would have really made my day...

As far as the end of the last Iraq story was concerned... I actually had to think about what my issue was this time -in that case how bad can it be, right?- as it was probably about ten days ago that I read that last piece. Then I looked at the salon.com article about Iraq, which has a very similar, but as far as I remember, subtly different ending. First , it's that ring. I think in the NRC there was less doubt about the fact that the american colonel just took it (suggesting what? That when it comes down to it the american army is just as corrupt as all these sheiks are?) while at salon.com the translator merely thinks the colonel took it, and possibly because a refusal would have been rude. Secondly, at salon.com someone is quoted in saying that the insurgency is based on economic motives, not so much on ideology. In the NRC there was some kind of line about every ideology ALWAYS being based on economy. That is a statement that I disagree with.
Maybe the salon.com version is a literal translation of the dutch article but I don't think so. It seems that minor adjustments have already been made to the ending before I even filed my 'complaint', great!

To end on a lighter note: toe= Neosporin first aid antibiotic treatment, over-the-counter at Duane Read. (in the land of the free you can buy antibiotic ointment over the counter) And now stop complaining about that toe already! My god, Hemingway came back from Italy in a million little pieces and you didn't hear him complain... Be a man about it!

Eva

The article for Salon was an altogether different article, although there are some similarities with the series of articles for NRC, they are both based on the same experiences, written by the same author.
One of the limitations of the series for NRC, not necessarily a bad limitation, was the amount of words, around 400.
I never suggested that Lt. Col. Mackey was corrupted -- merely I said that while operating in Iraq, or any other foreign country, you can not be effective when you refuse to adjust (sometimes) to local culture. Later Lt. Col. Makey sent me an e-mail in which he basically confirmed this suspicion.
I didn’t say that ideology is always based on economical interests, just that based on my observations in Iraq the impact of economy is underestimated in many reports on Iraq, maybe not everything is for sale, but most of the things are for sale.
In the land of the free even Neosporin. I keep postponing taking Neosporin if you don’t mind, and I didn’t complain, I informed the readers of this site. That some of them took my toe more seriously than I did is not something you can blame me for.

Suffering

No I don't mind... I am just always surprised when people refuse available medication (in this case an innocent cream) or don't take painkillers when needed. I know a lot of people like that, none of them are american by the way. Does it really have to do with the belief, conscious or subconscious, that somehow a little suffering is good for a person?

Personally I don't think pain and suffering serve any positive purpose, and I am thankful for the fact that my oral surgeon was completely with me on that one...

Eva

You are jumping to conclusions once again.
Nowhere did I state that I was in unbearable pain, or that I did needed pain killers and refused to take them.
You might know that many Americans cannot afford to see a doctor, hence the appetite for self-medication.
Converts always tend to radicalize, often you sound like a convert but I’m not sure to what exactly you converted.
Anyhow: have you been a member of a communist party?

Arnon

Ofcourse I know about all the insured and under-insured americans, I really feel for them, it is a terrible problem and for someone like me who runs, not walks, to Beth Israel Medical Center whenever there is even the suggestion of a medical problem arising, it is also my personal nightmare. Ofcourse America is not perfect, and I am not blind to the limitations of capitalism american style.
Even more than for all these cool painkillers, I was thankful for the fact that my insurance company decided to pay for this surgery. The fact that this was not something I could automatically count on, that it took phone calls and paperwork and that sort of thing made me realize again what I very well know: that this is America and that in order to be here I have given up certain things. One thing actually: security. Don't get me wrong, I am in a much more priviliged position than millions of americans are, and let's not even mention the position of all illegal immigrants . But I did give up a level of security related to a number of things that are essential in life. In the Netherlands you really have to work hard at sucking at work before you potentially loose your job, you know your rent can only go up by X% each year and health insurance covers pretty much everything. And you know what; I find that this extreme level of security makes people complacent and indifferent, don't you think?

Again, the american situation is not perfect and something has to be set up so that everyone in the US will have access to reasonable medical care. But I find the average american much more 'Fired up and ready to go' (borrowing a slogan from someone who is not exactly my favorite presidential candidate ever) than the average dutch person, and I think it has to do with this need for 'survival'. I think it reflects on society and on the way people interact with each other, and it brings out a lot of positive energy. Do I sound like a one-track-pony again?! I'm sure you can in some way related to this though.

The communist party?! Hell no. I have never converted to anything, and -as I recently realized when I had to think about this- I have been a member of surprisingly few clubs and parties. My beliefs actually haven't changed very much since highschool. I was always the only person in english class ferociously defending Margaret Thatcher...

Eva

I don’t want to engage in a discussion about health insurance nor do I think that it is wise to make broad generalizations about the US or the Netherlands. My dislike of my native country is far from rational.
What I most appreciate in the US is that it is still is – despite misgivings of many –
an immigrant country; that people still tend to come here in the hope of a better and more secure life. Ninety percent of the interpreters I spoke to in Iraq hoped to come to the US.
They didn’t mention Europe, maybe some of them would have preferred Europe but they knew that the chances of getting into Europe are close to nil.
As to your praise for Thatcher: George Steiner once remarked that you have to be a radical in your youth in order not to become a conservative pig when you are older.
I assume that your love for Thatcher was your idea of being a radical.