[OPE] The transgression of boundaries in the palimpsest of memory

Haaretz (6 May 2009) reports:

Dov Weisglass, chief of staff to former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, wrote
in an op-ed piece published this week in the Yedioth Ahronoth daily that the
Bush administration had secretly agreed to expanding Jewish settlements on
the West Bank within their existing boundaries. (...) Ephraim Halevy, the
former head of Israel's spy agency, Mossad, [also] told Israel Radio on
Saturday [that in an] exchange of letters between former President George W.
Bush and then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, the US acknowledged that the
prevailing circumstances on the ground would make it unrealistic to expect
Israel to withdraw wholly to the pre-1967 armistice lines.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1090709.html

Hilary Clinton deftly replied to this, that: "There is no memorialization of
any informal and oral agreements. If they did occur, which of course people
say they did, they did not become part of the official position of the
United States government. And there are contrary documents that suggest that
they were not to be viewed as in any way contradicting the obligations that
Israel undertook pursuant to the road map. And those obligations are very
clear." http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1090709.html

So how do we know what really happened? According to NYT 27 Dec 2008 (Robert
Pear & Scott Shane, "Bush Data Threatens to Overload Archives" ):

"If the electronic records of the Bush White House total 100 terabytes of
information, as archives officials estimate, that would be about 50 times
the volume of electronic records left behind by the Clinton White House in
2001 and some five times the contents of all 20 million catalogued books in
the Library of Congress."
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/27/washington/27archives.html?partner=permalink&exprod=permalink

Here's Mr Bush's comment on his way out of office (from Christopher Demuth,
"A Conversation with President Bush", AEI Online 18 December 2008): "As I
told you, I'll miss being the Commander-in-Chief; I'll miss the people I've
worked with in the White House. We have a--I tell people, some days happy,
some days not so happy; every day is joyous. And that's a true statement.
I'm working with some awesome people. And I love them dearly and will miss
seeing them every morning. But since I'll be an emailer again, I'm sure I'll
be able to--(laughter)--stay in touch." http://www.aei.org/speech/100027

We may never know, what the full truth is, until we get better search engine
capability. If there were emails, and the emails weren't deleted, that is.

Jurriaan

You're just a memory
Of a love that used to be
You're just a memory of a love
That used to mean so much to me
She got a mind of her own
And she use it well
Well she's one of a kind
She's got a mind
She got a mind of her own
And she uses it mighty fine

- Rolling Stones, "Memory Motel"

E-mail message checked by Spyware Doctor (6.0.0.362)
Database version: 5.10260
http://www.pctools.com/uk/spyware-doctor-antivirus/
_______________________________________________
ope mailing list
ope@lists.csuchico.edu
https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/ope
Received on Sat Jun 6 11:02:00 2009