Thursday, April 20, 2006
Distorted Map Accompanying Review of "The Lobby"
I read an interesting Salon.com review of Walt and Mearsheimer's recent paper, The Lobby. It was interesting in that it asserts that "The Lobby's" AIPAC-As-Cabal positions are shoddily asserted -- with any facts inconvenient to the argument either ignored, presented out of context, or simply misrepresented -- and yet feels that this is merely a pity because Walt and Mearsheimer's point needs to be made and the two professors have now gone and spoiled the game for everyone else.
But the most puzzling thing about the review was the graphic attached to the article, a map of the state of Israel and the region in general:
Anyone notice a few countries missing, gobbled up presumably by some over-sized, usurping, imperialistic land-grabbing country? And the point is?
Yeah, I know. Gripe, gripe, gripe. That's me.
I'm sure they can easily explain this as just another editorial oversight of this-or-that variety that coincidentally paints Israel yet again in a fairly demonic and aggressive light. It happens all the time, nothing to get excited about. As if AbbaGav would be happier with a map making the opposite mistake, like at the UN, with Israel missing instead of greedily bloated. You just can't please AbbaGav either way.
Of course simple accuracy could be an option, but that would be limiting the expression of essential, if not objective, truth.
For reference, here is another map of the region in which Israel is perhaps 10% the size of Saudi Arabia rather than 3 times as large. I'd say maybe it's that distorting map-view, the Mearsheimer Projection, except I don't know of any map projection that transfers Iraq's Persian Gulf- and Kuwait-bordering territory to Israel.
If you really, really liked this -- or even really, really hated it -- there's lots more:
But the most puzzling thing about the review was the graphic attached to the article, a map of the state of Israel and the region in general:
Anyone notice a few countries missing, gobbled up presumably by some over-sized, usurping, imperialistic land-grabbing country? And the point is?
Yeah, I know. Gripe, gripe, gripe. That's me.
I'm sure they can easily explain this as just another editorial oversight of this-or-that variety that coincidentally paints Israel yet again in a fairly demonic and aggressive light. It happens all the time, nothing to get excited about. As if AbbaGav would be happier with a map making the opposite mistake, like at the UN, with Israel missing instead of greedily bloated. You just can't please AbbaGav either way.
Of course simple accuracy could be an option, but that would be limiting the expression of essential, if not objective, truth.
For reference, here is another map of the region in which Israel is perhaps 10% the size of Saudi Arabia rather than 3 times as large. I'd say maybe it's that distorting map-view, the Mearsheimer Projection, except I don't know of any map projection that transfers Iraq's Persian Gulf- and Kuwait-bordering territory to Israel.
