Day 2 - 5th Worldwide Security Conference

I am just about to set off and thought I would give you all a preview.

Last year they invited Claudia Rosett of the 'Foundation for the Defence of Democracies' who gave a frankly batshit off topic rant on how the UN was a major supporter or terrorism and should be disbanded.

Ah, these funky neo-cons. I did say in my write up that the Neo-Cons were part of the problem and not the solution so why are we giving space for their bizarre world view?

EWI didn't reply, but they did airbrush her out of the conference report and I thought they were suitably embarrassed.

But no! She's back - to the surprise of quite a few delegates and EWI staff. Even better, she's on a panel entitled 'Talking to Terrorists?'. Oh boy this is going to be good.

Want to see how nuts she is? Read her blog or an article or two or three,and make your own minds up

Meanwhile here's some background on the Foundation for the Defence of Democracies and on their founding (source American Conservative)

In early 2001, a tightly knit group of billionaire philanthropists conceived of a plan to win American sympathy for Israel’s response to the Palestinian intifada. They believed that the Palestinian cause was finding too much support within crucial segments of the American public, particularly within the media and on college campuses, so they set up an organization, Emet: An Educational Initiative, Inc., to offer Israel the kind of PR that the Israeli government seemed unable to provide itself.

At first, Emet floundered, without an executive director or a well-defined mission. But that changed after Sept. 11, and Emet changed too, into what is now the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. The name is different, but the goal of influencing America’s opinion-forming classes remains. More

Alternatively, perhaps they just invited her as a caberet act?