Re: Re:

i thought you would find it amusing that ehud thought the proposed soccer boycott had the most potential to change the fate of the country. that the people really paid attention. he also thought that publicly disagreeing with the current situation would be counterproductive to fostering real change.

That is amusing. Soccer is where it really hurts.

He probably has a good sense of the state of the country, which is sinking into a morass.

he sees the south african experience as the current path. not pleasant. he said that it also was some sport penalty maybe cricket. that put people on notice back then. he thought that the fall would be difficult for the current govt. and that local politics was clumsy at best.

Have been off mail and am slowly catching up with a deluge.

He's right that the sports boycott, mainly rugby, really hit home. But there is more to say. After the sanctions and boycotts really hit home, the supporters of apartheid were confident, for a simple reason, which was quite explicit: they were counting on the US to support them, and if it did, recognized that the rest of the world didn't matter. And in fact Reagan supported them to the end of his term, the last holdout in the world. Not long after the US joined the rest of the world and apartheid collapsed. But there were reasons why the US did so: Cuba. Cuban forces drove South African aggressors out of Angola, compelled them to abandon illegally held Namibia, and made it clear to them that their hope for dominating the region couldn't be realized. And there also was a solution acceptable to South African elites and to Washington: keep the socioeconomic system in place and allow some black faces in the limousines.

I add little to this dialogue, but look forward to putting two people that I have affection for, together, for a fun exchange.