"The Jewish Lobby"...
Sep. 6th, 2007 11:52 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
akujunkanand U.S. Foreign Policy has generated no small amount of controversy...even before it was a book. I read the paper from which the book has been expanded when it first became widely available on the Internet, and found it to be a surprisingly balanced and uninflammatory look at the foreign relations problems caused for the United States by the extreme pro-Israel slant of several disparate lobbies.
I was thus quite happy to learn that the book's authors were set to speak at an independent bookstore here in town. So happy, in fact, that I decided to run the risk of being late to the second meeting of my favorite class (which did in fact end up happening) to go see them. In fact, they've apparently had a hard time scheduling public talks about the book, either because potential venues are unwilling to run the security risk, or because they (or their patrons or sponsors) wanted to host debates, as opposed to book talks. So, overall, I considered myself very lucky to be able to go and see them speak.
I walked away from the experience highly impressed. These guys are poised, graceful under fire (read: overtly hostile criticism), eloquent, and skilled at giving an even-handed and rational explanation of their arguments and the evidence to support them. This became even more abundantly clear during the Q&A session following their prepared remarks; they handled the audience's questions and comments adroitly, in a way that left little doubt that they were able to do so because they'd spent a lot of time considering the issue and not because someone from their publishing company or institutions had prepped them on how regurgitate talking points and soundbites until their interviewers gave up.
I walked away highly, highly impressed.
ETA: Here's a crappy cell phone shot to prove I was there.
That will be all.
I was thus quite happy to learn that the book's authors were set to speak at an independent bookstore here in town. So happy, in fact, that I decided to run the risk of being late to the second meeting of my favorite class (which did in fact end up happening) to go see them. In fact, they've apparently had a hard time scheduling public talks about the book, either because potential venues are unwilling to run the security risk, or because they (or their patrons or sponsors) wanted to host debates, as opposed to book talks. So, overall, I considered myself very lucky to be able to go and see them speak.
I walked away from the experience highly impressed. These guys are poised, graceful under fire (read: overtly hostile criticism), eloquent, and skilled at giving an even-handed and rational explanation of their arguments and the evidence to support them. This became even more abundantly clear during the Q&A session following their prepared remarks; they handled the audience's questions and comments adroitly, in a way that left little doubt that they were able to do so because they'd spent a lot of time considering the issue and not because someone from their publishing company or institutions had prepped them on how regurgitate talking points and soundbites until their interviewers gave up.
I walked away highly, highly impressed.
ETA: Here's a crappy cell phone shot to prove I was there.
That will be all.
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on 2007-09-06 04:34 pm (UTC)how's life there so far?
no subject
on 2007-09-06 10:40 pm (UTC)Overall, things have been going pretty well. Found an apartment today for fairly cheap (yay!) but fairly far away from the metro (boo!). But at least I'll be able to surf the net at home and "enjoy ristening to one's stereo" again.