Nope. I was flabbergasted. I worded my response badly. The author must have been on drugs and was hallucinating. I mean how could he spin this missile attack into money-making project for Palestinians?!
I spent a fair amount of time in trying to read behind the paywall ..
The April 13 Israeli skeet shoot—knocking out 99% of the approximately 170 drones, 120 ballistic missiles and 30 cruise missiles Iran launched toward the Jewish state—was a technological tour de force. It combined difficult math, real-time sensors, sophisticated software and no small amount of artificial intelligence to guide advanced hardware, propulsion systems, explosives and lasers. That one night probably cost more than $1 billion. “We intercepted. We thwarted. Together we will win,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tweeted.
Now make it profitable—and use it to promote Palestinian prosperity. These defenses against incoming threats are a marvel. Israel’s Iron Dome, like Raytheon’s Patriot air-defense system, was designed mainly to take out short-range rockets. Patriot missiles can cost $4 million each, while Iron Dome missiles are $40,000 to $50,000, helpful given the sheer number of cheap Israel-bound rockets. In an asymmetric-warfare world, defense is still expensive.
You could put it down to " Black humour" but that kind of sophistication doesn't really exist in the US where they do "gags" for laughs.
-I think it's merely an example of that well developed alternative reality called " American political thought" in that it bears no resemblance to anything in that real world the rest of us live in but is instead a concoction of misinformed but obviously self-evident "truths", wishful thinking, patriotic chauvinism, anti-intellectualism and of course don't forget literalism (of the biblical kind: though of course in the real world well over half of the US population aren't actually literate enough to read that book anyway.)
Needless to say the bloke is a psychotic racist straight out of the colonial era (which it turns out never ended). I especially liked the snide touch of 'maybe add the explosives elsewhere' - mate, there's nowhere on earth Israel can trust ensnared wage slaves to not sneak away a few hundred kilos of explosives to exact revenge for what that country has done to the Palestinians. I think they're just going to have to make their stupidly expensive, ultimately ineffective high-tech weaponry themselves, or get the yanks to do it for them.
Opinion | A Plan for Palestinian Prosperity Opinion by Andy Kessler
The April 13 Israeli skeet shoot—knocking out 99% of the approximately 170 drones, 120 ballistic missiles and 30 cruise missiles Iran launched toward the Jewish state—was a technological tour de force. It combined difficult math, real-time sensors, sophisticated software and no small amount of artificial intelligence to guide advanced hardware, propulsion systems, explosives and lasers. That one night probably cost more than $1 billion. “We intercepted. We thwarted. Together we will win,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tweeted.
Now make it profitable—and use it to promote Palestinian prosperity. These defenses against incoming threats are a marvel. Israel’s Iron Dome, like Raytheon’s Patriot air-defense system, was designed mainly to take out short-range rockets. Patriot missiles can cost $4 million each, while Iron Dome missiles are $40,000 to $50,000, helpful given the sheer number of cheap Israel-bound rockets. In an asymmetric-warfare world, defense is still expensive.
But Iran’s long-range attacks required more: David’s Sling intercepts cruise missiles. Spyder finds and destroys aircraft and drones. Arrow can pick off ballistic missiles coming from outside the earth’s atmosphere. The U.S. Navy also provided help. Three ballistic missiles were taken out by our Aegis missile-defense systems, and 70 of the drones were shot down by U.S. ships and aircraft.
Josh Wolfe—whose venture firm, Lux Capital, invests a third of its funds in defense and aerospace—told me last week: “Every country watching that show is now thinking ‘I want that!’ An export version of these systems could be Israel’s next big product.”
Israel should eventually build factories in Gaza and the West Bank to manufacture these systems. There’s no better way to turn an enemy into an ally than to give him a job. That may sound far-fetched, but history is on my side. After Germany’s surrender in 1945, amid a landscape of destroyed cities, the Marshall Plan helped rebuild Germany into a peaceful ally. The reconstruction of Japan started during occupation under Gen. Douglas MacArthur. We did a pretty good job because—wouldn’t you know it—behind China and the U.S., Japan is third in the world in global manufacturing output. Germany is fourth, Italy seventh.
“Made in Japan” was a joke at first, indicating substandard quality. But over time, Japanese manufacturing and labor productivity improved until the name was synonymous with quality. (In the late 1950s, my mother was pregnant as she and my father sailed back to the U.S. after his Navy stint in Yokohama. On Japan visits years ago, I used to get a giggle from investor audiences when I told them I was made in Japan.)
This hiring of old enemies is still happening. All those antiwar protesters from the 1960s and ’70s, including “Hanoi Jane” Fonda, would be shocked to learn that their iPads, AirPods and Apple Watches are sourced in Vietnam. Apple says it has created more than 200,000 jobs there and spent close to $16 billion since 2019 as it migrates its supply chains out of China. CEO Tim Cook, on a visit to Vietnam last month, said the company plans to spend more. Trade is a more effective healer than foreign aid.
So turn Gaza and the West Bank into factory floors assembling defense systems, although maybe add the explosives elsewhere. Bring great jobs and a middle class to their mostly poor inhabitants—they can even work on Saturdays!—without handouts from the politicized United Nations. Turn Gaza into Hong Kong, a place of free trade, or Mexico, a neighbor with a cheap but effective labor force.
In 1975, Vietnam was a war-ravaged, rice-growing communist backwater. In 1994, the U.S. imported $50 million in goods from Vietnam. In 2023, we imported $114 billion worth. Vietnam’s labor productivity in 2021 ranked only 136th of 185 countries. It still grew, as the country has inexpensive labor and lots of room to improve. After Germany reunified in 1991, the formerly communist east turned around in short order. On a visit to South Korea years ago, I learned the country has detailed action plans to take over North Korea if and when the current regime collapses, and turn it into a cheap-labor manufacturing powerhouse. Israel needs to do the same to assure long-term peace on its borders.
Sure, I’m thinking way ahead, but a Hamas-free Gaza might be the perfect test bed for oil-free economic upside in the Middle East. The Gaza Strip has a population of two million, the West Bank another three million. An Israeli effort to educate a workforce to hire into high-tech factories—semiconductors as well as defense—could go a long way toward establishing a friendly, prosperous neighbor and future ally. It will take a lot of work, but it’s worth it.
Posted by Ken Waldron on May 10, 2024, 7:46 pm, in reply to "found it..."
Thanks Ian.
"In 1975, Vietnam was a war-ravaged, rice-growing communist backwater. In 1994, the U.S. imported $50 million in goods from Vietnam..."
How nice...no mention of the fact that between those years the US ran an absolute & punitive economic embargo to try to destroy Vietnam...even to the extent of printing a warning on every single US passport (-I recall being shocked on seeing it on a friends passport at the time) that not even personal items above I think it was $15, could be purchased from there.
Re: found it...
Posted by Ian M on May 10, 2024, 8:23 pm, in reply to "Re: found it..."
No worries,
re: the quote, what's wrong with growing rice, communism or no communism? I'd argue it's a better situation than being forced to move to a city and working for a corporation pitilessly exploiting your 'inexpensive labor' to produce throwaway consumer trinkets for affluent westerners.
Good point about the embargo. I struggle to believe that becoming a neoliberal export-oriented economy supplying the country that ruined yours, likely killing multiple family members, is going to make you forget the past or pay no heed to how you're being exploited in the present. But maybe it's just me, deprived as I am of the kind of insights into these matters you would get from running an investment firm providing 'funding for private and public technology and communications companies'.
Andy Kessler is a former hedge fund manager turned author who now writes on technology and markets.
His first book Wall Street Meat: Jack Grubman, Frank Quattrone, Mary Meeker, Henry Blodget and me was published in March of 2003, followed by Running Money: Hedge Fund Honchos, Monster Markets and My Hunt for the Big Score , published by HarperCollins in September of 2004. Running Money was added to the New York Times Business Bestseller list on November 7, 2004. Then came How We Got Here which you can find as a free PDF here.
July of 2006 saw the release of The End of Medicine , about Silicon Valley invading medicine and doing to doctors what ATMs did to tellers.
Andy is a frequent contributor to the Wall Street Journal op-ed page and has also written for The New York Times op-ed page, Wired, Forbes Magazine, The Weekly Standard, LA Times, The American Spectator magazine and techcentralstation.com and thestreet.com websites. He has even written a piece of fiction for Slate - bet you can't find it.
Andy Kessler was co-founder and President of Velocity Capital Management, an investment firm based in Palo Alto, California, that provided funding for private and public technology and communications companies. Private investments included Real Networks, Inktomi, Alteon WebSystems, Centillium and Silicon Image.
In the early '80's, Andy spent 5 years at AT&T Bell Labs as a chip designer, programmer, and spender of millions in regulated last minute, use it or lose it budget funds. In 1985, he joined PaineWebber in New York, where he did research on the electronics and semiconductor industry and was an “All Star” analyst in the Institutional Investor poll.
In 1989, Andy joined Morgan Stanley as their semiconductor analyst, and following in the footsteps of Ben Rosen, he added the role of technology strategist and helped identify long-term, secular trends in technology. In 1993, he moved to San Francisco to join Unterberg Harris, where he ran a private interactive media venture fund, with investments that included N2K, Exodus and Tut Systems.
Andy received a BS in Electrical Engineering from Cornell University in 1980 and an MSEE from the University of Illinois in 1981. K-12 was at Bridgewater-Raritan High School East in New Jersey. Every morning for 13 years, while heading out for the school bus, Andy looked to his left, up the hill, and checked out the flag flying at Middlebook Encampment, where George Washington and his troops spent winters watching the British troops in New Brunswick. On June 14, 1777, the Continental Congress approved the Betsy Ross 13 star flag as the official flag, and it flew for the first time at the Middlebrook Encampment. Pretty cool.
He lives with his wife and four sons in the Bay Area and enjoys basketball, hiking, skiing, biking, Pininfarina designed moving objects and reminiscing about raising Siberian Huskies.
Andy Kessler @andykessler WSJ: A Plan for Palestinian Prosperity wsj.com/articles/a-plan-for-… The April 13 Israeli skeet shoot—knocking out Iranian drones, ballistic missiles and cruise missiles—was a technological tour de force. @Israel #Gaza_War @POTUS #MarshallPlan Opinion | A Plan for Palestinian Prosperity Eventually, Israel should build weapons factories in Gaza and the West Bank. wsj.com
Evrim Rızvanoğlu @RizvanogluEvrim Are you serious?!
Layla 🪬 @itslaylas Have you ever met or talked to a Palestinian? asking palestinians to build the bombs that kill our relatives is cruel.
AG @lavidaag This deserves the low engagement, one of the most asinine takes I’ve ever seen. Yes, the Israelis would definitely give Palestinians jobs to build the weapons that kill them. How brilliant.
Esther @k_thos this idea has parallels to german actions during WW2. [quote tweet: Meezy @jomeezy617 May 8 During WWII, Nazi Germany forced occupied people to work in weapons factories to kill their own people. You can read more about your suggestions here: https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/forced-labor-an-overview ]
Robert Arctor @DonArctor How did you write this with a straight face?
Stepped On Cocaine Enthusiast @holisticbong Wow Andy what a modest proposal, let's get all the newly created orphans to work in the factories as well!
🌹🏳️🌈 @rojurrr lmao you’re disgusting
M @Monophilia1 Hey @andykessler , did you get this despicable idea while browsing Holocaust encyclopedia?
👑@HalaMadrid_NYC May 7 Zionist trash
Ted Kottler, Bookseller @TKottler59216 Y o u s h o u l d b e s t r a p p e d t o a m i s s i l e
AG @AG5818690362508 Potentially the worst take written on the conflict, so far. Breathtakingly bad.
Bullwark @MattOben You're entirely to comfortable talking like this my man
👑 @HalaMadrid_NYC Shut the fuck up zionist bitch
Avatar @GiorgioBzh Asshole 🖕 @andykessler Mange tes morts.
Dawūd داوود 🏳️🌈🇵🇸 @moochael Andy, are you a real person or a comic book character? You belong in the Hague and I’m saying that because I’m a kinder person than you. The last thing Palestinians need is a war criminals help to attain justice and prosperity. We have enough of that already.
Stop Cop City @TacoThunder5 Goddamn psychopath
Alan MacLeod @AlanRMacLeod Just when you think you've seen the worst possible take, the Wall Street Journal prints an all-timer.
Posted by t on May 10, 2024, 8:13 pm, in reply to "found it..."
It's kinda embarrassing to hallucinate in public, but then these are financial sharks sans moral compass or an anchor to the reality:
Josh Wolfe—whose venture firm, Lux Capital, invests a third of its funds in defense and aerospace—told me last week: “Every country watching that show is now thinking ‘I want that!’ An export version of these systems could be Israel’s next big product.”
But .. but .. zioNATOstan lost! Ergo, he is lying and wants punters to invest in this crappy venture. How droll.
on May 9, 2024, 8:28 pm