Bernard Avishai's Blog

Bernard Avishai Commented on Realists by Bernard Avishai

2009-11-18T09:22:00Z

Dan, as usual you are eloquent beyond what might be expected in the precincts of "Comments." I would plead guilty-as-charged except for one matter, which I don't think you are seeing. There is another reality in this country, and another half of Bibi's brain, which may be thrown into a file called "the economy." The kind of diplomatic isolation a "permanent war of conquest" entails will inevitably severely undermine Israel's capacity to generate an economic life, levels of growth, etc. to contain the country's rising social tensions, poverty, educational system dysfunction, and so forth. Read Aluf Benn in today's Haaretz: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1129016.html. I'm not sure I buy the whole analysis, but I have believed for some time, and probe this seriously in my last book, that the real social brake on greater Israel is greater Tel-Aviv, that is, the world of Israel's elites who can't stand where their country is going, or that their sons and grandsons have to do duty in the West Bank. The sheer numbers of our homegrown ultras may mean we are running out of time. But there is a secular-democratic, Hebrew-cosmopolitan reality here that is feeling as cornered by "settlers" as the Ramallah middle class is feeling cornered by Hamas. With the right kind of international support, they will come out of their depression, lethragy, and nighclubs by their hundreds of thousands. You cannot say what "Israel" wants watching Likud and AIPAC any more than you can say what America wants watching FOX after W.'s 2004 election.

Bernard Avishai Commented on Realists by Bernard Avishai

2009-11-17T17:32:51Z

My God, can one not appreciate what one learns from another over the years and yet disagree publicly about this or that important thing?

Bernard Avishai Commented on What Can Obama Do About Palestine, Meanwhile? by Bernard Avishai

2009-11-08T19:44:00Z

Uh, no, it won't. But there will be blood and civil war and ethnic cleansing. There is more than one historical analogy, it seems. Anyway, you might consider more than one.

Bernard Avishai Commented on What Can Obama Do About Palestine, Meanwhile? by Bernard Avishai

2009-11-08T19:40:04Z

You left off his last lone, with which I agree, and have argued here many time:

"...we should put a detailed U.S. plan for a two-state solution, with borders, on the table. Let’s fight about something big.

Bernard Avishai Commented on Connected Cars: The 'Killer App' For The Smart Grid--And The New Driver of Growth by Bernard Avishai

2009-11-05T06:18:28Z

I suggest you read my article, and look particularly at the Oak Ridge Study. The point is not how much power, but how it is distributed. But you knew that, right?

Bernard Avishai Commented on Connected Cars: The 'Killer App' For The Smart Grid--And The New Driver of Growth by Bernard Avishai

2009-11-05T06:11:35Z

Many good points. The critical one is the (now) preeminence of Asian suppliers in making power-dynamic components. This is certainly true, but my point is that the nature of the competition does not give an advantage to Asian suppliers owing to labor costs. The competition is on know-how, where American entrepreneurs can at least assume a (more or less) level playing field. Also, many of these supplier companies (I mention LG Chem and Yazaki) are just as likely to open manufacturing facilities in the US, to be closer to assembly, since the labor content of components is so small. We need to shake off some old assumptions.

Bernard Avishai Commented on Connected Cars: The 'Killer App' For The Smart Grid--And The New Driver of Growth by Bernard Avishai

2009-11-04T14:41:43Z

Look, Spider, you are (thinkingly) missing the point. Gen-1 technologies are just that. All components are going to get better and cheaper. Compare the first cell phones to what we have now, or the first laptops. The question is, do we finally have an electric car that (given the price/performance advantages over gas, and a good-enough solution to the "range extension" problem of all fully electric vehicles) has a chance to cross the chasm to a mainstream market; and given others getting into the act, what will be the consequences for the grid? I think the answer is clearly yes, and so do the various start-ups that are betting their lives on it. Get 100,000 miles out of a battery and save at least 10 cents a mile--do the math. But 8 years from now, the electric car will be a new iPhone compared to an original iPod. what The GM team that is working on the Volt should not be confused with the ancien regime. If the mother corporation folded, their intellectual property would attract plenty of investors.

Bernard Avishai Commented on Palestine Economy: Update by Bernard Avishai

2009-11-04T11:42:42Z

Dan, this is a shrewd question, and (as I say in my article) probably maps to Bibi's vision, but your working assumption underestimates the savvy and national purpose of Palestine's business leaders. If they could be "bought off" they'd be living elsewhere, where (among other things) their children would not want to emigrate.

Bernard Avishai Commented on Palestine Economy: Update by Bernard Avishai

2009-11-03T16:01:55Z

"A scenario reminiscent of certain areas of Berlin in 1933."

People, what's going on here? Is Israeli = Nazi the only formula TPM Cafe readers can come up with today? This kind of thing makes it harder for people like myself to report, because you make it easy for you-know-who to say that critical reports about the occupation play into the hands of people stridently opposed to Israel's very existence, which, by the way, even my friends in Ramallah are not.

Bernard Avishai Commented on Palestine Economy: Update by Bernard Avishai

2009-11-03T15:46:43Z

BluePearl (he yawns and rubs his eyes), but why are pulling your punches. Tell me what you really think.

Bernard Avishai Commented on The Law Of Return: 'Oh Learned Judge!" by Bernard Avishai

2009-10-30T15:28:51Z

Look, there is a more important point here that is not simply personal. It is that democratic countries can have national characters in certain legal ways and not in others. There is nothing 19th. century about wanting to preserve one's language and the culture it subtends. The question is how, which our Zionist watch-dogs cannot really grasp. This debate is long overdue, and not only for Jews.

Bernard Avishai Commented on Goldberg: The Last Word (At Least From Me) by Bernard Avishai

2009-10-23T11:53:36Z

Dan, I am not sure what I write here is really meant only for Jews about Jews, though I should have worked harder to show why. Anyway, I just returned from Poland, and feel passionate that the question of how nations survive in political forms, how they treat minorities, how democracies adapt to the contradictions,how demagogues use claims of patriotism to undermine the standards of civil society--all of these things--are universal questions that have plagued us for a couple of hundred years. Still, I find you consistently fair minded and agree that when we speak, we should understand who is in the room. I apologize for the implication that non-Jews may have nothing to contribute here. After all, I am not Catholic but feel brotherhood with Jim Carroll and his struggles. I would want to know that you could feel this way about mine, and I should have taken the time to earn your consideration.

Bernard Avishai Commented on J Street And World Order by Bernard Avishai

2009-10-20T08:24:16Z

AnnaA,
I take your question seriously, though I am not sure it was meant this way. The US can give people in Ramallah a political horizon, a provisional border, and the promise to gradually get the IDF out of the way of their businesses. I lay the latter issues out in the October "Harper's," if you haven't seen this.

Bernard Avishai Commented on J Street And World Order by Bernard Avishai

2009-10-19T17:16:33Z

MJ, thanks, and I think you are right. You just have to visit campuses to see how the tide has turned, though it is always one simplification replacing another (now it is the one-state solution). I can't believe Michael Oren does not see this; that he cannot stay aloof from the one group in the country that resonates with what American foreign policy will become over the next generation.

Bernard Avishai Commented on J Street And World Order by Bernard Avishai

2009-10-19T13:09:52Z

Thank you for this comment. In a way, you stated what was in the back of my mind when I wrote this. We are all going to need a spine strengthened by strategic clarity moving forward.

Bernard Avishai Commented on The Outlines Of The Mentor State by Bernard Avishai

2009-10-06T10:53:01Z

Dan, I'm traveling and cannot do justice to your many thoughtful comments. I am sure we could enjoy drinks someday. The point of my posts was not to invite a rehearsal of all the old arguments in favor of commonwealths regulating markets. I have made clear often enough that do not think markets self-regulating and remain a "Canadian" in the search for the balance you spend much energy reaffirming. The question is how to deliver this balance: through government agencies and bureaucracies or through new alternative ways that exploit the very new technologies that make this blog space possible. We live in an age when every public good, from newspapers to universities, are being reinvented. So, too, does the commonwealth need to be. If the government can mandate standards, and unleash competitive entrepreneurial ventures of all kinds without sacrificing the efficiencies we once got from government's scale, why would we not welcome the change?