NETANYAHU, CONGRESS, AND A PALESTINIAN-ARAB STATE

I believe in Israel's right to exist in peace with its neighbors.

Is peace possible when the charters of the Palestinian Authority and Hamas call for Israel's destruction, when regional despots like Ayatollah Ali Khamenei call for death to Israeli Jews? There are those who would tell you to ignore the charters and the speeches, that they are just words. But Jews have come to understand, after centuries of being taught by example, that when a political movement or a government official says that they will kill Jews, they are to be believed. The original Zionists made that assumption and the Israeli government continues to operate on that premise.

Ask yourself a simple question: Which hypothetical circumstance would be most likely to lead to peace in the region, disarming the Palestinians Arabs or disarming the Israelis? As Golda Meir is reputed to have said, though she certainly wasn't the first: Disarming the Palestinians Arabs would lead to peace. Disarming the Israelis would lead to the destruction of Israel.

Step back for a moment and look at history. There are those who will tell you that history doesn't matter, that we should focus on the present. Those people don't understand either the Jewish or the Arab mentality. Events that took place centuries ago are to both peoples as fresh today as a cool morning breeze. We can dispute whether or not the Palestinian Arabs were in the main chased from Israel by Zionists in 1948 or if the bulk of them left their homes at the urging of Arab armies promising a swift return once the Jews were pushed into the sea. Either way, certain subsequent events cannot be disputed:

1. The Palestinian Arab refugee camps were built by their Arab brothers who, with the exception of Jordan, refused to allow the refugees basic civil rights and a path to a normal life within the host country. As a result, while in other countries Palestinian Arabs have been radicalized and promised a right of return that has not been and in all probabilities will not be granted, the bulk of Palestinian Arabs in Jordan are fully integrated and say that they wouldn't return even if given the opportunity.

2. From 1948 to 1967, the West Bank and Gaza were in Arab hands. A Palestinian Arab state could have been declared without Israel's involvement. Israel would no doubt have had security questions. In the central part of the country, before 1967 you could have taken a flying leap from Israel's eastern border and landed hip deep in the Med. But if the neighboring Arab states had prepared for peace instead of war, those questions could have been answered.

3. After 1967 and after Egypt recognized Israel's right to exist, Israel traded land, valuable land, to Egypt in turn for peace. That peace has held for close to 50 years. I repeat. Peace with Egypt - as well as Jordan - has held for 50 years. The prerequisite? Simply recognizing Israel's right to exist and establishing diplomatic relations.

I believe in a two-state solution. I believe that Israel's settlement policy is misguided, primarily in place as a sop to the Israeli political Right. But I support Israel against such uninformed charges as genocide against the Palestinian Arabs. Israel could level Gaza and bounce the ashes. It restrains itself from doing so even if its recent actions in Gaza do not lend themselves to the term 'restraint'. Ask yourself the outcome if such military asymmetry were reversed.

And now we come to Netanyahu. Why shouldn't Netanyahu address the US Congress?

Let me count the ways...

1. The Constitution clearly gives the Executive responsibility for the bulk of the conduct of foreign affairs including the negotiation of treaties. Yes, Congress must approve. But the Founders understood that there should only be one voice at the table during negotiations with foreign powers. That voice belongs to the Executive. Negotiation by committee, and therefore this foray into the negotiations with Iran by Congress, is just stupid.

2. We know what Netanyahu will say. He will say that Iran is an existential threat. That Iran cannot be trusted. That Israel cannot allow Iran to possess a nuclear weapon. There. I've given Netanyahu's speech for him. He can save the time and the jet fuel it will take to get here and back to Israel to continue campaigning for reelection.

3. Speaking of campaigning, the US has a longstanding policy of not interfering in democratic elections conducted by its friends. Well, except for the CIA. But since the Mossad is better at covert ops than the CIA, the Israelis don't have to worry on that score. They should worry, however, that Netanyahu thinks that it's a good idea to drag the US Congress into Israeli politics. Our Congress has an approval rating only slightly higher than Boko Haram's. And there is reason to believe that the fear tactics Netanyahu is using may backfire, that his political opposition is coalescing. Is Netanyahu desperate or just clueless?

4. And speaking of politics, Americans have a saying that politics ends at the border. Not any more, apparently. If speaking before Congress makes Netanyahu look silly, John Boehner conducting foreign affairs behind the President's back makes John Boehner look silly - or sillier, depending on what you think of his tanning spray.

There's more, but that's enough. The proposed speech is bad for the negotiations with Iran, bad for Netanyahu, and bad for Congress. What's the point?

SNOW IN THE LANGUEDOC - IT DOES, YOU KNOW

 One of the reasons that we moved to the south of France was Cathey's vow, "I will never shovel snow again." Well, we won't have to shovel but it was a bit of a shock to wake up to a dusting of the white stuff.  It's the first week of February, after all. The temperature has seldom dipped below freezing and this is the first hint off wintry precipitation. So I suppose that we can't complain. However Sylvie, less than a year old, was befuddled. And once a flake landed on her nose, she wanted nothing more to do with the stuff except at a distance.

An hour after these pictures were taken, the snow was gone. Melted. As one friend in the States put it, the beauty of snow without the shoveling.

RESTAURANT L'AMBASSADE, BEZIERS - A REVIEW

When I was writing restaurant reviews professionally in the Lehigh Valley of eastern Pennsylvania, I would take copious notes. How was the room furnished? Did the acoustics allow for comfortable conversation? Crisp linens? Sparkling glassware? Was the service attentive, professional? And I would carefully describe every dish - visual presentation, aroma, texture, taste, ingredients, derivation. All grist for the mill. I was being paid to eat and I was determined to give my employer and the reader their money's worth.

I now live in the south of France, in the land of the Impressionist artists who taught us that beauty is not always best expressed through strict attention to photographic detail. It's possible, perhaps desirable, to simply sketch the outlines and let the imagination of the viewer fill in the forms. I'm certainly not in the same league on the printed page as the Impressionists were on canvas, but you get my meaning. My style is not as precise as it once was. You'll have to get to know me, to trust me, and to read between the lines.

Why have I spent so much time explaining my current process? Because I have just finished the best fine dining experience that I have yet to have had in France and I don't want to spend an inordinate amount of time on the details. The details would only fuzz up the experience rather than sharpen it. There are those who would disagree, who would demand every jot and tittle. Fine. Enjoy a lunch at L'Ambassade. (And you WILL enjoy it.) Write your own revue. But think of me as the Rod Serling of restaurant reviewers. Are you familiar with the customary opening of Twilight Zone? Rod would face the camera, perhaps smoking a cigarette, and say, "Imagine, if you will, a world in which..."

Imagine...

L'Ambassade is directly opposite the train station in Beziers, not the toniest part of town. With an unprepossessing facade and simple, adequate, but almost pedestrian interior furnishings, L'Ambassade doesn't strike any poses.

The service is attentive but not intrusive. Informative without being overbearing. Timed to our pace rather than demanding that we conform to theirs. Nearly three hours at table and we never felt either rushed or neglected. (You read that right. Three hours. For lunch.)

An assortment of amuse-bouches presented us with a kaleidoscope of tastes and textures. I particularly enjoyed a test-tube portion of creamy mussel soup sipped through a straw (my table mates found it a bit too briny) and a tiny bowl layered with custard, sauced mushrooms, and a lobster froth. About six different such tidbits were presented to us on two rectangular plates, one plate for each side of the table, enough for the seven of us to have one of each of the bits.

The starters were diverse and unusual, for this Yank anyway. I had the masque de cochon, pig snout for the uninitiated, with a skewer of fried offal. Calm down. If you are a meat eater in a culture that adheres to the 'from tail to nose' philosophy, you should be prepared for a little tail, a little nose. The thin circles of tender snout were quite tasty and were accompanied by green lentils that were prepared in such a way, and in such a creamy sauce, that completely changed their typically beany flavor. Cathey had an off-menu velouté de champignons (mushroom soup) that spanned the gamut of textures from solid bits of mushroom to foam. She described the soup as essence of mushroom.

We were offered several such off-menu items, by the way. We all chose from the 30 Euro menu that, in print, featured two choices for starter and three mains. In fact, we were offered about twice as many choices. Our host, a new foodie friend of ours here in France, is well known in L'Ambassade. Since he dines there often enough to have run through the seasonal menu, the chef provides an alternative or two for him when he books a reservation.

I chose ris d'agneau (lamb sweetbreads) for my main course. I am not a particular fan but the other three choices - two on menu and one off - were each seafood and none caught my fancy. Simply grilled, on a bed of rizotto adorned with truffle shavings, and with a couple of hearty chunks of fresh girolle mushrooms, the sweetbreads filled the bill. But they did point up another curiosity, perhaps French, perhaps just L'Ambassade. Think about it. Four choices. Three fish - monkfish, sea bass, and baccalao (salt cod) - plus sweetbreads. From my point of view, a bit restrictive. Speaking of the baccalao, that was Cathey's choice. Perfection.

Before dessert, a shot glass of citrus mousse with almond slivers cleansed the palate. Then wondrous desserts. Several choices. I had chocolate ice cream in a ganache cup sitting atop a chocolate 'brownie' (but so much more) encased in ganache, with a shot glass of chocolate syrup on the side. Wondrous is just the right word for French chocolate. Cathey had crepes Suzette, an add-on of a couple of Euros, prepared at table side. Without the dramatic pyrotechnics that sometimes accompany the dish, but perfectly executed just the same.

A word about the wines. We all drank white throughout the meal, a fine, full-bodied four-grape white, primarily chardonnay and viognier, from the Domaine Castelneau a bit east of us. I think that given my menu choices, my pairings-conscious host would have preferred that I shifted to red. But the viognier gave the white enough of a boost to work with my choices and I saw no reason to change from the excellent vintage. At the finish, and in honor of our host, we were treated by staff to glasses of a sweet Banyuls from Catalan country.

And, of course, coffee.

With a bit of a gratuity, 50 Euros a head. An afternoon of exquisite taste at an incredibly low price for the quality of the fare. If you are a true foodie and you find yourself anywhere near the train station in Beziers, you owe L'Ambassade a visit.

Read more of my reviews HERE.

MONETIZING MY BLOG - WOULD YOU HATE ME IN THE MORNING?

Google AdSense.

Why not?

Tell me what you think. If you're reading my blog, I'd like to think that you're smart enough to deal with ads. But maybe you'd just rather not. Maybe you think that it's a sellout.

I'm listening. I'll give it a few weeks and see who says what, if anybody says anything at all.

CAFE DU MIDI - BIZE MINERVOIS - A REVIEW

You can't go home again. Well, in this case it might be more accurate to say that you can't always get back to where you once were even if you go back to the same place. Catch my drift? Too much drift?

On a luscious fall day in 2004, my wife Cathey, her sister Liz, and I happened across a restaurant in the little village of Bize Minervois. It's a pretty little village with the river La Cesse running alongside, not far from the regional olive cooperative with its neat gift shop, and on the back road from here to there if you're tired of the highway. We're in and around Bize quite often. But we've never returned to that little restaurant just inside the Bize archway until this weekend. We remember the restaurant well, though we've lost the name, because of a picture that Liz took of Cathey and I as we sat down to eat, a picture of a younger, happy, and satisfied couple that was printed out, framed, and given prominent play in my office at work and also served as my avatar on several websites in the decade since it was taken. The meal was as memorable as the picture. The girls shared a huge salad plate with a dozen or more ingredients including fresh veggies of the region and the season, pickles, and a hunk of country pate. I had rabbit, my first in France, stewed to perfection and served in a funky terracotta bowl. No ambiance, though. Not a lick. Just good French country cooking.

Today's Cafe du Midi is a different sort of place. Modern brown and red fabrics in place of the white linen. Modern, slightly awkward chairs. Modern lighting. Modern. That's okay. Modern is okay. But the menu was not okay. Our choice for a main dish was either hamburger or steak. Granted that it was a winter weekend. Granted we arrived just before a party of about twenty that had booked beforehand. Granted that it was the fixed price special. Even so, you shouldn't have to choose between cow and cow.

I will say that the presentation was interesting. Check out the picture. But to Cathey, the idea that hot and cold courses were served at the same time meant that by the time that you got to the last hot course, it wasn't hot any more.

So...

The sauteed veggies atop a square of puff pastry with a mild sauce was OK. The gazpacho with bits of bacon would have been interesting if we didn't get the feeling that the tomatoes came out of a tin. The steak was French biftek with a sauce and a dash of onions. The fries - chilling down while we worked on the veggies and the gazpacho - were probably reconstituted. The pineapple was fresh and the presentation novel. The goat cheese was good and the cheddar was French cheddar. (The French don't get cheddar.) Good baguette.

With a demi of wine, 32 Euros. Cathey has spoken. There are too many kitchens to sample in the region to come back to the Cafe du Midi any time soon.

Read more of my reviews HERE.

TRUFFLES - FRENCH BLACK WINTER TRUFFLES

 

Every day, a link to Languedoc Living appears in my Inbox, providing a useful compendium in English of news, event listings, and feature articles concentrating on our region but including a taste of the rest of France, Europe, and the world. I give the site a thorough look as often as time permits. Recently, I learned that the season for truffle fairs had arrived. Is it any surprise that my wife Cathey knew this? The surprise, I suppose, is that I realized that Cathey would be interested and that I proposed without any prodding that we pay a visit the truffle fair in Villeneuve Minervois, a small town in the foothills of the Massif Central about an hour north and west of us here in Quarante.

We arrived at the salle polyvalente (community room) at about 10am. Just about every village has one of these multi-purpose spaces. Villeneuve Minervois’ sports a kitchen and a stage at the edges of a basketball court downstairs and what appeared to be classrooms/meeting rooms upstairs. A market was already in full swing. Tables displaying wine, artisan whisky, saffron and saffron-infused products, truffle-infused butter and brie, artisan chocolate and cheeses and sausages, and knives and other gadgets with points and edges were arranged in an outward-facing square on the floor of the court. After a quick circuit and tastings, we had purchased two bottles of sparkling Limoux wine and a couple of hunks of chocolate, both white and dark, both with bits of raspberries. I thoroughly enjoyed my sip of Black Mountain, very smooth artisan whiskey. No sale, though. I’m a bourbon man myself.

But the reason for the festivities are the truffles. I won’t bother defining what truffles are or describing their culinary importance. If you don’t know, you can look it up. I will simply say two things: that we are talking here about the French black winter truffle, tuber mélanosporum, and that if you enjoy mushrooms, truffles are kind of like mushrooms to the nth degree. Truffles are a gourmet’s delight. At a cooking demonstration under a small tent with perhaps 50 chairs lined up, the audience was standing room only.

The truffle foragers arrive with their musky little treasures in baskets, in glass jars, or in plastic containers. They present their finds to an examiner stationed by the entrance, in this case a youngish man casually dressed in jeans, and his female assistant. They represent the French Department of Agriculture as well as the local Brotherhood of the Truffle. The examiner assesses every single truffle, sharp knife in hand, trimming them as needed, carefully shaving and smelling. If the truffle passes muster, it goes in a bin on the examiner’s scale. If it doesn’t, it’s added to a pile of rejects under the examiner’s table. There may be some discussion concerning a rejection, but the discussion is always civil and the examiner’s judgment is final. The assistant writes down the forager’s name by hand in a simple, lined notebook and, when the examiner is finished, writes down the combined weight of the forager’s approved truffles. The truffles are then placed in a cloth bag, tied securely, sealed, and handed back to the forager.

The foragers took their approved hauls to a long table at one end of the hall, separated from the crowd by a waist-high rope. A gent with a rifle, one of the Brothers, patrolled the stage above. When all of the day’s truffles had been examined, very close to the appointed hour of 11am, the examiner walked down the line to each forager’s station, cutting open the seals of the cloth bags and pouring the contents into whatever display container that the forager had set up. Some of the forager’s displays were quite fancy. Some foragers simply used the plastic containers that their truffles had arrived in. Every station had its own scale. When the examiner had opened and poured out the last bag, and without any warning, the Brother on the stage fired off a loud blank. (I hope that it was a blank.) The rope dropped. The stampede began.

I knew then why there had been such a crowd around the examiner’s station by the door. Folks who were intent on buying were scoping out the batches that they thought looked the best, watching and listening to the examiner. So when the rope dropped, they hustled to purchase the truffles that they’d targeted. We weren’t so focused. We simply walked up to the lady at one end of the table with just a dozen or so mostly small truffles sitting on the lid of a plastic container, watched the two ladies ahead of us pick up and smell each and every one of her truffles before purchasing two, then repeated the exercise for ourselves, picking out one small truffle of 14 grams that she put in a little cellophane bag for us. 11 Euros. That’s right. 11 Euros for a fresh French winter truffle weighing one-half ounce. We were amazed. We would have paid at least four times as much in the States, probably more. At that price, we could afford another. We were more discriminating. We walked down the table slowly, eying each display.  We liked that of a forager displaying deep black truffles in a cute little basket lined with red fabric. We picked out another truffle. 16 grams. 12 Euros. Damn.

When we got them home, Cathey put the truffles on a paper towel inside a Mason jar and put them in the fridge. We’ll be shopping for fresh-made pasta. Cathey will make a simple sauce and shave bits of truffle on top. Perhaps an omelet? Yum…

One final note. Cathey rhapsodized over the smell of truffles that she said pervaded the salle polyvalente. I frankly didn’t notice it. But when friends popped by our house the day after the fair for a visit to set a luncheon date in order to introduce us to their favorite local restaurant, Cathey brought out the jar and opened it to give them a whiff. And from the other end of the table the fragrance of the truffles wafted over to me. Unmistakable.

CHARLIE HEBDO - FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION - AMERICAN EXCEPTIONALISM

About a week has passed since the murderous attack on Charlie Hebdo in France. Clearly, there were other targets. Clearly, there was collateral damage. I grieve for all who died and praise all of the heroes. But Charlie has received most of the international publicity and is the subject of most of the commentary. I've read American and European news reporting and opinion pieces. I've interacted with friends around the world on social media. I've been thinking.

It's time to write.

I've never subscribed to the theory of American Exceptionalism. Alexis de Tocqueville observed a bustling, vibrant bunch of Anglo-Saxon American go-getters in the early 1800s and thought that they were the cat's pajamas. But the American Revolution has been widely misrepresented and continues to be misrepresented to this day. Its leaders were landed gentry chafing under the rule and, perhaps more importantly, the taxing authority of an absentee landlord. The Founders were in the majority slaveholders and did not end slavery given the opportunity, continuing to hold slaves in full knowledge of the moral bankruptcy of the practice. They were perfectly willing to ally with Native Americans in time of war and they were perfectly willing to invoke Manifest Destiny in order to screw Native Americans out of hearth and home in times of peace. They didn't give their wives the vote and they impregnated their female slaves. They've been made into saints, but their sandals were covered in mud.

Having just trashed the Founders, it would be easy to assume that I hate my country of origin and have left it in disgust in order to live a life of decadence in France. Not true. (Well, living out my life in decadent circumstances is a consummation devoutly to be desired, but...) I have been fortunate to have lived in a country that encourages folks like me to speak our minds in this way, free from fear of reprisal. And that's the point. That's one of the things that the Founders got absolutely, positively, 100% smack dab on the button correct and that has continued to be a vital foundation of American society. Freedom of Expression.

But from Facebook trolls to respected columnists, a new meme has emerged: "The murders at Charlie Hebdo were horrible and without justification, but it must be said that Charlie Hebdo was lousy satire."

Well, I say: "No, it must not be said."

The quality of the satire is totally irrelevant and bringing it up at a time like this is both naive and dangerous. Naive because the quality of the satire had nothing to do with the murders. Salman Rushdie and Theo van Gogh are cases in point. They weren't targeted by book reviewers or film critics. They were targeted by terrorists. Not for quality. For content.

And that's what makes this meme not only naive, but dangerous. In assuming that quality is somehow relevant, the way is paved for censorship. With censorship, punishment.

I submit that the responses to artistic expression are not the responsibility of the artist. If they were, one could almost accept censorship. Indeed, that's how censorship gains a foothold - blaming the artist. In fact, the responses to art are personal. The artist has a right to represent. The viewer has the right to reject. But it ends there. It makes no difference if the art is good or bad. We need Punch and we need MAD Magazine. And we need Charlie Hebdo. Here's why.

After World War II, the Europeans felt the need to censor certain speech. Perhaps understandable. Definitely a mistake. Obnoxious and relentlessly insulting speech is the ONLY test of a belief in freedom of expression. Shading a full-throated defense of such speech with caveats, saying that Charlie didn't have the absolute right to print what they printed without expectation of harm, connecting quality to this discussion, defining one form of speech as acceptable and another as criminal, you've opened the door to more than censorship, you've opened the door to punishment. If Charlie hadn't the right, didn't Charlie deserve to be punished?

Who decides what is obnoxious and insulting? Who decides guilt? Who decides punishment? If the answers to these questions are not the free market, then the answers are that the State decides what is obnoxious and insulting, who is guilty, and what the punishment should be. Anyone who is truly satisfied with allocating that kind of power to the State is not a proponent of freedom of expression.

Tomorrow there's time to judge quality, to decide not to view the cartoons or buy the publication. Today is not the time. You have the right to add conditions to your condemnations. Absolutely. But using that right today paints you with the same brush as Charlie's misogyny painted them. You do indeed conduct yourself as you accuse Charlie of conducting itself, using rights to no valid purpose. You've become Charlie. And you do not deserve to be punished for it.