No Grass here.

[Joseph Tracy]

Glad Otto said that. I thought perhaps the poem was less awkward in German. 
 As just a political statement, many people think and I think the issues are valid  and at least worthy of open discourse.  But they are not even close to serious  consideration by American mainstream media. I think this is sad and pathetically timorous.  If you criticize Amy Goodman, or Glenn Greenwald, or  even Goldman Sachs or like Neil Diamond nobody is going to accuse you of anti-semitism, but if you criticize/question the policies of Israel with the same  moral or political rubric you would apply to the US or Russia  or France, you probably will be so accused.   

The threats toward Iran are far out of proportion to any threat or action on their part.  These threats are also just a teency bit hypocritical, especially from countries who have produced the Iraq war and  nasty clowns like George Bush and Avigdor Lieberman. Now don't get me wrong here,  I don't feel that I should be blamed for George Bush and  there are plenty of Israelis who oppose Lieberman.  It' just that you get the POTUS and Netanyahu and Limbaugh and NPR and O'Reilly all on the same page about some country where "no options are off the table" and well, that's what Grass is probably worried about. 


On Apr 22, 2012, at 11:20 AM, Otto wrote:

> Old-age dementia?
> 
> A bad poem? (from a literary point of view)?
> 
> 
> 
> 2012/4/22 Matthew Cissell <macissell at yahoo.es>:
>> It struck me that given the nature of the P-list it seems a bit surprising
>> that no one has mentioned Gunter Grass' recently printed poem that has made
>> some waves. Of course maybe our German colleagues are tired of it already
>> and don't want to see it here. Has it not had much repercussion in the US?
>> Just curious about its absence on the list.
>> 
>> mc otis