Love Me Some Ben-Gurion!

[Bạch Đằng Lam Sơn Bookstore in Vung Tau on 8/25/24]

In 1984, I heard Czeslaw Milosz lecture and recite his poems in Philadelphia. I then read most of his poetry in English, plus his nonfiction Emperor of the Earth: Modes of Eccentric Vision, The Captive Mind and The Witness of Poetry. Milosz introduced me to Simone Weil, Emanuel Swedenborg, Zbigniew Herbert and Witold Gombrowicz, etc. In 2008, I had dinner with Milosz’s translator, Robert Hass, in Berkeley, but I was so full of shit by then, I made a terrible impression, I’m sure. I’m sorry, Mr. Hass! Being booted from the literary scene has been a great gift.

Hass’ essays in Twentieth Century Pleasures helped me to think more clearly about intellectual commitment. To maintain integrity, you must sacrifice much. Being so young, I could only understand a fraction of that book.

I’m just blessed to have been exposed to so much great literature before I bought my first computer in 1995. Brain damaged by FaceBook, TikTok and YouTube idiocy if not video games, the young are increasingly lost in virtual hells, with reading, if attempted at all, a sloppy and impatient exercise often done while taking a dump.

Even reading garbage is good, if you know it’s fluff or bullshit. Lowbrow browsing flesh out your understanding of society, so go get your teeth pulled regularly just to be exposed to Golf Digest, Good Housekeeping, Midwest Living, Elle and GQ, etc. Also reflect on their advertisements. Everything is a clue. With print dying, Teen Magazine, KO, Mad, Life, Inside Kung Fu and Ebony are dead, sadly. With so much garbage online, we’re richer than ever.

Even serious books can harm. Pope writes:

A little learning is a dangerous thing; 
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring: 
There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, 
And drinking largely sobers us again.

Yo Alex, drinking largely has actually made thousands even dumber! Have you talked to any American academic lately? Having read ten thousand books, they’re wrong on everything. Cowed into idiocy, they’re among the most pitiful in history.

Thanks to Milosz, I bought Gombrowicz’ Ferdydurke, so was slapped with this bracing insight:

In our relations with other people we want to be cultivated, superior, mature, so we use the language of maturity and we talk about, for instance, Beauty, Goodness, Truth... But, within our own confidential, intimate reality, we feel nothing but inadequacy, immaturity…

Everyone puffs himself up. Not only that, we greatly exaggerate the wisdom, virtuousness or beauty of those we admire. Declaring people geniuses, saints and angels shore up our collective vanity. Worst, though, is to turn monsters into gods. Bottom feeders look up to admire celebrity assholes gleaming through shafts of sunlight.

Hakeem Jeffries’ declaration that Biden is “one of the greatest public servants of all time” has actually been approvingly quoted by many morons. Jeffries is not some open mike comic with one good line but the House Minority Leader raking in more than 200K a year. If not a millionaire, he will be soon. Bullshitting pays.

These thoughts on books and jiving resulted from my brief visit to Bạch Đằng Bookstore last evening. With a heavy rain flooding streets, Cóc Cóc was closed. Bạch Đằng is a river where the Vietnamese defeated the Chinese twice, in 938 and 981, and the Mongols once, in 1288. I mention this to remind you that war to preserve the nation is always on the Vietnamese mind. Nations without nationalism die.

Bookstores have disappeared across the globe. My favorite in Philly was Factotum. At 17th and South, it’s a block from a great jazz bar, Bob and Barbara’s, and 3 1/2 from Bacchanal, where I got to read my first poems to audiences. Next to Bacchanal was Mom’s Soft Touch, a wonderful soul food joint with huge portions. I was too poor to eat there often. Mom’s mac and cheese is worth an untimely death. Pity those who never tried her meatloaf.

I bought so many used books at Factotum, only to resell some, even unread, to Paul Reuther when I needed money to buy rice or instant noodles. Paul had such great taste, he never stocked garbage. A graduate from the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, Paul now works at the Corcoran in DC. The nation’s first museum has canvases by Degas, Thomas Cole and Sargent. Its most marvelous was Bellows’ Forty-two Kids, now in the National Gallery. Such a complex work normally requires preparatory sketches, done from life. If attempted today, Bellows would be arrested. I spent many hours at the Corcoran.

Remaining bookstores tend to be jokes. Not too bad, Bạch Đằng had translations of Murakami, Defoe, Dumas, Remarque, Harper Lee, Lü Buwei, Si Ma Qian and Wu Cheng’en, etc., plus studies of the Buddha, Phan Thanh Giản, Confucius and Mencius, etc. The last was authored by Nguyễn Hiến Lê (1912-1984). An awesome scholar, he published 120 books. For months, his granddaughter was my neighbor at DC HomeStay. Her incidental poems on FaceBook can suddenly kick ass.

There were biographies of Ho Chi Minh and Vo Nguyen Giap, of course, but also of Kennedy. Most surprising, though, was one on David Ben-Gurion! It’s Michael Ba-Zohar’s official biography. The 1966 English edition of this hagiography is called Ben Gurion—The Armed Prophet. Like every proud Jew, I have it in my computer. Its foreword begins:

In the week beginning June 5, 1967, the world was startled by a lightning war which threw the Middle East into a turmoil—the Six Day War. Six vital days which saw the birth of a new Middle East, altered the map of this part of the world, alarmed the Great Powers, humbled the Soviet Union and demonstrated the power of Israel.

In the aftermath of this astounding victory, few thought about the crucial weeks which Israel lived through immediately preceding the war. Incited by Syrian extremists, Naser was determined to show that he was the supreme leader of the Arab world. Obsessed by memories of the defeats inflicted upon him by Israel in 1948 and 1956, he launched into an unreasonable undertaking. It seemed an opportune time to wipe Israel from the map.

Syrian extremists launched a mindless war against powerful Israel. You can see where this is going. The preface gushes:

I spent eighteen months in the company of David Ben-Gurion, and for eighteen months I tried to discover the secret of his drive and energy, of the magical force which has enabled him to overcome insuperable obstacles and to wave the blue-and-white flag of the Jewish people’s independence after two thousand years of exile.

Bar-Zohar’s other books include Beyond Hitler’s Grasp, Massacre in Munich: The Manhunt for the Killers Behind the 1972 Olympics Massacre, The Quest for the Red Prince: Israel’s Relentless Manhunt for One of the World’s Deadliest and Most Wanted Arab Terrorists, Hunting for The German Scientists, The Avengers, Lionhearts: Heroes of Israel, No Mission Is Impossible: The Death-Defying Missions of the Israeli Special Forces and Mossad: The Greatest Missions of the Israeli Secret Service. Bar-Zohar plagiarized so much in the last, he had to pay compensation to another Israeli, Ronen Bergman. His next book is Iron Swords, Bleeding Hearts: The Fateful War of Israel with Hamas. Bar-Zohar’s teaser:

I began writing this book on October 8, 2023, after a sleepless night. I had watched, on a foreign channel, the horror in the settlements at the Gaza border, and, for a change, the boisterous street protests in favor of Hamas in foreign capitals. I knew that this crucial chapter of history would be distorted and falsified by lies and fake news, as well as emotions, blind fanaticism, insane hatred of some and foolish adoration of others. I felt that my duty was to tell the truth about these apocalyptic events that shook the world.

How did this brainwasher get published in Vietnamese? It’s not surprising he’s available in German, French and Italian, but this lying Jew has also been translated into Russian, Polish, Japanese, Hindi, Tamil and Malaylam! For a glimpse of Israel’s primary founder and first prime minister, download Naeim Giladi’s out-of-print Ben-Gurion’s Scandals: How the Haganah and the Mossad Eliminated Jews.

Nations most in line with the Jewish agenda, regarding Israel, Ukraine, genital mutilation, illegal immigration or whatever, will perish first.

As Jews butcher countless innocents, the West doesn’t just look away but sends money and weapons. Washington Post on 4/12/24, “The United States and Germany—which supply the vast majority of Israel’s imported arms—say the transfers are essential to support Israel’s security.” To thank whites, Jews sow chaos in white nations, so there is justice, after all.

In Bạc Đằng Bookstore, you can also buy busts of Ho Chi Minh, portraits of Vo Nguyen Giap or statues of Jesus. They were all gods who could somersault on water. For your most impressionable young ones, there are picture books about Uncle Ho. Older kids not overly retarded can read short tales about his virtues. From Đỗ Bảo Ngân’s Bác Hồ tấm gương sáng mãi [Uncle Ho the Forever Shining Role Model], I translate two examples so you and yours can hopefully improve your sorriest asses. I have neither degraded nor improved Đỗ Bảo Ngân’s prose.

You Can Give These to the Poor

Around 1914, Uncle Ho—at the time called Nguyễn Tất Thành—had arrived in London—the capital of England. For a time here Uncle was a kitchen helper at the Carlton Hotel.

At the Carlton Hotel, there were daily workers in the kitchen. These people, after guests had eaten, were responsible for clearing the dishes… and for dumping the leftover into a large barrel, to be dumped. Sometimes the leftover consisted of a quarter of a chicken, an entire plate of bread and huge pieces of beefsteak…

When it was brother Thành’s turn in the kitchen, he would put the leftover aside, cover it carefully and cleanly, arrange it neatly then give to the cook.

Seeing this, chef Escoffier asked brother Thành, “Why haven’t you dumped these like everybody else?”

Calmly brother Thành replied, “These shouldn’t be thrown away. You can give these to the poor.”

What brother Thành said surprised the chef very much, because never before had anyone at the hotel thought or spoken like brother Thành.

The chef and everyone looked at brother Thành with esteem and admiration for his love towards the poor.

*

Save the Match and Kindle in the Kitchen

After more than week during the battle to protect the Đức Giang Oil Depot, on 6/29/1966, Uncle Ho visited an air defense unit stationed at Trầm Temple (in Hoài Đức). The visit had not been announced. When the car had stopped halfway up, a soldier recognized Uncle so yelled out. Uncle gestured for him to keep quiet then told the soldier to take Uncle to his unit.

With his simple rubber sandals, Uncle walked briskly up the hill, his brown bà ba outfit fluttered by the wind. After inspecting the clubhouse, Uncle quickly went to the kitchen. Seeing comrade Hào, the cook, carrying a large pot of rice, Uncle asked cheerfully, “How many bowls do you eat each meal?”

“Dear Uncle, I eat three!”

“That’s good you can eat like that.”

After the remark, Uncle took out a packet of cigarettes to give Hào one.

“It’s Uncle’s gift for you. Go ahead and smoke it.”

Then Uncle took out another cigarette for himself. Seeing that Uncle was looking for a light, Hào quickly took out a book of matches and was about to light Uncle’s cigarette, when he was stopped, “You save that match for cooking. With all those red flames in the kitchen, we can kindle away!”

Though it was just a match, Uncle taught us a profound lesson about frugality.

Stepping from the kitchen, Uncle asked cadres of that company, “Do you plant vegetables?”

“Dear Uncle, we can only plant water spinach at the foot of the hill. On the slope, there are too many pebbles to plant anything.”

After recounting his experience in war zones, Uncle said, “Just shovel away the pebbles, turn over the earth then cover it with mud from the pond, green vegetables will grow well. You plant, you eat, and lessen the burden of others to supply you.”

From then on, on rocky cliffs bordering the paths inside that unit, green gardens competed with each other to sprout wonderfully. The unit didn’t just become self-sufficient with vegetables, but had enough to sell to other units and even civilians.

*

It’s only 9:14 but, in my own way, I’ve planted enough for this morning. Up since 2AM, I’ve only had a piece of cheese, avocado smoothies, coffee, tea and coconut water. It’s not so hot today. Boiled pork dipped in fermented fish paste is calling my name.

In Ukraine, Zelensky’s sacrificial soldiers have supposedly shot down Russian missiles with machine guns. Jews also claim Nazis machine gunned Jewish babies flying through the air, for sport. At least one Nazi could tear a clothed Jewish baby in half with bare hands. Almost nothing you hear is true. Even events happening right before your eyes can be massaged.

[Bạch Đằng Lam Sơn Bookstore in Vung Tau on 8/25/24]

[Bạch Đằng Lam Sơn Bookstore in Vung Tau on 8/25/24]

[Uncle Ho Lives Forever and Unce Ho the Forever Shining Role Model]

[Uncle Ho Lives Forever]