I will be speaking to a mixed group of graduate students and prominent members of the community, some US State people in La Jolla (pronounced La-Hoya), California on Thursday on the future of the “nation” of Palestine. I’m speaking again later in the day on the subject of Boko Haram, currently killing Nigerians for fun and profit.
The topic and the fact that I’m bloviating on it shouldn’t surprise anyone. It’s a common topic and there are as many solutions to the problems as there are people to suggest them. I’m hardly an expert, but the people who are paying me, are doing so because I have an uncomfortable propensity to speak my mind. That’s rare in an academic environment and I’m sure that I’d be fired or would never achieve tenure – if I was an academic, and I’m not. The odd thing is the patron who is footing the bill – King Salman, the ruling monarch of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. 
Traditionally, I’ve been a harsh critic of the Saudis, and a harsher critic of Iran. I think that the difference is that I have personally known members of the royal family and they feel that while I may be misguided, there are some threads that they want discussed. And they want some people taking notes, which is how they are being shanghai’d into sitting there and listening to my drivel. The Saudis also like the fact that I’m not a Jew and am not particularly pro-Israel as well. I like to think that there is objective truth in the region that everyone can agree on. 
In the case of Boko Haram, I’ve been encouraging the Saudis to fund a Muslim-led effort to wipe them from the face of the Earth. It’s gaining some traction. I’ll let you know how things stand in a week or ten days.
Venue 
La Jolla is home to boutique universities, state universities, private conference centers and an LDS temple (right) that can be viewed from the I-5 freeway and looks very cool. 
The city is ‘old money’ in the SoCal sense of ‘old’, which is not that old at all – old regionally.
Some of the Saudis that I know own racing stables just north of there in Del Mar. People who live in Del Mar, California are a bit weird even by California standards and are referred to as Del Martians.
And if this blog seems to be punching all over the map, I know it is.  Because this whole speech thing is strange, La Jolla is eccentric, and it has nothing what-so-ever to do with the White Wolf Mine, and I’ll be living there, in a month.

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15 COMMENTS

  2. I've never been to La Jolla, which sounds interesting. But of course I've been too busy posting about GIANT RATS to go much of anywhere.

    Have fun telling it like it is.

  4. In the case of Boko Haram, I've been encouraging the Saudis to fund a Muslim-led effort to wipe them from the face of the Earth. It's gaining some traction.

    That's one of the most encouraging things I've heard lately.

    Boko Haram is pidgin English combining "book" (western books) and the Muslim word for "forbidden". More loosely translated, "learning is forbidden". That's the mark of a civilization headed for greatness, right? Wonder when they'll get their own space program going? A billion years in the future?

  5. Boko Haram wants to reenact those heady days when Mohammed was the prophet and the Mooslim hoards were sweeping in from the desert, raping women and killing off unbelieving men. As a reenactment group, they do have it down. Destroy all knowledge except their twisted take on Islam.

  7. The Deep State has a history of fostering the care and breeding of GIANT RATS, and suppressing discussion of that fierce, yet cowardly species. They are said to grow larger and wealthier within the Washington DC Beltway.

  9. An enemy of my enemy is my friend (for now). Encouraging he Muslims to do anything seems counter productive. But you know them better than I do, so have at it. You should record your session and post it for us. Make it documentary type thing.

  10. Will your talks be available on-line anywhere? Either as a video (I presume you have slides as well), or the text of the talk, or even just synopsis/notes? I'd be very interested in both talks.

    Admittedly I don't follow the Palestinian thing closely, but one of my major concerns doesn't seem to be discussed often, if at all: namely what to do about the Palestinian victimhood/rage culture of the last decades (i.e. probably 3 generations so far?). I see a parallel with "black culture" in the US. You have a people who have legitimate historical grievances (though in the US case I'd argue it's more as a group than any actual individuals at this point), as well as facing on-going discrimination. But the aggregate (as expressed through their political leadership and "community representatives") response to these real problems is counterproductive and frankly reinforcing negative stereotypes such as excessive criminality, general violence, and high time preference.

    Back to the middle east, assume some science-fiction level miracle, such as Egypt giving the Sinai peninsula to the Palestinians for territory and the Israelis and UN (read the US and EU) building them great infrastructure and enough desalination plants. How do you make a free, safe and productive society out of a people who now for generations have had chronic unemployment (destruction of work ethic), terrible education (but plenty of indoctrination), and seem to be united mainly by enmity toward an outside force (namely Israel)? Without hatred, what unites the factions and the people in this new nation-state?

  13. It should be coming out in "Foreign Affairs" – I think. I've been asked not to release the lecture on the Internet in such a way as to scoop the journal. Since I was paid to do this, I am inclined to respect their wishes. I'll try to abstract it in an abstract way tomorrow.

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