Hollosi Information eXchange /HIX/
HIX HUNGARY 74
Copyright (C) HIX
1994-09-12
Új cikk beküldése (a cikk tartalma az író felelőssége)
Megrendelés Lemondás
1 Re: How to die? (mind)  22 sor     (cikkei)
2 Re: beer/god (mind)  15 sor     (cikkei)
3 Re: beer/god (mind)  32 sor     (cikkei)
4 Re: beer/god (mind)  23 sor     (cikkei)
5 subscribe (mind)  6 sor     (cikkei)
6 HELP (mind)  9 sor     (cikkei)
7 Re: Slovak dam (mind)  8 sor     (cikkei)
8 On Sun, 11 Sep 1994 14:12:57 -0400 Tracy Moran said: (mind)  5 sor     (cikkei)
9 Re: Slovak dam (mind)  5 sor     (cikkei)
10 Re: A monarchy? (mind)  26 sor     (cikkei)
11 Re: The Slovak dam (mind)  97 sor     (cikkei)
12 Re: Is this a joke? (mind)  36 sor     (cikkei)
13 Re: Is this a joke? (mind)  63 sor     (cikkei)
14 Hold the fort (mind)  13 sor     (cikkei)

+ - Re: How to die? (mind) VÁLASZ  Feladó: (cikkei)

Subject: How to die?
From: Gabor Ellmann, 
Date: 1 Sep 94 11:48:04 GMT
In article > Gabor Ellmann,
 writes:
>So, what is the problem?
>Well, it is the religion.  I must confess, that I'm a "militant" atheist
and
>my view is as strong as any practicising orthodox (capital or small o)
can
>have.  Nevertheless, I too, must face the usual problems of coping with
or
>trying to avoid the traditionally religious ceremonies at hatch, match
and
>dispatch.  (Strong atheism is often called religion but it is not yet an
>"officially" accepted one, thus it is lacking of ceremonies.)

it (atheism)is, or at least was a few years ago, still illegal in
england.
that is a reasonable measure of recognition!

d.a.
+ - Re: beer/god (mind) VÁLASZ  Feladó: (cikkei)

Subject: Re: beer/god
From: Eva Durant, 
Date: 31 Aug 94 15:08:48 GMT
In article > Eva Durant,
 writes:


>So - God as a comforter? I even dislike dummies for babies - adults
>should manage to face reality

adults *do* manage to face reality, no matter how unpleasant. that is
on of the things that makes them adults, rather than just "grown-ups".


d.a.
+ - Re: beer/god (mind) VÁLASZ  Feladó: (cikkei)

From: Charles Atherton, 
Date: 31 Aug 94 22:45:17 GMT
In article > Charles Atherton,
 writes:
>On Wed, 31 Aug 1994 16:08:48 +0100 Eva Durant said:
>>>
>>You may find this surprising, but we were very free to read Sartre,
>>Camus, Beuvouir in secondary school, (Budapest) so long ago that I
forgot
>>how to spell'em, in the 60's.
>
>--Well, what's to be surprised about?  Sartre was something of a Marxist,
>wasn't he?

he was an existentialist, which in many ways, porecludes him from being
a "marxist", since marxism is based on empricisim, and existentialism is
not. certainly sartre was a left-wing intellectual, and shared enough
views
compatible with marxism to call him perhaps a "neo-marxist"

> And Beuvouir (is that spelled right?) was associated with
>him, wasn't she?

simone de beauvoir and jean-paul sartre studied together (or at the same
time) and lived together for about fifty years.

>And Camus was pretty much a radical.

"they" all were.


d.a.
+ - Re: beer/god (mind) VÁLASZ  Feladó: (cikkei)

On Sun, 11 Sep 1994 09:01:17 GMT > said:
>he was an existentialist, which in many ways, porecludes him from being
>a "marxist", since marxism is based on empricisim, and existentialism is
>not. certainly sartre was a left-wing intellectual, and shared enough
>views
>compatible with marxism to call him perhaps a "neo-marxist"
>
--Okay, I wouldn't argue with that.  If "neo-Marxist) makes you
happy, I'm happy.

>simone de beauvoir and jean-paul sartre studied together (or at the same
>time) and lived together for about fifty years.
>
--Well, Imi, after all, this list is mixed company and I was trying to
be polite!  Their affair was carnal, er, common knowledge, but I thought
it best not to put it so baldly and settled for "assocated with."

>>And Camus was pretty much a radical.
>
>"they" all were.
>
--My point exactly.  That's why I didn't find it surpriseing that Durant
Eva was allowed to read them.
+ - subscribe (mind) VÁLASZ  Feladó: (cikkei)

Tracy Moran
Elliott School of International Affairs
Someone who loves to get email.
Internet: 
"The only tyrant I accept in this world is the still voice within."
                                                           Gandhi
+ - HELP (mind) VÁLASZ  Feladó: (cikkei)

********************************************************************
Tracy Moran
Elliott School of International Affairs
The George Washington University
Someone who loves to get email.
Internet: 
"The only tyrant I accept in this world is the still voice within."
                                                           Gandhi
********************************************************************
+ - Re: Slovak dam (mind) VÁLASZ  Feladó: (cikkei)

Re: Jan George Frajkor's posting re: the Gabcikovo dam--
Ok, touche'!  But could we cut out the snideness?  It would make your sub-
stantive information more credible, at least to me.  My understanding re-
mains that environmental degradation of the Szigetko"z wetland area occurred.
Am I wrong about this?
Dzenkuje,
Be1la

+ - On Sun, 11 Sep 1994 14:12:57 -0400 Tracy Moran said: (mind) VÁLASZ  Feladó: (cikkei)

>HELP
>
Terry--edvidently you have subscribed.  Address your help requests to
the LISTSERV.  Be sure to keep the sheet that tells you how to sign off.
>********************************************************************
+ - Re: Slovak dam (mind) VÁLASZ  Feladó: (cikkei)

On Sun, 11 Sep 1994 15:37:00 EST W. BATKAY said:
>Ok, touche'!  But could we cut out the snideness?

--Snideness is essential on this network.  Actually, it's not snideness,
but simply frank and candid talk.
+ - Re: A monarchy? (mind) VÁLASZ  Feladó: (cikkei)

While this issue has no Hungarian relevance, I feel the need to correct
erreneous information, lest it is accepted by readers as fact.

Imi Bokor responded to a question:
>>--Wait a minute, you two!  While this is technically true, when was the
>>last time a British monarch actually could do this?  Certainly not since
>>sometime before Victoria!
>
>Not true. the new agreements are in (i think) the statute of westminster
>of 1948. in australia at least, the queen, through her representative the
>governor-general, still has that right, last exercised in november 1975.

It is part of popular demonology on the Australian left that it was the
Queen who dismissed the Whitlam government in 1975, thus intervening in
Australian politics.

Facts do not support this interpretation.  The Governor General, an
Australian, appointed by Australians with the purely formal signature
of the Queen, is Australia's de-facto head of state.  It was he who
initiated the dismissal of the Whitlam government in 1975.  The Queen
signed on the dotted line, as she was supposed to by the gentlemen's
agreement between the Crown and the Australian government.  If she had
refused to accept the GG's recommendation, she would have directly
intervened in Australian politics.  By accepting it, she did not.

George Antony
+ - Re: The Slovak dam (mind) VÁLASZ  Feladó: (cikkei)

George Frajkor wrote:

> The effect
>on the environment has been positive according to reports of the
>technical and enivornmental panel set up to report to the
>International court of Justice.

Wow!  All positive, with no adverse effects, this must be a world
first in the history of human intervention in the environment.
How come that it hasn't been publicized worldwide ?

Could we have a full reference, please.

> The World Wildlife Fund two months ago admitted it was wrong and has
>announced it will not support any campaigns against the dam.

Could you supply full reference to this too, please.

>I don't know of other environmentalist groups.

Along the former main channel of the Danube, forests on the floodplain are
dying due to the drastic reduction of flow.  This would happen both in
Hungary and Slovakia.  On the Hungarian side (and most likely in Slovakia
also), the water table along the former main channel has dropped by a
few metres, causing wells to dry up.  The reduced flow in the former main
channel caused brakish pools of water to collect in the channel, due to
lack of sufficient flushing.  This leads to deteriorating water quality
in the pools and also in the groundwater that is fed from the channel.
Hence, whatever water is still available from shallow wells becomes less
suitable for human consumption than previously.

>>As I understand it, the main problem for Hungary is not enough water for farm
-
>>ing, but adequate water levels for potable drinking water for Budapest, which
>>get most if not all it's water from the Danube just up-river of the city.  Th
e
>>diversion of the Danube caused by the dam threatens this supply.
>>
>  The amount of water flowing past Budapest remains exactly the same.
>Look at a map of the river. The diversion reroutes part of the water
>through the new canal instead of the old bed, and puts it back into
>the channel below Gabcikovo.   The volume is necessarily the same. In
>fact, it would HAVE to be or there would not have been any sense to
>the plan to build a dam at Nagymaros.

This reflects a lack of understanding of the hydrology of the region and
the source of Budapest's water supply.  Budapest does not take water
directly from the river - cleaning that thin sewage flavoured with heavy
metals and all sorts of organic compounds of proven health effects would
be prohibitively expensive.

Rather, Budapest relies on wells sunk in the extensive gravel layers left
behind by the previously meandering river.  Gravel and similarly permeable
geological formations filter the groundwater that is also flowing in a
south-south-easternly direction in the Hungarian section of the Danube Bend
region (north-west of Budapest).  That is, the water lifted from wells on the
western side of the river in the region of Budapest originates mainly in the
section of the river before the Danube Bend, and by the time it gets to
Budapest it is well filtered.  By cutting the flow in the main channel,
the Slovak authorities lowered the water table and the amount of water
that would normally filter through to Budapest underground.  This
shortfall can only be made up from wells sunk into the current floodplain
of the river above Budapest that supply much dirtier water.

>  The lowered water levels along the old Danube bed were being caused
>much more by the effect of dams in Austria over the past 20 years on
>silt deposition than by the new diversion.

You must be joking.  The few metres drop recently in the water level of the
former main channel is the direct consequence of the Slovak diversion
upstream and has nothing to do with whatever the Austrians may have done.

>In fact, this condition
>could be mostly cured by completing the reservoir at Dunakilti and the
>dam at Nagymaros, which would slow down the erosion and back up the
>water to create a larger reservoir below Gabcikovo.

Yep, that would create eventually a big brakish pool of water in the
former main channel instead of the small one now.  While the water
table would certainly be raised, it would be much higher than
before near the dam, with consequent salinity problems on the surface
upstream from the dam.  Further back, along the former main
channel, the groundwater level would be restored but its quality would be
worse than before the Slovak diversion.

In addition, a dirty big dam in one of the most scenic parts of Hungary
is not something Hungarians want.  In the good old heady days of
grandiose Stalinist nature-transforming developments this was not an
issue, but nowadays it is.  It seems that this change of thinking
has not yet permeated official Slovak circles.

>Dams have a habit
>of backing water up and raising underground water tables.

One learns something new every day.

George Antony
+ - Re: Is this a joke? (mind) VÁLASZ  Feladó: (cikkei)

Subject: Re: Is this a joke?
From: George Antony, 
Date: 2 Sep 94 01:32:17 GMT
In article > George Antony,
 writes:
>Greg Grose wrote:
>
>        [quoted report on Hungarian government requesting the rescinding
>        of the Benes Doctrine deleted]
>
>>This doesn't strike me as too subtle or diplomatic.  I thought the
>>new government was supposed to be different?
>
>Supposed by whom ;-) ?
>
>>Can someone expand on this?
>
>Just in a nutshell: in Czchoslovakia, the post-war Benes government
declared
>Germans and Hungarians collectively guilty for the war.


perhaps the reason for this was the "non-invasory" crossing of the
borders by hungarian armed forces and the re-annexation of territories by
horthy's hungary which the learned gentlemen so painstaikingly assured
were
acts of humanitarian inmtervention, marred only by the fact the that the
ungrateful bastards didn't like being helped at bayonet point.

i don't blame the czechs and the slovaks for misunderstanding, even the
encyclopedia britannica got it wrong and writes that hungary "invavded"
what was left of czechoslovakia, and also later ruthenia. and if the dons
of oxford and chicago can get it so wrong, what can you expect of such
ungrateful and ignorant masses?

d.a.
+ - Re: Is this a joke? (mind) VÁLASZ  Feladó: (cikkei)

>>Just in a nutshell: in Czchoslovakia, the post-war Benes government
>declared
>>Germans and Hungarians collectively guilty for the war.

Vitriolic as always but more opaque than usual, Imi Bokor appears to
display considerable sympathy with the Benes doctrines:

>perhaps the reason for this was the "non-invasory" crossing of the
>borders by hungarian armed forces and the re-annexation of territories by
>horthy's hungary which the learned gentlemen so painstaikingly assured
>were
>acts of humanitarian inmtervention, marred only by the fact the that the
>ungrateful bastards didn't like being helped at bayonet point.
>
>i don't blame the czechs and the slovaks for misunderstanding, even the
>encyclopedia britannica got it wrong and writes that hungary "invavded"
>what was left of czechoslovakia, and also later ruthenia. and if the dons
>of oxford and chicago can get it so wrong, what can you expect of such
>ungrateful and ignorant masses?

Let us take a hypothetical example of Janos Kiss, a farmer owning 10 acres
in the vicinity of Kosice (Kassa in Hungarian).  During the war, he manages
to avoid conscription by the various authorities (let's say he had lost the
crucial finger needed for pulling a trigger), keeps out of trouble lying
as low as possible, joins nothing, participates in nothing, pays his
taxes to the authorities of the day, works his land and looks after his
family.

After the war, someone in the new regime decides on a clean sweep of
the enemies of the state in the village.  Since the Benes Doctrines declared
all Hungarians and Germans collectively guilty for everything committed by
Hungarians and Germans during WWII, it is not necessary to establish guilt
in a court of law, individually.  Rather, all ethnic Hungarians and Germans
are woken in the middle of the night, given 10 minutes to get ready, packed
into boxcars and shipped out.  Janos Kiss is sent to a lead mine in Bohemia
with the rest of able-bodied men, his family straight to Hungary.  After a year
he is let go: back at home he finds his farm and house given to a Slovak family
,
his own gone.  He is told that he is an alien, as he has been stripped of his
Czechoslovak citizenship by the authorities, and he had better clear out or he
will be in trouble.  His health ruined, property and family gone, he too
crosses the border into Hungary.  Similar, and worse, things happened in
sufficient numbers not to make this little fable a mere tear-jerker.

Imi's reaction, quoted above, reiterates the guilt of the Hungarian armed force
s
and 'Horthy's Hungary' (all of it, presumably) in the annexation of Czechoslova
k
territory.  As there is nothing else in his response, one can only assume
that these unlawful acts committed by Hungarians weigh sufficiently heavy in hi
s
view to justify acts like that described above.

This is the legal principle of 'two wrongs make one right', closely related to
the concept of the vendetta.   Modern Western legal approaches do not usually
rely on these principles, and specifically rule out collective guilt.  The
Nuremberg Trials confirmed that such an approach was considered by the Western
Powers to be the appropriate response even then.  The USSR followed a different
approach, but Czechoslovakia prided itself on being part of Western culture.
Hence, the Hungarian government as is justified in raising the issue as was
its predecessor.  The political wisdom of doing so is another matter.

George Antony
+ - Hold the fort (mind) VÁLASZ  Feladó: (cikkei)

Dear Hungary listmembers:

I'll be out of easy e-mail reach for the next several days, though I'll
still try to logon for housekeeping needs.  But, if you find you're having
trouble that requires the listowner's intervention, I'd appreciate it if
you'd just try to be patient.  I'll deal with everthing as soon as I can!

And, if you all don't post over 50 messages in any one day, Listserv won't
freeze up the list like it did last Spring.

Take care, enjoy yourselves, and keep on arguing!

Sincerely,  Hugh Agnew )

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