Once Again, The City Of Lights
Once again, we sit and watch violence being done in the heart of France and one of the capitals of human culture. Offer up a prayer, in whatever way you conceive of that to be, for the victims, their friends and families.
Some are going to say that the Russians have shown the way in dealing with the thing that is ISIS -- simply, we will have to kill them all.
Others will say that after "Lil' Boots" Bush's imbecilic, unnecessary invasion of Iraq, western governments can't do as the Russians have done. We can't send troops -- no government in the Middle East wants our military (or France's, or the UK's) in their countries. America can't afford another military commitment economically, and neither the Right, Center or Left in the U.S. can afford it politically. It's why, so far, we've only sent fighter-bombers to strike IS positions, and a limited number of special-forces soldiers.
Still others (like Little Rupert and his issue) will use yesterday's events to raise the overall climate of paranoia and fear ...in order to sell advertising time or space, and to support their pet, right-wing politicians (I swear before Almighty God: If Hitler were to reappear, Fox/News Corp would give him his own half-hour show).
The Middle East may be a snake pit of clan, tribal, national and religious loyalties; a tapestry woven out of blood feuds thousands of years old, into which outsiders step in at their peril (A Fool Lies Here / Who Tried To Hustle The East).
I don't know how it all will end. I've been in situations where violence was the common denominator (or, simply, common). Violence will be required to remove IS; that is their raison d'etre and they want to cause as much of it as they can. But if the way all the events in the region conclude is through violence and only violence, then we've learned nothing. We are facing global issues that demand we act interdependently, cooperatively, with compassion. Violence will not help us, our friends and families, and strangers bound to us by a common humanity, to survive.
For any broader solution to be more than window-dressing before the next proxy war or excess of evil: the only way to end violence is simply to stop. Some will be amazed at how crazy or stupid I must be to offer up something so simplistic -- but I must be crazy, because it seems just that simple to me.
Once again, we sit and watch violence being done in the heart of France and one of the capitals of human culture. Offer up a prayer, in whatever way you conceive of that to be, for the victims, their friends and families.
Some are going to say that the Russians have shown the way in dealing with the thing that is ISIS -- simply, we will have to kill them all.
Others will say that after "Lil' Boots" Bush's imbecilic, unnecessary invasion of Iraq, western governments can't do as the Russians have done. We can't send troops -- no government in the Middle East wants our military (or France's, or the UK's) in their countries. America can't afford another military commitment economically, and neither the Right, Center or Left in the U.S. can afford it politically. It's why, so far, we've only sent fighter-bombers to strike IS positions, and a limited number of special-forces soldiers.
Still others (like Little Rupert and his issue) will use yesterday's events to raise the overall climate of paranoia and fear ...in order to sell advertising time or space, and to support their pet, right-wing politicians (I swear before Almighty God: If Hitler were to reappear, Fox/News Corp would give him his own half-hour show).
The Middle East may be a snake pit of clan, tribal, national and religious loyalties; a tapestry woven out of blood feuds thousands of years old, into which outsiders step in at their peril (A Fool Lies Here / Who Tried To Hustle The East).
I don't know how it all will end. I've been in situations where violence was the common denominator (or, simply, common). Violence will be required to remove IS; that is their raison d'etre and they want to cause as much of it as they can. But if the way all the events in the region conclude is through violence and only violence, then we've learned nothing. We are facing global issues that demand we act interdependently, cooperatively, with compassion. Violence will not help us, our friends and families, and strangers bound to us by a common humanity, to survive.
For any broader solution to be more than window-dressing before the next proxy war or excess of evil: the only way to end violence is simply to stop. Some will be amazed at how crazy or stupid I must be to offer up something so simplistic -- but I must be crazy, because it seems just that simple to me.
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