Frank accuses me of being prejudiced against you, Tech; and considering how many years we've been bickering, how can I deny prejudging you? I know that you're a propagandist--a poisoner of the informational well--and that's the problem I have with you. You poison the informational waters with false information, and you induce an informational drought by promulgating an impoverished simplistic and one-sided view of history, one that interferes with an understanding of history rather than helps it.

Poisoning the well has been considered a heinous crime for 10,000 years or so, since people first settled and survival came to depend on communal resources like wells. Information is as vital to the life of today's civilization as water was to that first agricultural civilization, and the plagues of cyberwarfare and cybercrime, spam, phishing, identity theft--and propaganda--are going to force us to hold poisoning the well of information in similar contempt. You're a barbarian at the gate of information-based civilization, Techie, a sapper undermining the integrity of the foundations of free society.

Jody sincerely wants to learn; but you worked to subvert her efforts with trash like "Truman railroaded it through, against US interests, and we've been paying the price in bloodshed and oil and terror ever since." My response was to point out that the history of the Middle East did not begin in 1948 and that it's an outrageous lie to attempt to pin today's troubles on Harry Truman. And, as I pointed out, that's not only a false view, it's an impoverished view, because the history of the Middle East is far richer than that, and in the parts that you left out are to be found the true roots of today's troubles. You did Jody a disservice.

It's probably true that I've been abrupt with you lately. I cut you off, last time you wanted to wrestle, and that might've been rude. At least this time I'm taking the time to explain my lack of patience with you. Enjoy.

;-)