What about the rest of us?

I am trying to understand the social contract that I am part of.

The economy is in a very poor shape, and the media and politicians keep talking about bailout plans to rescue hundreds of companies and millions of individuals.

But what about the other millions of companies and individuals who for years have worked in a very responsible way? Those who, as head of their companies had the leadership skills to run their businesses watching for the interest of all their stakeholders instead of the interest of just a few of them? Those who, as individuals, duly paid their taxes and ran their lives in a responsible way, not committing to more than they could afford?

Being part of this group, I feel cheated and fooled. Because now the government is counting on us to rescue the irresponsible ones. We are the ones to rescue those who bought a house bigger than they could afford. We are the ones to rescue those corporations whose executives and thousands of managers took home millions of dollars in the last years, while digging big holes that would swallow their once wealthy companies.

Is this the social contract that I am part of?

If you feel that you are part of "the rest of us", please share this message with others whom you know are part of "the rest of us".

In Vino Veritas

This is a 2000 years old Latin saying that I am sure most of you are familiar with: "In wine lies the truth".

Yesterday, the Times of London published a story based on a YouTube clip by a Dutch journalist who caught a drunken British journalist making several confessions on tape.



Classical example of "in vino veritas".

This video brought memories of my time as a journalist in Israel, right after the Yom Kippur War in 1973, when I was a stringer for a couple of journalists from the widely respected Brazilian newspaper O Estado de São Paulo - first Nelson Santos, and later Mario Chimanovitch.

Santos was a very knowledgeable journalist who had been covering Israel and the Middle East conflict for many years, and who had been asked to write for that newspaper under a pseudonym, as he also wrote for Jornal do Brasil in Rio de Janeiro under his real name, Nahum Sirotsky.
After the 1973 war Israel's fortunes changed, and the same happened to many people, including some journalists. Nahum was "gently" removed from his assignments in both Brazilian newspapers, and O Estado de São Paulo started looking for a replacement. Mario Chimanovitch was chosen. The story of how this happened is interesting: Mario was that newspaper's correspondent in the remote Pantanal area (the mid-west swamp region of Brazil). The editor-in-chief - Julio Mesquita - was on vacation in that area, and Mario was his host. As Mario recounted to me later, he was in a boat with Mesquita, when he was offered the job to replace Nelson in Israel. This was around April/May 1974.

In July of that year I came home to Tel Aviv, back from a trip to Brazil, and found a note at my door: "I am the new correspondent of O Estado de São Paulo in Israel, and I need your help. Please call me asap. Mario".

Next day I met Mario, who asked me to become his stringer as he knew nothing about Israel, the Middle East, and the only language he spoke other than Portuguese, was a broken French. And, yes, he also told me that he was a Marxist. I thought to myself that this was clearly a situation where I could be of help.
I worked for Mario for just a short period. I could not withstand the fact that he was what we called "a scissors journalist", an expression that later was replaced by "a cut and paste journalist" as we can see in the YouTube video mentioned at the beginning of this story.
As Mario would finish cutting and pasting his story (based on French left-wing newspapers, to match his ideology and the only language he new), he would meet me so that I would review, offer my suggestions (seldom accepted because it was not in line with his ideology) and make it factually correct. I recall when one night I came home about 1 AM, and found a note: "I could not find you, here is the article I already sent". After I read it and noticed some blatant mistakes, I called him and told him to call the newspaper asking them to wait because a revised copy would be sent. We then met at the UPI office, where we used to telex the article to the newspaper - the article was corrected and sent.
Shortly after I quit my work for him.

Back to the drunken journalist; if you see the tape, you will not only notice that "cut and paste" side of journalism (which I believe is more prevalent than you may think) but also, and perhaps more importantly, the following statement: "the readers of the Birmingham Mail are going to get my version of history".

A journalist's opinion is not to be confused with a journalist's "version of history". Unfortunately, throughout the years, from before 1973, to 2008 and years to come, many versions of history have and will been presented under the guise of "opinion", and many factual reports have been and will be distorted so that the journalist can disseminate his/her version of history.

It is incumbent that we as readers, be as informed as we can, and read from as many sources as we can, so that we can distinguish between facts and one individual's version of history. And then, reach our own conclusion on how history was made.

My Last Appeal

Election day is just around the corner, and this is my last appeal to friends, some of which praise me for being open minded, but who have a hard time showing the same degree of open mindedness.

We are facing one of the most important presidential elections in U.S. history. It is not just important due to the political, social, economic and security circumstances that we are living, but also because one of the candidates is the front runner not by virtue of what he has demonstrated in the past, but rather because of his exceptional debate and rhetoric persuasion capabilities, allied to a $750 million war chest, an extremely well run marketing campaign, but more importantly, a phenomenal thirst for change by all of us, and a phenomenal thirst of power by the leaders of the Democratic Party.

Yes, we need change. Yes, we need a leader that will take us to the correct direction (notice that I avoided the words "right direction", so that there is no pun intended). But in the process of moving towards this change that we all need, some of us are at risk of making a questionable decision. A decision that is driven not by who the candidate is, but driven by what we want him to be, by what we need him to be. This is the danger of the situation that we are living.

If we remove ourselves from the "want" and the "need", and try to make an objective verification of the facts, I believe we have enough elements to make us concerned about Obama's character. From his sitting at the benches of the Trinity Church for over 20 years, to his remarks to Ali Abunimah: "Hey, I'm sorry I haven't said more about Palestine right now, but we are in a tough primary race. I'm hoping when things calm down I can be more up front", and going through the overwhelming number of times that he voted "Present" at the legislature, failing to show his true positions. Are we willing to see what he means by "when things calm down I can be more upfront" not just in regard to Israel, but in all other national and international issues?

There are many, many other points that I could raise about his character, but I will mention one gesture that he could have made this past month: having received a record $150 million for his campaign in September, he could easily say "I am taking $100 million and donating to charities". Instead, he bought 30 minutes of network time. Do you really think that those 30 minutes were essential to reassure his potential victory?

This is my last appeal to you: I take pride of the fact that I am independent. Over the course of the years since I became a US citizen, I always voted according to my conscience, and never straight for a party. The same happened during this election, as I have already cast my ballot and voted for both republicans and democrats. Please open your minds as well and try to see the man, beyond of what we "want" and what we "need" him to be. And then, make a decision to vote for someone who may not be the ideal one, who may have his flaws as we all do. But whose agenda is clear and whose character is well known.

I humbly ask you to vote for McCain.