that "save as draft" button is really the death knell for any would-be post on this site. i don't think anything that's ever been saved as draft has later been posted. just now, for the first time, i asked blogger to display all of the posts i have "saved as draft." i got a list of 14 would-be posts going back to july 2, 2004. i don't think i've looked at any of them since the day i hit the save button. most of them are half-completed movie reviews (plus one book review). there's actually one half-completed post i started in syria that i have absolutely no memory of ever writing.
only a handful of my never-born posts are straight political posts, like my almost-written hamas post. in order to get published a post has to have a certain impetus to it. i've got to feel moved to hit the publish button. politics usually does that to me and i guess i understand how the non-political stuff often does not. why do i care if i ever write a post trashing raja, a film that was never even released in the theater? then again, why do i post anything here?
it's a mystery to me why i never finished my hamas post. it seems like the kind of thing that would make it to the page. nevertheless, it's time has passed. not that hamas being in charge of the palestinian authority isn't still an important issue, but the impetus to get me to post about it is gone. i'm not sure why, it just is.
anyway, the point i would have made about hamas' victory, and why might turn out to have a silver lining, is buried in this profile of the israeli foreign minister. specifically, i'm thinking of this paragraph:
"In the Mossad," Mr. Avineri said, "you get a reality check, or a reality shock." While the parental generation was ostracized by its ideology--Likud did not come to power until the late 1970's--the children, like Ms. Livni, have become integrated. "It's a journey from pariah to the establishment," Mr. Avineri said. "There's less anger and bitterness and more responsibility."you can figure the rest out yourself.
