Here is a short photo drop. Joan and I went to Rock Pile Wilderness in the Mark Twain Forest. Climbed a watch tower, followed the trail of a violent storm, hiked and spotted the biggest water snake I have ever seen. We then were rewarded with a short visit with our Livingston, Zambia buddies, the Bayles. They came, preached, and left their great kids with us for 3 days. A picture of Niko, Syriah and Jerica at the Cahokia Mounds. I included a couple photos of our back yard with bird feeder with squirrel protector and my Mississippi Valley garden with 8 ft tomato plants. I will see if I can fit them all in this post.

Here is an interesting video about deficit spending. Joan and I just agreed that most people think it is about helping people, the minority understand these spending programs as a way of tying everyone to the government.

Here is an article about the politics of cap and trade in Australia. I hope the same thing happens here. We are being manipulated on so many fronts simultaneously that we might just wake up to that “Brave New World”.

 

The book that sparked the change away from believing the false dogma of man-made climatic change is "Heaven and Earth: Global Warming; The Missing Science" by Ian Plimer. I noticed his book must be hard to come by with a price of $163.00 for a new book. Gore’s Global Scare book has over 400 used copies available starting at .43 cents. I guess you need to pay a price to be educated about truth, the lies come cheap. Just a comment, my understanding is the book is being reprinted as we read.

I have been reading "The Legacy of Persia" edited by A. J. Arberry and published in 1953. Persia is modern Iran and was able to maintain its identity despite the Arab invasion spurred on by its Islamic faith. They just never were able to toe the line as evidenced by its embrace of the Shiite flavor of Islam. Here are just a few quotes:

 

What is it that gives form and flavour to a great culture? A long and prized tradition, a poise and an assurance, a satisfaction with work well done—these are some of the evident but superficial symptoms. Beneath the surface other currents flow: poise is itself the delicate balance of forces striving in contrary directions, satisfaction a hardly-won relief from deep-set discontent. It has been often remarked that the Persian character is full of inconsistencies; the observation is true, but the phenomenon is a necessary condition of the perennial consistency of Persian civilization. Conflict within the Persian soul has saved the Persian mind from ever becoming sterile. So much it is necessary to say by way of prelude, before we lift the curtain and glimpse the exquisite pageantry of Persian life.

 

The world is to be organized and can be controlled or, where it resists control, endured and in the end overcome. The world is to be enjoyed; and if its full enjoyment may only be experienced by a small number of its inhabitants, justice and benevolence dispensed by wise though privileged autocrats can surely make tolerable that tedious and sordid labour which is the destined portion of the great masses; the spectators at the banquet are free to take pleasure in the sight and sounds of the revel, and may pick up a few of the crumbs. Yet this very complacency bears within itself the seeds of violent revolt; like jesters at a royal court, rebels and heretics periodically enliven the otherwise sober and slightly ponderous narrative of Persian history, giving spice and savour to the tale.

 

The Persians have always been mystics, skeptical, individualists, interested in the content and objectives of life, qualities they still retain despite the urge of the mechanized world around them towards organization and a greater efficiency. Every conqueror, even the hordes of Jenghiz Khan, has eventually succumbed to their irresistible charm, and been assimilated to the prevailing spirit of the people. They are gay and romantic, possessed of a vitality which appears in their early pottery and in many an Achaemenid bronze figurine, and impressed its pattern of the thousand-year reign of Arab Islam, to burst forth again in native freedom with the Safavids in the sixteenth century. Among their customs noticed by Herodotus are some pretty ones derived probably from days when their Aryan ancestors roamed the Northern plains on horseback: that a child until the age of five is not seen by his father, but brought up among the womenfolk; sons from the age of five to twenty are taught three things only, to ride, to shoot with the bow, and to speak the truth; and fighting in battle is held the highest manly quality, and next to it a large family of children. A good warrior ideal this last! The disapproval of lying and debt suggests the stricter public-school code, and analogy which might find support in their scorn for trade.

 

The skill with which they could discharge an arrow backwards from the saddle while galloping away from the enemy has given us the phrase; ‘a Parthian shot’.

 

The rapid spread of Mithraism throughout the Roman Empire from the Flavian period onwards, and its near-victory over Christianity in the third and fourth centuries, under Galerius and Diocletian, are symptomatic of the narrow margin by which in a wider field the Sassanian Empire just failed to subdue the Roman The legions stationed in Asia Minor and Armenia adopted the cult and took it with them all round the frontiers, and to Rome itself. Everywhere it spread like a forest fire…Its attraction would seem to have lain mainly in its moral elevation, the dualistic opposition between good and evil, in which the pure soul was for ever struggling to assist the good to gain the mastery, whereby the maximum effort was called for on the part of each individual, and a positive reaction to every situation encouraged.

 

In the political field the victory was complete; in the cultural it was but short-lived, for the old culture of Persia was not to be destroyed in a day, especially when the Arabs had little of their own to offer in return, and what was an immediate political victory for the Arabs was to become, in the course of little more than a century, a cultural triumph for Persia. Persian art, Persian thought, Persian culture, all survived to flourish anew in the service of Islam, and, impelled by a new and powerful driving force, their effect was felt in a widely extended field from the early eight century onwards.

 

Admonishing his son and successor, Mahdi, he said: “Shed no blood unlawfully; it is a sin in God’s sight. But defend your sovereignty and destroy anyone who disregards it or dares to withdraw himself form it.”

 

What we have in mind in speaking of “Persian Fatalism” is that genuine ancient stoical pity which springs not from the exasperation of the intellect caught in its own toils, nor form the shame or violated sense of decency of the fortunate confronted with the wretched and the repulsive, buty from a spontaneous sympathy (in the full sense of the word) with all that ‘lives but a short time and is filled with many miseries’. Its note is not the bitterness of Al-Maarri or the abstract, altruistic concern of the nineteenth—century Liberal, but an echo, necessarily faint, of the compassion of God Himself. It is expended upon those who have suffered as we have suffered, suffer, or shall suffer, and though a strong current of it runs through all Persian belief and expression, it is nowhere more evident than in Firdausi, the bard by choice of the ancient things.

 

And if the opening passages of the tale have recalled the Arabian Nights, the closing scenes assume a Miltonic grandeiur. The doomed pair, having descended to the Subterranean Palace, find themselves in the presence of Eblis himself, the majestic ruler of the apostate angels, whose mild voice renders only more terrible the impression of melancholy, pride, and despair by which he is, and must be, eternally, racked. Their fatal curiosity gratified, they wander on, abject and apathetic, and ultimately join the company of those whose hearts are consumed with unrelenting fire and who have lost the most precious gift of heaven—Hope.

 

Reading this in the context of current events gives one pause to think.

 

Loving in the time of youth’

That is happiness, in sooth;

Happiness, at love to play

With the lovely all the day;

Happiness, to sit apart

With companions of one heart,

And in harmony divine

To imbibe the purple wine.

Best it is in youth for thee

To be loving instantly,

Since, when thou art aged grown,

All thy virtue will be gone.

To be young, and wary o

The intemperance of love

What is that, if it not be

Weariness, and misery

If a man be young and strong,

And not love the whole day long,

O the pity and the ruth

Of the season of his youth! (Farrjkhi, 1037

 

If in making this final analysis of the value of Persian literature we have turned aside from the discussion of form, where we found so much of account, and dwelt rather upon the spirit which inhabited that form, it is because we believe that the truly enduring things, in words as in actions, are the things of the spirit. In her writings, as in her art, the soul of Persia lives; compared with this abiding triumph, the ruin of her politics matters very little. For the Persians, in victory as in defeat, but especially in defeat, have taught the world how to live with dignity and pleasure, whether the dinity be emperor’s or beggar’s, whether the pleasure be of earth ofr heaven. They have known life, and loved life, for all its pains and sorrows; and when the time has come for them to say farewell to life, it has always been with a backward glance of regret, and a prayer, like Iraj Mirza’s (1925,), to be remembered.

 

Know ye, fair folk who dwell on earth

Or shall hereafter come to birth,

That here, with dust upon his eyes,

Iraj, the sweet-tongued singer, lies.

In this true lover’s tomb interred

A world of love lies sepulchred;

Each ringlet fair, each lovely face

In death, as living, I embrace.

I am the selfsame man ye knew

That passed his every hour with you;

What if I quit this world’s abode,

I wait to join you on the road,

And though this soil my refuge be

I watch for you unceasingly.

Then sit a moment here, I pray,

And let your footsteps on me stray;

My heart, attentive you your voice,

Within this earth’s heart will rejoice.

 

 

I dedicate this post to Neda Ahah Soltan age 26.

Here is a Father’s Day article: "Five Myths on Fathers and Family".

 

Myth #1 the stay at home father.

 

Actually less than one percent of the 22.5 million families have a stay at home Dad.

 

Myth #2 women want everything 50/50.

 

“Another prevailing media myth is that contemporary women are looking for fathers who will split their time evenly between work and family life. It may be true for the average journalist or academic, but it is not true for the average American married mom.”

 

“Moreover, most women who are married with children are happy to have their husbands take the lead when it comes to providing and do not wish to work full-time. For instance, a 2007 Pew Research Center study found that only 20 percent of mothers with children under 18 wanted to work full-time, compared with 72 percent of fathers with children under 18.”

 

Myth #3 Marriage is just a piece of paper.

 

“Married fathers are also much more likely than their cohabiting peers to stick around. One recent study by Wendy Manning at Bowling Green State and Pamela Smock at the University of Michigan found that 50 percent of children born to cohabiting parents saw their parents break up by age five; by comparison, only 15 percent of children born to married parents saw their parents divorce by age five. Dad is much more likely to stick around if he has a wedding ring on his finger.”

 

Myth #4 The kids are all right.

 

“Every couple of years, some journalist seeks to revive the myth of the good divorce — often to excuse his or her own bad behavior. Sandra Tsing Loh is Exhibit A this week. In the most recent issue of The Atlantic, she spends several thousand words trying to justify her divorce from her husband of 20 years — a man she admits is a “good man” and “loving father” — under the cover of a sprawling, incoherent, and frankly disturbing review of five books on marriage and family life. (Among other things, the reader is regaled with all too much information about Loh’s private life; we learn, for instance, that one reason she ended up divorced is that she could not replace the “romantic memory of my fellow [adulterous] transgressor with the more suitable image of my husband.”)”

 

“In reality, Loh is probably deluding herself. The best social science presents a rather different picture than the rosy one Loh is trying to paint. According to research by Sara McLanahan of Princeton University and Paul Amato of Penn State, girls whose parents divorce are about twice as likely to drop out of high school, to become pregnant as teenagers, and to suffer from psychological problems such as depression and thoughts of suicide. Girls whose parents divorce are also much more likely to divorce later in life.”

 

Myth #5 Dads are dispensable.

 

“The final myth propagated by journalists in connection with fatherhood these days is the myth of the dispensable father. Often conjured up in glowing profiles of women who have become single mothers by choice, this myth holds that fathers do not play a central role in children’s lives.

This myth fails to take into account the now-vast social scientific literature (discussed above) showing that children typically do better in an intact, married families with their fathers than they do in families headed by single mothers.

It also overlooks the growing body of research indicating that fathers bring distinctive talents to the parenting enterprise. The work of psychologist Ross Parke, for instance, indicates that fathers are more likely than mothers to engage their children in vigorous physical play (e.g., roughhousing), to challenge their children — including their daughters — to embrace life’s challenges, and to be firm disciplinarians.”

 

 

I thought this was interesting from "Liberal Fascism" by Jonah Goldberg. This came from his blog at www.nationalreview.com. The point the book is that it tends to be liberal tendencies that lead to fascism. You can see hints of our future in the quotes below. This is the unheralded battlefield of American politics. The division is not right and left, but spiritual, in that part of the country still believes in the values associated with Christianity and the other doesn’t and the vanguard of progressive, liberal thought is out to destroy this stubborn “clinging” to out of date religious values.

 

Hitler & Christianity II   

 

Like the engineers of that proverbial railway bridge, the Nazis
worked relentlessly to replace the nuts and bolts of traditional
Christianity with a new political religion. The shrewdest way to accomplish
this was to co-opt Christianity via the Gleichschaltung
while at the same time shrinking traditional religion’s role in civil society.
To this end, Hitler was downright Bismarckian. The German
historian Götz Aly explains how Hitler purchased popularity with
lavish social welfare programs and middle-class perks, often paid for
with stolen Jewish wealth and high taxes on the rich. Hitler banned
religious charity, crippling the churches’ role as a counterweight to
the state. Clergy were put on government salary, hence subjected to
state authority. “The parsons will be made to dig their own graves,”
Hitler cackled. “They will betray their God to us. They will betray
anything for the sake of their miserable little jobs and incomes.”5
Following the Jacobin example, the Nazis replaced the traditional
Christian calendar. The new year began on January 30 with the Day
of the Seizure of Power.6 Each November the streets of central
Munich were dedicated to a Nazi Passion play depicting Hitler’s
Beer Hall Putsch. The martyrdom of Horst Wessel and his “old fighters”
replaced Jesus and the apostles. Plays and official histories
were rewritten to glorify pagan Aryans bravely fighting against
Christianizing foreign armies. Anticipating some feminist pseudo
history, witches became martyrs to the bloodthirsty oppression of
Christianity.

Under the progressives, the Christian God had been transformed
into the God of lower food prices. Under the Nazis, the Christian
God would be transformed into an Aryan SS officer with Hitler his
right hand. The so-called German Christian pastors preached that
“just as Jesus liberated mankind from sin and hell, so Hitler saves the
German Volk from decay.” In April 1933 the Nazi Congress of
German Christians pronounced that all churches should catechize
that “God has created me a German; Germanism is a gift of God.
God wills that I fight for Germany. War service in no way injures the
Christian conscience, but is obedience to God.”7
When some Protestant bishops visited the Fuhrer to register complaints,
Hitler’s rage got the better of him. “Christianity will disappear from Germany just as it has done in Russia . . . The Germanrace has existed without Christianity for thousands of years . . . and
will continue after Christianity has disappeared . . . We must get
used to the teachings of blood and race.” When the bishops objected
that they supported Nazism’s secular aims, just not its religious innovations,
Hitler exploded: “You are traitors to the Volk. Enemies of
the Vaterland and destroyers of Germany.”8

In 1935 mandatory prayer in school was abolished, and in 1938
carols and Nativity plays were banned entirely. By 1941 religious instruction
for children fourteen years and up had been abolished altogether,
and Jacobinism reigned supreme. A Hitler Youth song rang
out from the campfires:

We are the happy Hitler Youth;
We have no need for Christian virtue;
For Adolf Hitler is our intercessor
And our redeemer.
No priest, no evil one
Can keep us
From feeling like Hitler’s children.
No Christ do we follow, but Horst Wessel!
Away with incense and holy water pots.9
Meanwhile, the orphans were given new lyrics to “Silent Night”:
Silent night! Holy night! All is calm, all is bright,
Only the Chancellor steadfast in fight,
Watches o’er Germany

Nazis & Christianity Cont'd   

From pages 369-371:

...Just as the Nazi attack on Christianity was part of a larger war on the idea of universal truth, whole postmodern cosmologies have been created to prove that traditional religious morality is a scam, that there are no fixed truths or “natural” categories, and that all knowledge is socially constructed. Or as the line goes in The Da Vinci Code, “So Dark, the Con of Man.”

The “con” in question is, in effect, a conspiracy by the Catholic
Church to deceive the world about Jesus’ true nature and his marriage to Mary Magdalene. The book has sold some sixty million copies worldwide. The novel, and movie, have generated debates, documentaries, companion books, and the like. But few have called attention to the ominous roots and parallels with Nazi thought.
Dan Brown should have dedicated his book to “Madame” Helena Blavatsky, the theosophist guru who is widely considered the “mother” of New Age spirituality as well as a touchstone in the development of Nazi paganism and the chief popularizer of the swastika as a mystical symbol. Her theosophy included a grab bag of cultish notions, from astrology to the belief that Christianity was a grand conspiracy designed to conceal the true meaning and history of the supernatural. Her 1888 book, The Secret Doctrine, attempted to prove the full extent of the grotesque Western conspiracy that The Da Vinci Code only partially illuminates. Christianity was to blame for all the modern horrors of capitalism and inauthentic living, not to mention the destruction of Atlantis.  
Alfred Rosenberg’s Myth of the Twentieth Century, the second most important book in the Nazi canon, borrowed ideas wholesale from Blavatsky. Rosenberg lays out one Christian conspiracy after another. “Before it could fully blossom, the joyous message of German mysticism was strangled by the anti-European church with all the means in its power,” he insists. Like Blavatsky and Brown, he suggests the existence of secret Gospels, which, had they not been concealed by the Church, would debunk the “counterfeit of the great image of Christ” found in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. “Christianity,” writes Hitler in Mein Kampf, “was not content with erecting an altar of its own. It had first to destroy the pagan altars.” It was “the advent of Christianity” that first unleashed the “spiritual terror” upon “the much freer ancient world.”13

Large segments of the cultural left today subscribe to similar notions.
For example, Wicca and paganism constitute the fastestgrowing religion and religious category in America, with adherents numbering anywhere from 500,000 to 5 million depending on whose
numbers you accept. If you add “New Age spirituality,” the number of Americans involved in such avocations reaches 20 million and growing. Feminists in particular have co-opted Wicca as a religion perfectly suited to their politics. Gloria Steinem is rhapsodic about the superior political and spiritual qualities of “pre-Christian” and “matriarchal” paganism. In Revolution from Within she laments in all
earnestness the “killing of nine million women healers and other pagan or nonconforming women during the centuries of change-over to Christianity.”14
The SS chief, Heinrich Himmler, was convinced that the antiwitch craze was an anti-German plot concocted in large part by the Catholic Church: “The witch-hunting cost the German people hundreds of thousands of mothers and women, cruelly tortured and executed.”15 He dedicated considerable resources for the SS to investigate the witch hunts and prove they were attempts to crush Aryan civilization and the true German faith. The SS put together what amounted to their own X-Files unit—dubbed Special Unit H (for Hexen, or “witches”)—to ferret out the truth of over thirty-three thousand cases of witch burning, in countries as far away as India and Mexico.
Indeed, most of the founders of National Socialism would be far more comfortable talking witchcraft and astrology with a bunch of crystal-worshipping vegans than attending a church social. Consider the Thule Society, named after a supposed lost race of northern peoples hinted at in ancient Greek texts. The society was founded as the Munich chapter of the German Order, and while its occult and theosophical doctrines were nominally central to its charter, the glue that held it together was racist anti-Semitism. Anton Drexler was encouraged by his mentor Dr. Paul Tafel, a leader of the Thule Society, to found the German Workers’ Party, which would soon become the National Socialist German Workers’ Party. Its membership was a veritable Who’s Who of founding Nazis, according to Hitler’s biographer Ian Kershaw.

 

Here is the complete text of Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech today:

 

Honored guests, citizens of Israel.

Peace has always been our people’s most ardent desire. Our prophets gave the world the vision of peace, we greet one another with wishes of peace, and our prayers conclude with the word peace.

We are gathered this evening in an institution named for two pioneers of peace, Menachem Begin and Anwar Sadat, and we share in their vision.

Two and half months ago, I took the oath of office as the Prime Minister of Israel. I pledged to establish a national unity government – and I did. I believed and I still believe that unity was essential for us now more than ever as we face three immense challenges – the Iranian threat, the economic crisis, and the advancement of peace.

The Iranian threat looms large before us, as was further demonstrated yesterday. The greatest danger confronting Israel, the Middle East, the entire world and human race, is the nexus between radical Islam and nuclear weapons. I discussed this issue with President Obama during my recent visit to Washington, and I will raise it again in my meetings next week with European leaders. For years, I have been working tirelessly to forge an international alliance to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons.

Confronting a global economic crisis, the government acted swiftly to stabilize Israel’s economy. We passed a two year budget in the government – and the Knesset will soon approve it.

And the third challenge, so exceedingly important, is the advancement of peace. I also spoke about this with President Obama, and I fully support the idea of a regional peace that he is leading.

I share the President’s desire to bring about a new era of reconciliation in our region. To this end, I met with President Mubarak in Egypt, and King Abdullah in Jordan, to elicit the support of these leaders in expanding the circle of peace in our region.

I turn to all Arab leaders tonight and I say: “Let us meet. Let us speak of peace and let us make peace. I am ready to meet with you at any time. I am willing to go to Damascus, to Riyadh, to Beirut, to any place- including Jerusalem.
I call on the Arab countries to cooperate with the Palestinians and with us to advance an economic peace. An economic peace is not a substitute for a political peace, but an important element to achieving it. Together, we can undertake projects to overcome the scarcities of our region, like water desalination or to maximize its advantages, like developing solar energy, or laying gas and petroleum lines, and transportation links between Asia, Africa and Europe.

The economic success of the Gulf States has impressed us all and it has impressed me. I call on the talented entrepreneurs of the Arab world to come and invest here and to assist the Palestinians – and us – in spurring the economy.

Together, we can develop industrial areas that will generate thousands of jobs and create tourist sites that will attract millions of visitors eager to walk in the footsteps of history – in Nazareth and in Bethlehem, around the walls of Jericho and the walls of Jerusalem, on the banks of the Sea of Galilee and the baptismal site of the Jordan.
There is an enormous potential for archeological tourism, if we can only learn to cooperate and to develop it.

I turn to you, our Palestinian neighbors, led by the Palestinian Authority, and I say: Let’s begin
negotiations immediately without preconditions.
Israel is obligated by its international commitments and expects all parties to keep their commitments.

We want to live with you in peace, as good neighbors. We want our children and your children to never again experience war: that parents, brothers and sisters will never again know the agony of losing loved ones in battle; that our children will be able to dream of a better future and realize that dream; and that together we will invest our energies in plowshares and pruning hooks, not swords and spears.

I know the face of war. I have experienced battle. I lost close friends, I lost a brother. I have seen the pain of bereaved families. I do not want war. No one in Israel wants war.

If we join hands and work together for peace, there is no limit to the development and prosperity we can achieve for our two peoples – in the economy, agriculture, trade, tourism and education - most importantly, in providing our youth a better world in which to live, a life full of tranquility, creativity, opportunity and hope.

If the advantages of peace are so evident, we must ask ourselves why peace remains so remote, even as our hand remains outstretched to peace? Why has this conflict continued for more than sixty years?

In order to bring an end to the conflict, we must give an honest and forthright answer to the question: What is the root of the conflict?

In his speech to the first Zionist Conference in Basel, the founder of the Zionist movement, Theodore Herzl, said about the Jewish national home “This idea is so big that we must speak of it only in the simplest terms.” Today, I will speak about the immense challenge of peace in the simplest words possible.

Even as we look toward the horizon, we must be firmly connected to reality, to the truth. And the simple truth is that the root of the conflict was, and remains, the refusal to recognize the right of the Jewish people to a state of their own, in their historic homeland.

In 1947, when the United Nations proposed the partition plan of a Jewish state and an Arab state, the entire Arab world rejected the resolution. The Jewish community, by contrast, welcomed it by dancing and rejoicing.

The Arabs rejected any Jewish state, in any borders.

Those who think that the continued enmity toward Israel is a product of our presence in Judea, Samaria and Gaza, is confusing cause and consequence.

The attacks against us began in the 1920s, escalated into a comprehensive attack in 1948 with the declaration of Israel’s independence, continued with the fedayeen attacks in the 1950s, and climaxed in 1967, on the eve of the six-day war, in an attempt to tighten a noose around the neck of the State of Israel.

All this occurred during the fifty years before a single Israeli soldier ever set foot in Judea and Samaria .

Fortunately, Egypt and Jordan left this circle of enmity. The signing of peace treaties have brought about an end to their claims against Israel, an end to the conflict. But to our regret, this is not the case with the Palestinians. The closer we get to an agreement with them, the further they retreat and raise demands that are inconsistent with a true desire to end the conflict.

Many good people have told us that withdrawal from territories is the key to peace with the Palestinians. Well, we withdrew. But the fact is that every withdrawal was met with massive waves of terror, by suicide bombers and thousands of missiles.

We tried to withdraw with an agreement and without an agreement. We tried a partial withdrawal and a full withdrawal. In 2000 and again last year, Israel proposed an almost total withdrawal in exchange for an end to the conflict, and twice our offers were rejected.

We evacuated every last inch of the Gaza strip, we uprooted tens of settlements and evicted thousands of Israelis from their homes, and in response, we received a hail of missiles on our cities, towns and children.

The claim that territorial withdrawals will bring peace with the Palestinians, or at least advance peace, has up till now not stood the test of reality.

In addition to this, Hamas in the south, like Hezbollah in the north, repeatedly proclaims their commitment to “liberate” the Israeli cities of Ashkelon, Beersheba, Acre and Haifa.
Territorial withdrawals have not lessened the hatred, and to our regret, Palestinian moderates are not yet ready to say the simple words: Israel is the nation-state of the Jewish people, and it will stay that way.

Achieving peace will require courage and candor from both sides, and not only from the Israeli side.
The Palestinian leadership must arise and say: “Enough of this conflict. We recognize the right of the Jewish people to a state of their own in this land, and we are prepared to live beside you in true peace.”
I am yearning for that moment, for when Palestinian leaders say those words to our people and to their people, then a path will be opened to resolving all the problems between our peoples, no matter how complex they may be.

Therefore, a fundamental prerequisite for ending the conflict is a public, binding and unequivocal Palestinian recognition of Israel as the nation state of the Jewish people.
To vest this declaration with practical meaning, there must also be a clear understanding that the Palestinian refugee problem will be resolved outside Israel’s borders. For it is clear that any demand for resettling Palestinian refugees within Israel undermines Israel’s continued existence as the state of the Jewish people.

The Palestinian refugee problem must be solved, and it can be solved, as we ourselves proved in a similar situation. Tiny Israel successfully absorbed tens of thousands of Jewish refugees who left their homes and belongings in Arab countries.
Therefore, justice and logic demand that the Palestinian refugee problem be solved outside Israel’s borders. On this point, there is a broad national consensus. I believe that with goodwill and international investment, this humanitarian problem can be permanently resolved.

So far I have spoken about the need for Palestinians to recognize our rights. In am moment, I will speak openly about our need to recognize their rights.
But let me first say that the connection between the Jewish people and the Land of Israel has lasted for more than 3500 years. Judea and Samaria, the places where Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, David and Solomon, and Isaiah and Jeremiah lived, are not alien to us. This is the land of our forefathers.

The right of the Jewish people to a state in the land of Israel does not derive from the catastrophes that have plagued our people. True, for 2000 years the Jewish people suffered expulsions, pogroms, blood libels, and massacres which culminated in a Holocaust - a suffering which has no parallel in human history.
There are those who say that if the Holocaust had not occurred, the state of Israel would never have been established. But I say that if the state of Israel would have been established earlier, the Holocaust would not have occured.
This tragic history of powerlessness explains why the Jewish people need a sovereign power of self-defense.
But our right to build our sovereign state here, in the land of Israel, arises from one simple fact: this is the homeland of the Jewish people, this is where our identity was forged.
As Israel’s first Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion proclaimed in Israel’s Declaration of Independence: “The Jewish people arose in the land of Israel and it was here that its spiritual, religious and political character was shaped. Here they attained their sovereignty, and here they bequeathed to the world their national and cultural treasures, and the most eternal of books.”

But we must also tell the truth in its entirety: within this homeland lives a large Palestinian community. We do not want to rule over them, we do not want to govern their lives, we do not want to impose either our flag or our culture on them.

In my vision of peace, in this small land of ours, two peoples live freely, side-by-side, in amity and mutual respect. Each will have its own flag, its own national anthem, its own government. Neither will threaten the security or survival of the other.

These two realities – our connection to the land of Israel, and the Palestinian population living within it – have created deep divisions in Israeli society. But the truth is that we have much more that unites us than divides us.
I have come tonight to give expression to that unity, and to the principles of peace and security on which there is broad agreement within Israeli society. These are the principles that guide our policy.

This policy must take into account the international situation that has recently developed. We must recognize this reality and at the same time stand firmly on those principles essential for Israel.
I have already stressed the first principle – recognition. Palestinians must clearly and unambiguously recognize Israel as the state of the Jewish people. The second principle is: demilitarization. The territory under Palestinian control must be demilitarized with ironclad security provisions for Israel.
Without these two conditions, there is a real danger that an armed Palestinian state would emerge that would become another terrorist base against the Jewish state, such as the one in Gaza.
We don’t want Kassam rockets on Petach Tikva, Grad rockets on Tel Aviv, or missiles on Ben-Gurion airport. We want peace.

In order to achieve peace, we must ensure that Palestinians will not be able to import missiles into their territory, to field an army, to close their airspace to us, or to make pacts with the likes of Hezbollah and Iran. On this point as well, there is wide consensus within Israel.

It is impossible to expect us to agree in advance to the principle of a Palestinian state without assurances that this state will be demilitarized.

On a matter so critical to the existence of Israel, we must first have our security needs addressed.

Therefore, today we ask our friends in the international community, led by the United States, for what is critical to the security of Israel: Clear commitments that in a future peace agreement, the territory controlled by the Palestinians will be demilitarized: namely, without an army, without control of its airspace, and with effective security measures to prevent weapons smuggling into the territory – real monitoring, and not what occurs in Gaza today. And obviously, the Palestinians will not be able to forge military pacts.


Without this, sooner or later, these territories will become another Hamastan. And that we cannot accept.

I told President Obama when I was in Washington that if we could agree on the substance, then the terminology would not pose a problem.
And here is the substance that I now state clearly:

If we receive this guarantee regarding demilitirization and Israel’s security needs, and if the Palestinians recognize Israel as the State of the Jewish people, then we will be ready in a future peace agreement to reach a solution where a demilitarized Palestinian state exists alongside the Jewish state.

Regarding the remaining important issues that will be discussed as part of the final settlement, my positions are known: Israel needs defensible borders, and Jerusalem must remain the united capital of Israel with continued religious freedom for all faiths.

The territorial question will be discussed as part of the final peace agreement. In the meantime, we have no intention of building new settlements or of expropriating additional land for existing settlements.

But there is a need to enable the residents to live normal lives, to allow mothers and fathers to raise their children like families elsewhere. The settlers are neither the enemies of the people nor the enemies of peace. Rather, they are an integral part of our people, a principled, pioneering and Zionist public.

Unity among us is essential and will help us achieve reconciliation with our neighbors. That reconciliation must already begin by altering existing realities. I believe that a strong Palestinian economy will strengthen peace.


If the Palestinians turn toward peace – in fighting terror, in strengthening governance and the rule of law, in educating their children for peace and in stopping incitement against Israel - we will do our part in making every effort to facilitate freedom of movement and access, and to enable them to develop their economy. All of this will help us advance a peace treaty between us.

Above all else, the Palestinians must decide between the path of peace and the path of Hamas. The Palestinian Authority will have to establish the rule of law in Gaza and overcome Hamas. Israel will not sit at the negotiating table with terrorists who seek their destruction.
Hamas will not even allow the Red Cross to visit our kidnapped soldier Gilad Shalit, who has spent three years in captivity, cut off from his parents, his family and his people. We are committed to bringing him home, healthy and safe.

With a Palestinian leadership committed to peace, with the active participation of the Arab world, and the support of the United States and the international community, there is no reason why we cannot achieve a breakthrough to peace.

Our people have already proven that we can do the impossible. Over the past 61 years, while constantly defending our existence, we have performed wonders.
Our microchips are powering the world’s computers. Our medicines are treating diseases once considered incurable. Our drip irrigation is bringing arid lands back to life across the globe. And Israeli scientists are expanding the boundaries of human knowledge.
If only our neighbors would respond to our call – peace too will be in our reach.

I call on the leaders of the Arab world and on the Palestinian leadership, let us continue together on the path of Menahem Begin and Anwar Sadat, Yitzhak Rabin and King Hussein. Let us realize the vision of the prophet Isaiah, who in Jerusalem 2700 years ago said: “nations shall not lift up sword against nation, and they shall learn war no more.”

With God’s help, we will know no more war. We will know peace.

 

Keith Welty passed away this last Saturday. We had the funeral at the church Wednesday June 10^th. He died of heart failure. I met Keith when he came into church last August for a pot luck following a baptism. We baptized his ex-wife, current live-in and mother of his two daughters Brooke and Taylor. He began to come to church, he and Chris remarried and life went on. He was on medication as the government gave him about 700 dollars a month to survive and take his medicine. I am sure the side effects of high blood pressure and obesity due to his meds didn’t help his heart condition. He would normally try and follow a sermon through, but usually the head was drooping by the time the sermon ended.

 

One Sunday, something in the sermon must have caught his ear, as he attentively listened and responded at the end of the service to ask Jesus into his heart. Before that he always insisted that he was a good guy, which he was, and that was really all that was important. He began to change after that. I helped with some forms; he couldn’t read and write well, but was as intelligent as a guy could be. We talked about being a man of God and being a good father and husband. The institutional pull was working against the family as Chris needed her meds and small check and their daughter Taylor needed her meds and the family needed the small check that came to them because she was on the meds.

 

My attitudes about our medicated nation bleed out in my sermons. Nothing drastic, but it is tough to take responsibility for your life in a good way when reality is always cloudy because of the meds you are on. Keith knew that someday this would be the direction he would have to take, but there is no hurry. Keith had become an expert at the little electronic games that Taylor and the other kids in church play. Chris had the makings of a great parent and church was a good place for them to be.

 

Keith started the new year off at our church testifying to the church that he wanted God to help him to be the best Christian husband and father that he could be. It was after that when Keith’s step dad, who was living with them, passed away. I had visited him in the hospital. Terry from church had been doing bible studies with him and Chris and would always ask him if he wanted to get saved and he would respond by saying not now. He looked healthy to me but maybe in his spirit he knew something I didn’t. We prayed a salvation prayer together in the hospital and the next day he died. Chris, who had grown real close to him, flipped out. One thing led to another as the whirlwind of demonic activity engulfed her life she ran off with the kids claiming that Keith was the kind of man who shouldn’t be around his own girls, the girls he had raised by himself for the last 10 years before getting back together with Chris.

 

I am not sure if words can describe the feeling a man must have when he comes home to find that everyone is gone and his investigation leads him to find out that his wife and children have left him. We spent time together believing for things to work out. It seemed to only get worse. He couldn’t even see his children until the accusations made their way through the legal process. They would come to be unfounded and he was given the children each weekend. He came to church as a family man, then a single man and now as a single parent with his two kids. We always kept praying for Chris and Keith kept his heart free from bitterness and hatred. They went through a mediation process and it looked like the decision about who would have custody of the children would be established the Monday following his death on Saturday.

 

I was honored to do his funeral. He was a man of good reputation with all who knew him. We filled the church with church folks, family and many friends. We had some testimonies and one relative sang the full version of “Jesus Loves You”. It was the first time I had ever heard it sung with all of the choruses. I preached, recapping his life from my standpoint, much as I have written above, asked for heads to bow and eyes to close, and asked folks to raise their hand if they wanted to get saved or get their heart right with God. We had 12 hands go up including Chris’.

 

What the future holds I do not know. To know that somehow and in someway Keith’s untimely death will “work together to good” is all that I can believe.

I want to get a few book thoughts together before they get too backlogged. I read "The Coming Anarchy" by Robert Kaplan published in 2000. It is a collection of 9 of his published essays that give a picture of the future that matches the title. One essay was entitled “And Now for the News: The Disturbing Freshness of Gibbon’s Decline and Fall”. One essay uses the characters from Conrad’s “Nostromo” to enlighten us about third world realities. Here are some quotes:

 

It is malaria that is most responsible for the disease wall that threatens to separate Africa and other parts of the Third World from more-developed regions of the planet in the twenty-first century. Carried by mosquitoes, malaria, unlike AIDS, is easy to catch. Most people in sub-Saharan Africa have recurring bouts of the disease throughout their entire lives, and it is mutating into increasingly deadly forms. “The great gift of Malaria is utter apathy,” wrote Sir Richard Burton, accurately portraying the situation in much of the Third World today.

 

We are entering a bifurcated world. Part of the globe is inhabited by Hegel’s and Fukuyama’s Last Man, healthy, well fed, and pampered by technology. The other, larger, part is inhabited by Hobbes’s First Man, condemned to a life that is “poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” Although both parts will be threatened by environmental stress, the Last Man will be able to master it; the First Man will not.

 

China, in Homer-Dixon’s view, is the quintessential example of environmental degradation. Its current economic “success” masks deeper problems. “China’s fourteen percent growth rate does not mean it’s going to be a world power. It means that coastal China, where the economic growth is taking place, is joining the rest of the Pacific Rim. The disparity with inland China is intensifying.

 

Outside the stretch limo would be a rundown, crowded planet of skinhead Cossacks and juju warriors, influenced by the worst refuse of Western pop culture and ancient tribal hatreds, and battling over scraps of overused earth in guerrilla conflicts that ripple across continents and intersect in no discernible pattern—meaning there’s no easy to define threat.

 

As Naipaul wrote of urban refugees in “India: A Wounded Civilization”, “They saw themselves at the beginning of things: unaccommodated men making a claim on their land for the first time, and out of chaos evolving their own philosophy of community and self-help. For them the past was dead; they had left it behind in the villages.”

 

The American ethnologist and Orientalist Carleton Stevens Coon Wrote in 1951 that Islam “has made possible the optimum survival and happiness of millions of human beings in an increasingly impoverished environment over a fourteen-hundred-year period.” Beyond its stark, clearly articulated message, Islam’s very militancy makes it attractive to the downtrodden. It is the one religion that is prepared to fight. A political era driven by environmental stress, increased cultural sensitivity, unregulated urbanization, and refugee migrations is an era divinely created for the spread and intensification of Islam.

 

The intense savagery of fighting in such diverse cultural settings as Liberia, Bosnia, the Caucasus, and Sri Lanka—to say nothing of what obtains in American inner cities—indicates something very troubling that those of us inside the stretch limo, concerned with issues like middle-class entitlements and the future of interactive cable television, lack the stomach to contemplate. It is this: a large number of people on this planet, to whom the comfort and stability of a middle-class life is utterly unknown, find war and a barracks existence a step up rather than a step down.

 

He takes from Martin Van Creveld’s "The Transformation of War".

 

The book begins by demolishing the notion that men don’t life to fight. “By compelling the senses to focus themselves on the here and now,” van Creveld writes, war “can cause a man to take his leave of them.” As anybody who had experience with Chetniks in Serbia, “technicals” in Somalia, Tontons Macoutes in Haiti, or soldiers in Sierra Leone can tell you, in places where the Western Enlightenment has not penetrated and where there has always been mass poverty, people find liberation in violence. In Afghanistan and elsewhere, I vicariously experienced this phenomenon: worrying about mines and ambushes frees you from worrying about mundane details of daily existence.

 

Debunking the great military strategist Carl von Clausewitz, van Creveld, who may be the most original thinker on war since that early-nineteenth-century Prussian, writes, “Clausewitz’s ideas…were wholly rooted in the fact that, ever since 1648, war had been waged overwhelmingly by states.” But, as van Creveld explains, the period of nation-states and, therefore, of state conflict is now ending, and with it the clear “threefold division into government, army, and people” which state directed wars enforce. Thus, to see the future the first step is to look back to the past immediately prior to the birth of modernism—the wars in medieval Europe which began during the Reformation and reached their culmination in the Thirty Years’ War. Van Creveld writes, “In all these struggles political, social, economic and religious motives were hopelessly entangled. Since this was an age when armies consisted of mercenaries, all were also attended by swarms of military entrepreneurs….Many of them paid little but lip service to the organizations for whom they had contracted to fight. Instead, they robbed the countryside on their own behalf…Given such conditions, any fine distinctions…between armies on the one hand and peoples on the other were bound to break down. Engulfed by war, civilians suffered terrible atrocities.

 

As crime continues to grow in our cities and the ability of state governments and criminal-justice systems to protect their citizens diminishes, urban crime may, according to van Creveld, “develop into low-intensity conflict by coalescing along racial, religious, social, and political lines”

 

As state power fades—and with it the state’s ability to help weaker groups within society, not to mention other states—peoples and cultures around the world will be thrown back upon their own strengths and weaknesses, with fewer equalizing mechanisms to protect the.

 

The belief that we are all equal is liable to be replaced by the overriding obsession of the ancient Greek travelers: Why the differences between peoples?

 

James Kurth…explains that whereas nation-state societies tend to be built around a mass-conscription army and a standardized public school system,, “multicultural regimes” feature a high-tech, all-volunteer army (and, I would add, private schools that teach competing values), operating in a culture in which the international media and entertainment industry has more influence than the “national political class.”….Writing about his immigrant family in turn-0of-the century Chicago, Saul Bellow states, “The country took us over. It was a country then, not a collection of cultures’”…During the 1960, as is now clear, America began a slow but unmistakable process of transformation. The signs hardly need belaboring: racial polarity, educational dysfunction, social fragmentation of many and various kinds.

 

Hitler and Mussolini each came to power through democracy. Democracies do not always make societies more civil—but they do always mercilessly expose the health of the societies in which they operate.

 

Jeffrey Sachs…writes that “good government” means relative safety from corruption, from breach of contract, from property expropriation, and from bureaucratic inefficiency.

 

After its peacekeeping failures in Bosnia and Somalia—and its $2 billion failure to make Cambodia democratic—the U.N. is on its way to becoming a supranational relief agency. Rather, I refer to the increasingly dense ganglia of international corporations and markets that are becoming the unseen arbiters of power in many countries.

 

“The government of man will be replaced by the administration of things,” the Enlightenment French philosopher henri de Saint-Simon prophesied. We should worry that experts will channel our very instincts and thereby control them to some extent. For example, while the government fights drug abuse, often with pathetic results, pharmaceutical corporations have worked through the government and the political parties to receive sanction for drugs such as stimulants and anti-depressants, whose consciousness altering effects, it could be argued, are as great as those of outlawed drugs.

 

Take…”extreme fighting”…Asked why they came, they said that they wanted to “see blood.” The mood of the Colosseum goes together with the age of the corporation, which offers entertainment in place of values. The Nobel laureate Czeslaw Milosz provides the definitive view on why Americans degrade themselves with mass culture: “Today man believes that their is nothing in him, so he accepts anything, even if he knows it to be bad, in order to find himself at one with others, in order not to be alone.”

 

An elite with little loyalty to the state and a mass society fond of gladiator entertainments form a society in which corporate Leviathans rule and democracy is hollow.

 

Given the surging power of corporations, the gladiator culture of the masses, and the ability of the well-off to be partly disengaged from their own countries, what will democracy under an umpire regime be like?

 

Kissinger from “A World Restored”…Whenever peace—conceived as the avoidance of war—has been the primary objective of a power or a group of powers, the international system has been at the mercy of the most ruthless member of the international community.

 

Kissinger: Disorder is worse than injustice. Injustice merely means the world is imperfect, but disorder implies that there is no justice for anyone, since it makes even the mundane details of daily existence (walking to school, for instance) risky.

 

A person raised in a middle or upper-middle-class suburban environment, a place ruled by rationalism in the service of material progress, has difficulty imagining the psychological state of affairs in a society where there is little or no memory of hard work achieving its just reward, and where life inside a gang or a drafty army barracks constitutes an improvement in material and emotional security.

 

 

Just a quick concluding thought: the antidote is Christianity. It brings a hope and courage to a life that works in the worst of broken down situations and allows those filled with truth to rise up and not surrender to the baser modes of survival.

I am sitting here in Sparta enjoying, as Joan has explained to me, the convergence of the cold from the North meeting the warmth from the South over our heads today. Out one window I watch the garden grow, looking forward to the fruits of easy labor from the soil of the Mississippi Valley, while I listen to a musical birthday present from my youngest, Audra.

 

I came across a bible study I would like to tackle some day. It is located at Hotel Babylon. It brought back memories of my business days at Biblesoft as well as gave me justification for my interest in politics and world events. Here is a description of Daniel’s life leading to the importance of prayer 3 times a day for a hard working administrator:

 

Daniel’s prayers are about politics. He is preoccupied with the State he is

working for and also for the future of his own people now in exile. But his

scope is not at all pious and personal. He looks at the international stage,

depicts it as a series of titanic struggles between mythical beasts and in

doing so demonstrates a whole new way of looking at how countries

interact.

 

And here is a nice slicing together of the lesson learned from understanding Daniel’s needful prayer life:

 

The Daniel Day (but not Lewis) Plan

Morning

The urgent versus the important.

Start with what is important.

Today is the first day of the rest of your life.

1.What big picture stuff needs addressing today?

2. For whom are you responsible and what can you do today to fulfil that

responsibility and leave them better supported than this time yesterday?

3. For what are you responsible and what can you do today to fulfil that

responsibility and leave them better supported than this time yesterday?

4. Where do you see God’s kingdom and order coming in your life today?

5. Bring the important things you have identified to God. Pray them through

while watching for changes in their perceived importance and urgency.

Turning to the urgent

In your mind split the absolutely urgent (must be done today) from the rest.

How are you going to get the urgent done?

How can you stop new urgencies derailing the extreme urgent stuff you have

just identified?

Bring extreme urgent things in front of God. What does God perceive as

urgent? Why is this?

Pray them through while watching for changes in their perceived urgency.

Pray for the protection of the urgent to ensure that the urgent actually gets

done.

Prepare for the contingency of the urgent not getting done. What happens

next?

People

Pray for the people you have to deal with today with both the important

and the urgent things you have to do. What is important to them? What

urgencies will drive them? How does God feel about these? If God calls you

to be a person who serves and is merciful to others, how do you perceive

this working itself out today?

Evening review

Play back the day in your mind: what happened.

Play back the day as a history book. What was historic?

Play back the day as a list of activities: what important stuff got

accomplished

Play back the day as soap opera. Who were the main characters? How did

the plot develop? Did the day centre around you?

Play back the day as gospel. What was God up to? Where was God?

Pray first for situations brought to mind from the first playback

Pray next for the important stuff (cf Psalm 90:17 the prayer of Moses

Establishing the work you do) and diminishing the stuff that wasn’t helpful.

Pray next for the activity list asking God to help you judge whether what

needed to be done was done.

Pray for the people you were with today. Ephesians talks about God having

prepared the things we are to do. Pray about the scripts people have to

work to tomorrow as a consequence of what has happened today.

Pray about the increasing of God’s rule and kingdom as a consequence of all

the things that happened today good and bad.

 

I had a great visit to St Elizabeth’s Hospital in Bellville today. One of our ladies in church had a friend of a friend ask if I could go and visit Donna. I called ahead and asked the nurse about seeing visitors and specifically about a preacher visiting her. I received her OK. I came into the room as a nurse was attending her. I had to dress up in hospital garb, gloves, mask and robe.

 

So I began a great time with Donna. The conversation turned to the bible and she was wanting to read the book of Ruth. Well, as this is one of the sweetest stories in the bible it couldn’t be better. So I recalled the story of Ruth to her, enjoying Naomi’s name change, and Ruth just happening upon Boaz’ fields and the harvest party ending with Ruth’s marriage to Boaz and their son Jesse the father of David.

 

We moved on to the woman being stoned (the woman (where was the man) caught in adultery). I recounted the story with the mystery of what Jesus wrote in the sand. Finishing with Jesus’ admonition to go and sin no more. We finished with a recap of the book of Ecclesiastics. All is vanity and the conclusion to love the wife of your youth, work and love God.

 

She started to tire, but seemed to be enjoying the mini-sermons, so I took the opportunity to pray with her and for her and then headed home probably as ministered to by her as she was by me.