Past & Present

Maybe I should be ashamed to admit confusion about the way Mideast violence works. The specialists such as Juan Cole would probably think so.

But here is a recent story about a lawsuit that claims Iran, or Hezbollah to be more precise, was responsible for the bombings in 1996 in Saudi Arabia that killed 19 Americans.

Partly based on interviews with Osama Bin Laden himself, and because this is within Saudi Arabia, I had the impression this was an Al Qaeda attack. There is a difference, as wide as the Shia/Sunni chasm, between the two groups. Right?

My students learn about Norman Borlaug on the way toward appreciating that any world history of the twentieth century course ought to glance at the “green revolution” in agriculture worldwide, and the attendant polemics.

from AP:

DES MOINES, Iowa — President Bush has signed into law a bill authorizing that the Congressional Gold Medal be awarded to Norman Borlaug, a Nobel Peace Prize winner who has dedicated his life to fighting hunger and founded the World Food Prize.