November 6, 2002 (Wednesday),
London

UP early to take Jessica to school; outside it is still dark and drizzling with London's characteristic dirty, dark rain, like old paint-water, so we take a cab. The cabby is a cheerful Cockney. I challenge him to tell me a way to get to Grosvenor Square from South Kensington without hitting a single traffic light; he leaps at the mental puzzle, which I thought was impossible, and comes up with a very involved route -- he knows the names of every street and alley, too. We both chuckle loudly the whole way there and back. Best of British.

Several e-mails about the apparent suicide-attempt by Jewish terrorist leader Irv Rubin in a California jail and his alleged consequent "brain death". (One small mercy is that the press have stopped using his full first names, Irving David).

Michael Rivera of www.whatreallyhappened.com writes this:

I have a major problem with this story. Prisoners are given cheap disposable razors to use because they cannot be made into weapons. I just took one apart. The actual blades are attached to the plastic head to make them stiff. Without the plastic part, the blades have no rigidity at all. I just tried to use one to slice a piece of raw steak, using pliers to grip the blade at one end. The blade kept folding up. I have a hard time imagining Irv able to saw away at his own neck with one of these long enough to reach the Carotid. Second, once Irv's neck was cut deep enough to result in brain death, he would lose consciousness immediately, making a leap over the rails not only highly unlikely but unnecessary. Rubin, with his long record of suspected terror activity, had become a major embarrassment for Israel's "We're always the victims" public posture. He was due in court the morning of the "suicide". I wonder if he was planning to make a deal, a few inside secrets for leniency?

Reader John Boyle sends me his own comment on the news:

I thought Irv Rubin was brain-dead a long time ago. It is very bad, though, that he was not able to tell what he knew. I do not gloat on his death . . . we are both Christian and I will pray for his soul.

That has been my muted response too. I have felt for some time that Rubin was deranged, clinically speaking, a paranoid schizophrenic, and could not be judged by the laws designed for sane humanity. I wrote this as soon as he was arrested [Radical's Diary]; he was the victim of his own brain impulses rather than any inherent criminality. But the US criminal system is not very Christian, and is unlikely to have shown him the same degree of compassion in his forthcoming trial.

The above presupposes of course that the whole suicide episode is not a clever plot hatched by his lawyers to spring him from the jail hospital, to get him a release on compassionate grounds, whereupon the "brain dead" Rubin will make a trip to Lourdes, or wherever his kind go for their purposes, and Mankind will see the fastest medical miracle since Jesus Christ's interlocutor picked up his bed and walked.

 [Previous Radical's Diary]

on this website:

 David Irving, Radical's Diary on Rubin: "He seems to have enjoyed a life inspired by hatred of others whom he regards as inferior -- the very archetype of a nazi.

 Irv Rubin in Suicide Attempt

 JDL leader's attorneys want separate trials for defendants

 Defense attorney wants racist remarks thrown out

Trying to Blow up a Mosque? Meet the JDL fanatics | Los Angeles Times softens the profile of JDL terrorist Irv Rubin | LA grand jury indicts JDL members Rubin, Krugel in bomb plan | The Irv Rubin story: Never say never again | FBI spells Finis to Thug's Career: Militant JDL Chief Irv Rubin Arrested after Gunpowder Plot | Australia reports | Full text of charges | IHR recalls JDL's record | | "From the Irv Rubin bust to the Stern Gang: The Rich History of Jewish Terrorism"