Saturday, May 18, 2013 ************************************* AS I SEE IT ************************ The average Turk is totally unaware of the fact that Talaat and Kemal were fascists; and the average Armenian has nothing but contempt for “bourgeois democracy” – in case you thought Armenians are smarter. * In our circles, as in all autocratic circles, refusing to kiss ass is thought of as a serious offense. * The only way to understand Armenians (or anyone else for that matter) is to work for them or to be dependent on their goodwill. * I have dealt with too many crooks who pretended to be honest men to be taken in by cheap rhetoric. I am anti-Armenian only in the sense that I am anti -myself, which I believe to be a more useful stance that being pro-myself. # FROM MY NOTEBOOKS ******************************* Once upon a time I had all the answers. That’s when I was a dupe. * To speak of an honest politician is like praising a vegetarian cannibal. * Some Armenians owe their life to Turks and some Armenian writers owe their death to Armenians. My ambition in life: to write a cheerful book about death. # IT TAKES TWO TO TANGO ********************************* They behaved like bloodthirsty savages and we behaved like illiterate idiots who could not decipher the writing on the wall. * If our leaders emphasize the first (savages) and cover up the second (idiots) it’s because this cunning maneuver allows them to preside over another genocide (sbidak chart) and put the blame on economic, political, social, and cultural forces beyond their control. * But competent leadership consists in confronting and overcomin invisible historic forces that when left unchallenged can destroy not only tribes and nations but also empires as surely as bloodthirsty Asiatic barbarians on the warpath. #