Kate McMillan: Really, stupid, hateful screech harpy.

Apparently, enforced malnutrition and/or starvation of children is just a hoot to "Canada's Best Blogger":

The New Media Math

The Boston Globe offers a shocking statistic;

Although Gaza daily requires 680,000 tons of flour to feed its population, Israel had cut this to 90 tons per day by November 2007, a reduction of 99 percent.

Martin Kramer;

You don't need to be a math genius to figure out that if Gaza has a population of 1.5 million, as the authors also note, then 680,000 tons of flour a day come out to almost half a ton of flour per Gazan, per day.

It could be worse! "It's a good thing the eeevil Zionists didn't cut off the essential Stay Puft marshmallow supply."

Whoo hoo, that is some seriously knee-slapping humour there, Kate -- cutting off a basic food supply to an imprisoned populace. So let's see what really happened here, shall we?

Of course 680,000 tons of flour a day is a ridiculous and clearly absurd amount. But let's follow Kate's own link to one Martin Kramer, where we read:

Note how an absurd and impossible "statistic" has made its way up the media feeding chain. It begins in an Egyptian newspaper, is cycled through a Palestinian activist, is submitted under the shared byline of a Harvard "research scholar," and finally appears in the Boston Globe, whose editors apparently can't do basic math. Now, in a viral contagion, this spreads across the Internet, where that "reduction of 99 percent" becomes a well-attested fact.

Yes, Martin, it's all an evil leftist, Arab-loving conspiracy. But keep reading:

What's the truth? I see from a 2007 UN document that Gaza consumes 450 tons of flour daily. The Palestinian Ministry of Economy, according to another source, puts daily consumption at 350 tons.

Ah, and suddenly it all makes sense, doesn't it, because one immediately suspects that someone mistakenly wrote "tons" instead of "pounds," since 680,000 pounds is equal to -- ta da! 340 tons. Well, how about that? And that took all of about 30 seconds to figure out.

In a nutshell, then, the original Boston Globe claim is, as you can see, absurd, but mere seconds of investigation is enough to deduce that the actual reduction in flour is from 340 tons to 90 tons, almost a 3/4 decrease, which is still enough to cause food shortages, as one can see if one had the fucking sense to simply Google for it.

But that would be too much like work for Kate and her brood of adoring acolytes, who would prefer to ignore the imminent humanitarian crisis in order to crack a few jokes about it. Because, as we've established by now, that's just the way they roll.

P.S. Feel free to read the comments section at that article, where there are currently 33 comments and not one of those imbeciles has demonstrated the sense God gave a urinal deodorizer disc to wonder if that figure should be "pounds" instead of "tons," which is the absolutely first thing that occurred to your humble correspondent.

How can an entire demographic be so appallingly stupid? Where did evolution go so hideously wrong?

THE AMUSEMENT NEVER ENDS: Not surprisingly, the vast majority of commenters over at Kate's place have studiously avoided discussing the starvation tactics of the Israelis, and have obediently concentrated on making this into a diatribe against the irresponsibility and innumeracy of the mainstream media.

Also not surprisingly, the same people who are currently howling over the unforgivable mistake of confusing pounds with tons will never express the same sort of outrage over the National Post's previous gaffe regarding Iran and Jews and badges.

Will they, Kate?

Now that's some mighty selective journalistic outrage, wouldn't you say?