Carey Rowland's blog

Foundation for Debt Ceiling Research

Now is the time for all top dawgs to come to the aid of their country, y'all.

I'm talking about heavy hitters like Warren Buffett and Donald Trump, people whose impact can really make a difference.  If Donald and Warren want to contribute their money-gathering expertise to our national improvement, I propose they should organize three great charitable fundraising events. I'm suggesting that these guys do it because I'm just, like, one little guy with a big idea. But these two have the real wherewithal to get something done in the interests of balanced fiscality. 

So, the first  fundraiser would be a prize-fight in Atlantic City featuring George Soros v. David Koch.

The second would be a fight in Las Vegas between Bill Ayers and Charles Koch.

The third would be a tag-team wrestling match with the four heavyweights in Chicago.

Referees would be Mitch McConnell and Harry Reid.

Rush Limbaugh and Chris Matthews would serve as the official voices of USA Spurts.

All proceeds would go to the brand-new Foundation for Debt Ceiling Research, to be fiduciarially managed  jointly by Goldman Sachs and ACORN.

So Warren and Donald, when you get a minute, give me a call and we'll get going on this thing.

Glass Chimera

 

Michael's trouble and Naomi's hope

This is an eye-opener, although parts of it may disturb you. But Americans can not operate a democratic republic with heads in the sand.
Whether you''re with them or against them, the Occupyers are now fanning out a spectrum of ideological strategies, and our nation will be changed as a result. The societal inequalities they protest will not be easily disposed of. We must consider and analyze their complaints if our nation is to get over the polarizing hurdles that now obstruct our governing urgencies.

Although law enforcement agencies in cities throughout our nation have undertaken, for the most part appropriately, some restrictive measures to contain the Occupy campers, these people are not going away. They live among us, as does the Tea Party whose signs were raised before them.
To glean some understanding of where this thing is headed, I recommend a listen to this one-hour panel discussion:

http://www.democracynow.org/2011/11/25/occupy_everywhere_michael_moore_naomi_klein

The New School/New York City meeting of minds was sponsored by The Nation magazine,  and recorded at the above link for Democracy Now!. Michael Moore and Naomi Klein are positioned, as it were, at the two bookends of the discussion, with three other well-spoken panelists between them. The troublesome film-maker's controversial presence is appropriately seated on the left. Naomi's seasoned optimism later provides a constructive balance on the other end of the table.

Compare Michael's grudge to Naomi's hope.
On one end of unfolding Occupy Wherever drama, Michael Moore says, with an odd excitement in his voice, he'd like to overhear the fearful trepidations now being uttered nightly in the bedrooms of the 1%.
On the other end, Naomi Klein admonishes the Occupyers to move beyond the "outrage phase" to a new phase of hope.
Which way will the Occupy movement move?
The way of the American revolution, or the way of the French revolution?
The way of constructive democracy, or the way of a vindictive reign of terror?

Michael Moore is a genius of video programming, and he certainly expresses in his work a powerful advocacy for underpriveleged people, but he does have some problems, mostly that he presents everything in good vs evil terms. But ourmaterial world, including capitalism, is constituted in  shades of gray everywhere you look, whether you're facing left or facing right. Here are just a few of the key phrases that indicate his judgemental attitude:

~ the "beginning of the end of an evil system"
~ deficit/debt ceiling as a "distraction", as if fiscal responsibility were not a real issue
~ "they (the 1%) created this...all the pain and suffering," as if pain and suffering had not existed before corporatocracy
 .
Michael Moore prefaces his caustic assessments somewhat with a hopeful observation that the Occupy movement has "aleviated despair in this country" and "killed apathy." This is true. But here is what's worrisome about Michael Moore:

Toward the end of the program, he mentions the inspiration that he imbibes when contemplating that a mere two people, Marx and Engels,  occupied unbroken ideological ground over a century ago. Unfortunately for the world at large, what Marx and Engels could not foresee was the onslaught of oppressive state power, through the cruel manipulations of  Stalin, Mao and others, that would later be perpetrated in the name of their theoretical wealth and power redistributions. Someone should remind Michael Moore and his comrades just how the Stalin and Mao movements turned out after their early revolutionary phases. Contemporary protesters would do well to remember the words of one of their patron saints, John Lennon, who sang, "...but if you go carrying pictures of chairman Mao, you ain't gonna make it with anyone anyhow." While that Beatlish warning may be politically incorrect in China, it surely applies here in the land of the free and the home of the brave.

In contrast to Michael Moore's hyper-critical inputs, Naomi Klein got her turn, later, at the other end of the 5-member panel. Her well-prepared spiel included a listing of positive changes, "a track record of developing alternatives" that have manifested in practical applications since the Seattle WTO protests in 1999:

~ solutions to the ecological crisis becoming solutions to the economic crisis
~ green co-ops, as in Cleveland
~ farmers' markets
~ community-supported agriculture
~ community renewable energy
~ localizing economies
~ devolving power to community levels, decentralization

These last two or three are the ironically dubious components of an evolving Occupy agenda, insofar as this: the federal/statist interventions required for implementing egalitarian measures are inherently contrary to decentralizing reforms, unless the federal actions are  at some point withdrawn or minimized. How likely is that?

The happiest item on Naomi Klein's constructive list was her mention of the 14 bicycle-powered generators being used to fulfill electrical needs at Occupy Wall Street. This happened after the police had removed their gas-powered generators, which was a blessing in disguise since the campers needed some incentives to overcome their own fossil-fuel dependencies. I'll commend them for investing some innovative sweat equity to capitalize  their dream of green energy.
 
At moderator Richard Kim's direction, Naomi Klein addressed directly the issue of federal/state involvement. (I know for a fact, this is the biggest objection that arises from our conservative factions, especially since government programs are funded by taxes.) Naomi tempers the session's wonky explorations with an appropriate admonition: "State power can be just as alienating, as corrupt as corporate power."

And there's the rub, America. As a wise creature of the forest once said, "We have met the enemy, and he is us."

Glass half-Full

Judah and Israel

Settling back into the Appalachian homing crib now, after a west coast week turnaround, I'm puzzling about the few days I spent observing the Occuppyers at Seattle and Vancouver.

Yesterday I get an RSS email from Phyllis Chesler pronouncing the Occupy movement antisemitic.Whoa!

She presents some convincing evidence in her 5-page posting, with video quips of two Occupy LA  protesters whose statements about bankers reveal some authentically deliberate Jew-bashing, and there's a lengthy, detailed sign about the old bogey Illuminati/Freemason conspiracy, whch was a dark strain of allegedly hidden connections that I had investigated briefly about 33 years ago.

So I get to hypertexting around on the net, and sure'nuff, there's more to this Occupy movement than meets the all-seeing eye. More evidence shows up on Jeff Dunetz' yidwithlid blog:
Yid with Lid wrote:
"The MSM (mainstream media) worked very hard to brand the Tea Party Movement as Racist, but it wasn't. They are working just as hard to ignore the blatant Antisemitism and libelous demonization of Israel coming out of the Occupy Wall Street protests, and they are. It is not just a few nuts within the Occupy Wall Street Movement who are bashing Israel and Jews, it is the leadership and founders."

A few more clicks mouses us around to a different point of view, the other side of the shekel, from Dave Weigel at Slate:
Weigel wrote:
"There is a problem: The movement isn't anti-Semitic. It started in New York. Its ideological hero is Naomi Klein. This is a movement studded with liberal Jews! Here's one video that's gotten less play than the one of the irate anti-Semitic dipshit with the "Nazi bankers" sign: The Kol Nidre in New York, at the Occupy camp."

If Naomi Klein is such a formidable player in this Occupying wave, and she is Jewish, then how can the movement itself be antisemitic? Furthermore, If you view the 3-minute video (Kol Nidre, above) that Weigel posted, in which a large group of obviously Jewish dancers joyously stepped into Yom Kippur, it is obvious that the Hebraic delegation is untimidated about putting their best feet forward in the Occupy WallStreet festivities.

So we see one group of Jews who are out to change the world with their involvement in, among many other leftist movements, Occupy WallStreet etc; its the J-Street apologist contingent, the old socialist/labor cadre, the Yid liberal strain whose purpose is to confront the slings and arrows of world injustice and equality, and by opposing end those evils.

And we see another group of Jewish people,  including the grand old man of anti-defamation exposé Elie Wiesel, who have detected (accurately) within that same broad Occupy movement, an insidious strain of nascent nazis nestled nefariously in the shadows of  the sign-wielding rabble. Yes, the Jew-haters are in there; they lurk among thousands of protesters.

So is the Occupy WallStreet movement antisemitic? Yes and no.That makes it like just about any other political movement  in this melting-pot that we call America.
 The Judah-apologist school of Judaism and the Israel-defensive school are strange bedfellows nestled within the same religious/ethnic heritage; one is reformative and communitarian, the other is orthodox and conservative. Oy vey. What else is new? It's been this way since Rehoboam and Jeroboam.

The tension that exists between these two camps of Judaism, as represented by the activist Golda Meir strain and the prosperous Alan Greenspan strain, is as old as the Judean hills, and they have lived with it long enough to convince the world that they are here to stay.  Either way, they're not going away. Thank G_d.

The contemporary quarrel between liberal and conservative branches of political Judaism is reconcilable when surveyed through this proverbial wisdom  from Yid with Lid:

"Jewish tradition respects economic success, so long as it is obtained honestly, and proper respect is shown for the social responsibility that comes with it. That social responsibility is a personal duty and a job for the community led by its religious leaders, but not for the government."

Last link. Over two millenia ago, the prophet Zechariah posted this on his website:

"...I took for myself two staffs, the one I called Favor and the other I called Union...I took my staff Favor and cut it in pieces, to break my covenant which I had made with all the peoples...then I cut in pieces my second staff Union, to break the brotherhood between Judah and Israel."

And its been that way ever since. But hey! Mazel tov and L’chaim!.
But if you want to see what occupation really looks like in the here and now, look at this pic I snapped at Occupy Jerusalem six years ago:

Glass half-Full

The American

The American invents things, develops new technologies, seeks efficiency, strives for productivity, turns a profit, pays taxes, lives and dies.

The American wants to be self-reliant, but expects there are times  when seeking the help of others is necessary. Independence is a state to be sought after, but when in the course of human events in becomes necessary to link with others in order to get the job done, then so be it. He doesn’'t want to ask what others can do for him, preferring instead to ask, "How can we help you today?"

The American takes personal responsibility seriously. She works hard, but takes some time off now and then.  He generally knows what he wants, but realizes you get what you can until what you want is within reach.

The American collaborates with others to build bridges. Sometimes she discovers deep down inside a destructive impulse to burn those bridges. Maybe she herself has been burned, with injustice or abuse. But what good can come of being vindictive? To forgive is divine. To move on is necessary.

An American gets a transfer, or switches jobs when it just ain't happenin'

He plans ahead, but expects the unexpected. If something can go wrong, it will. He'll cross that bridge when he comes to it. She sees obstacles ahead, but doesn't obsess about them; they are understood to be part of the landscape. Trouble comes with the territory.

Yet is he faithful, and knows when to persist, and when enduring humiliation is a chasm that must be crossed. She perseveres through thick and thin.

The American may occasionally use objectionable language, but he learns that inserting the f-word, the n-word, and a few other ill-advised utterances can prove self-defeating. A tactful propriety may prove more productive, and even political correctness has some value now and then. Euphemism can be fun, but speaking truth plainly when others are occupied with beating around the bush can prove quite expedient. Cut to the chase.

The American speaks correction to a bully, a thief, or a drunk.

Most of the time, he is kind, but every now and then a little means streak comes out, and must be checked.

She’ll cut you some slack, but understands there comes a time to take it back, for your own good, of course.

The American is neighborly, but he doesn't pry into other people's business.

She is tolerant, peace-loving. He defends the weak instead of exploiting them.

She minds her own business, but persists in making appropriate inquiries; he sees that some folks want to be left alone.

The American wants to discern the difference between a means to an end, and an end itself.

She tries to save money, like grandma used to do. He wants to work hard for everything he has, but sometimes just an afternoon of NCAA basketball will contribute miles of inspiration that neutralizes exhaustion. With potato chips and a beer or two.

He doesn't do pie in sky, nevertheless understands the power of dreams.

She appreciates the liberty of being casual, but enjoys spiffing up when it is time for cuttin' a shine.

He takes a shower every Saturday evening whether he needs it or not.

The American turns on his hot water spigot, his car ignition, her electric light, but takes it for granted. It may not always be so easy.

Playing by the rules is a prerequisite for order and for decency, but there are some times when practicality, or fair play, requires that the rules to be set aside. Wisdom is knowing the difference.

The American respects law, but has been known to occasionally scoot under the changing red, on a bad day.

On a good day, which is most of them, he’ll wait his turn.

The American avoids talking about religion or politics. If you believe that, I've got some swamp land in Arizona I'll sell ya. De Tocqueville can tell you more about that.

The American is a democrat, or a republican, but that third-party possibility is always in the back of his mind; it could happen, although when's the last time it did? 1840? Who knows? Wikipedia?

The American is liberal, maybe even a socialist, but possibly a conservative, perhaps a libertarian, but not a communist, although those who wish to stand beneath that banner have liberty to do so. But they are barking up the wrong tree, or spinning their muddy wheels.

It's a free country.

The American votes, and likes to keep up with what's going on in the world, and to form an opinion of her own, although it is not so different from everybody else’s as she might think. Hey, everybody has an opinion, but what’s it worth?

What’s it to ya?

Through each American--through her, through him--government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from the earth, if that citizen is willing to do her part, and pull his weight. The American says keep up the good work, and keep on keepin' on.

Last one out, turn off the lights.

Btw, Are you an American?

Glass half-Full

Intelligent Chaos, by chance?

"He doesn't believe in evolution," spoken about a political candidate.

How about baseball--does he believe in baseball?
"Well, yes. I think he likes the Cowboys, er, I mean the Rangers. And he likes the Yankees. I mean...Mickey Mantle, Roger Maris, ya gotta love 'em, and Yogi Berra, who said 'the future ain't what it used to be.'"
Probably not the Red Sox then. He probably doesn't like the Red Sox, if he likes the Yankees?
"Uh, no, he'd say anybody but the Red Sox.But maybe the White Sox. I think he likes them."

 What about apple pie? Does he believe in apple pie?
"Well, yes, probably. I mean...this is America, for God's sake."

The flag--does he believe in the flag?
"Absolutely."

What about Chevrolet? Would he drive a chevy to the levee?
"Actually, he drives a Ford. Have you driven one lately? Besides, I don't think he can afford a Volt."

How 'bout mom? Does he believe in motherhood?
"Oh, yes. Surely he does. I mean, who doesn't? How else would we have gotten here? Everybody has a mama."

But not by evolution.
"No."

What about Natural Selection?
"Oh... for sure. Naturally. I'm pretty sure he believes in that. And he may even acknowledge natural selection and evolution as two of the plethora of natural processes that contribute to biological development, within creation."

So he believes in Creation?
"Sure. How can you not? I mean, its all around us."
So  you believe in Intelligent Design?
"Oh yeah, I've always had a Mac. I use it for everything."
You're not into Windows, then?
"Nah. Any Windows-based system can't hold a candle to a Mac. But I will say this about windows: Whenever God closes a door, he opens a window. I'm thankful for that."

Well ok then. I'm glad to hear it. Thanks for sharin'.
"Da nada, man.  Its a free country."

CR, with new novel, Smoke, in progress

Ich bin ein Americano

Classical music--the Eurocentric, orchestral kind, with Bach and Beethoven and so forth--had reached a dead end by the time the 20th century rolled around. The great masters had done their thing, had flung their genius tapestries of sound into the expanding universe of human culture. Bach and Vivaldi had long ago established a foundation of finely-tuned complexity and passionate virtuosity.Mozart and Beethoven then erected upon their base an intricate structure of technical perfection and artistic reverie.
In the 1800s, impressionists, Ravel and Chopin and others, flung the masters' exquisite  orchestral constructs onto a canvas of blended colors and introspective wanderings among the forests of a disappearing natural world.

When the 20th century came roaring in with wheels of steel, endless hours of  numbingly repetitive work, and dark forebodings of mechanized war, the old impulses of harmony and order in music had been lost. Massively organized concerts of deathly destruction had ground themselves into a muddy halt on European battlefields. A bewildering wasteland of alienation was spread out upon what had been a world of high culture.
Orchestral musicians sank into an abyss of academic irrelevance and bizarre experimentation.

Then along came an African bound in merciless servitude to a sweaty cotton dock down in New Orleans, and that formerly-enslaved black man restored to the fallen world of Western music what it had lost: rhythm.
And the rest is history. Well, it all was, but...
That ole man rhythm shuffled his feet, walked up a worn-out gangplank onto a Mississippi riverboat queen where he wafted up to Memphis, planted a few cotton-eyed blues shoots. Then he churned on up to St.Louis where he laid down some soon-to-be-classic 12-bar roots, and then  beat out a trail on up to Chicago and got some uptown soul goin'on. By the time ole white on rice had laid his badself down and he be ready to do a little receivin' from de black folk he done brought hisself clear on up to New Yawk where he stopped and did some serious orchestratin' and western music was reborn in cradle of slavish trouble like nobody ever known in the history of the world.

And then came Gershwin.
Then the hopelessly stricken world of organized western music could get back on the boat in New Yawk harbor with some desperately needed pizzazz and a shine on his shoes, and transport his bad self around the world. And I told him dat.
And this is what I thought about when I heard, all on the same day, three awesomely talented clarinetists from totally different musical strains yesterday at the waterfront in Seattle.

1.) First there was Doreen Ketchens playing along with her tuba-totin' hubby and (probably 9-year-old) daughter cuttin' a shine on the drums while Doreen flung out that ole dixieland licorice stick magic right in the middle of all them white folk at Steinbrueck park overlooking Puget Sound. Doreen told me, while I was buying their CD, they had just arrived from New Orleans three days before.
2.) Then there was three talented fellers thumpin out a kind of retro ragtime klezmer thing goin' on right in front of  the original Starbucks at Pike Place. They called themselves the Millionaires' Club, and I laid down some jack for their CD too.
3.) Leaving the Pike Place tourist mecca area, back up on 1st Ave, was yet another clarinet virtuoso. He was doin the solo thing, a la Joni Mitchell's For Free scenario, blowin' out those groundbreakin'  clarinet strains from Gershwin's soulful  Rhapsody in Blue.
Sorry I didn't buy his CD, but I did come back here to our son's place and start writing these thoughts.

And I remember thinking, in the midst of all that clarinetish genius in the middle of a gorgeous sunny Seattle day, and recalling the old Blood Sweat and Tears Tune, or maybe it was Chicago who sang that "I think it was the fourth of July" song about being in the park with all that native energy goin' on and all them happy folks and ice cream cones and red white and blue what not, and I thought, for some reason, of President Kennedy telling the Germans back in '61 that there is some help and some hope for a world that has fallen into destruction.

And he told those Germans that there was hope, and he said that when the world wants to get you donn,  that old bad honkin' world should just come to Berlin "Let them come to Berlin..." said Kennedy to the Berlinners in 1961. Let them come and see how you've rebuilt yourselves in freedom that has overcome the ashes of tragic world war.
"Ich bin ein Berliner," he told them, figuratively. I'm a Berliner. We're all Berliners on this bus. We can all rebuild from the ashes of history. We can all overcome the sinful tragedy of an African bound to a cotton bale on the docks back in New Orleans back in the bad old days. And I thought...Let them come to America and see.
Ich bin ein Americano, and proud of it.  

Glass half-Full

No tulips nor tomatoes here.

I work for a pretty good company; we manage and maintain apartments, a whole lot of them. I am a maintenance guy, and enjoy helping folks solve their little  household breakdowns. I fix many toilets, sink drains, holes in the walls, broken doors and such.

Funding comes  indirectly through the U.S. Department of Agriculture, as that federal agency subsidizes tenants' rental needs.

In front of the apartment buildings where I work, there are mulched ground areas for sparse shrubbery. In past years, some residents have wanted to use  small portions of their time and energy to put a few plants in the ground--tulips or lilies in the spring for color and cheer, tomatoes and maybe squash for a few veggies on the table later this summer.

But the tenants are not allowed to plant anything for themselves. Instead they are required to view the sterile, pine-barked grounds outside their windows, and live contentedly  appreciating the unproductive, boxy little shrubs spaced three or feet apart along the front edge of the building.

And of course they can amuse themselves watching TV.

This seems a little odd to me, considering that the place is subsidized by the U.S. Department of Agricultural. Folks are prevented from growing a little food of their own?

I suppose it is just a sign of the times--life in the post-productive USA.

Glass Chimera

 

Faithful Presence

To change the world-- a noble challenge to which we Christians have always aspired-- now becomes a new call to service issued by James Davison Hunter, in his book by the same name: To Change the World.

Dr. Hunter's clarion call is preceded in the book by an analysis of historical and contemporary manifestations, among the people who call themselves servants of God, of that God-inspired inclination to make the world a better place. Hunter's analysis identifies three strategic camps within  American Christianity today:
~Christians whose dominant cultural identity is found in defending themselves and their institutions (especially the family) from encroaching secularism; (the "defensive against" camp, as defined by Prof. Hunter)
~Christians whose motivation for divine fulfillment is centered on working toward justice, and toward institutional and individual benevolence to help poor and oppressed people; (the "relevance to" camp as defined by Prof. Hunter)
~Christians whose purpose is to maintain and advocate a pure manifestation of Christ's work and teachings, with emphasis on peace and non-violence; (the "purity from" camp, as defined by Prof. Hunter)

After a cogent description of each, and consideration of their various impacts upon society as a whole, James David Hunter concludes his book's message with a new (although its as old as the prophet Jeremiah!) paradigm for Christian involvement in our secularized world. "Faithful presence" is the strategy by which we authenticate God's love for all people by adopting societal well-being as our own. This requires us to accept worldly responsibilities for the welfare of the communities and nation in which we live. Rather than despising worldly society we take our places, prepared and enabled by God, within it.

Our biblical example and precedent for this collaboration is found in the exhortation that Jeremiah issued to the Jewish exiles in Babylon, two and a half millenia ago. The prophet told them:

"Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I have sent into exile form Jerusalem to Babylon: build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat their produce. Take wives and have sons and daughters; take wives for your sons, and give your daughters in marriage, that they may bear sons and daughters; multiply there and do not decrease. But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare." (Jer. 29:4-7)

I emphasize that last sentence because I think it summarizes well the essence of Professor Hunter's point. Even more importantly, though-- it is a biblically sound, potent call to service for our generation of Christians and all those who follow us--"faithful presence" in the community and nation in which we each live. Responsible presence, caring presence, contributing presence, and hey--presents! at Christmas and other appropriate times.

The "welfare" of which Jeremiah speaks above is not the governmental dole system which in some cases enables laziness and lethargy to overtake people who are down and out. Nevertheless, our welfare system--woefully deficient as it is-- is not beyond the capacity of our great God, through his son Jesus, to redeem and sanctify those unfortunate citizens (Christian and otherwise) who partake of it.
So do not judge those who find themselves stuck in that dolish "welfare" predicament. But rather, work as God's productive people, saved by the blood of the Lamb, to lift the levels of living water in God's sea of humanity so that all boats will rise within it.

Glass half-Full

Birth of democracy in Islamic lands?

We Americans are caretakers of a noble experiment that goes back 235 years. Since 1776, we have attempted to govern ourselves through consensual politics that is enabled and protected by a constitution. When it comes to democracy, we are perhaps grand old masters of the game; but when it comes to fledgling democratic impulses in a 21st-century world, we are the new kids on the block, trying to puzzle out what is going on while the rest of the world moves too quickly for us to assimilate.
During the fiery days of our revolutionary birth, the urges for freedom had been squeezed out of a painful crucible of Christian Reformation and Enlightened humanistic Rationalism.

But now we are witnessing, through media, nascent democratic movements in Muslim North Africa and the Persian Gulf. We must understand, however, that we see this amazing roll of events only through a myopic, self-deceiving lens of electronic images and theoretical biases.

We must not deceive ourselves into thinking we know anything about what is going on over there, although the consequences can be huge for us and for the world if things go wrong. There is a lot at stake, including, just go ahead and admit it, the frigging oil supply.

With or without full understanding, we as Americans must necessarily  support the democratic movements that prove to be authentic, even if the resultant chaos is scary as hell.
In Egypt, for instance, the united front of idealistic, young reformers emanating from Tahrir is now fracturing into a collection of disparate groups. Which faction will emerge with the mantle of leadership?
It needs to be all of them, and none of them. What do you expect from a democracy?

Look at our own inception. We had the Patriots and the Tories, then the Federalists and the Democrats, the Whigs (whatever they were), then the Republicans and the Democrats, which we still have today.  Who came out on top?  Both of them, and neither of them, and that's the way it should be. What do you expect in a democracy?

In contemporary Egypt, they have--let's just say for the sake of rhetorical simplicity--two poles of political possibility. On one end are the "democrats." That's the broad, generic meaning of the word. They're the ones who got on Twitter and Facebook and made this whole thing happen. But they are young and disjointed, zealous but politcally inept, and certainly naive when it comes to dealing with the army, the police, and entrenched political structures. Charles Levinson offers, in the Wall Street Journal,  an initial inventory of some  leaders who may emerge there:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703561604576150604132131990.html

So, on one end of Egyptian political possibilities we have these liberators.  On the other end are the Islamists, aka known most commonly in that particular country as the Muslim Brotherhood. They are well-established, well-organized, legalistic, and (to this American Christian) scary as hell.
But in a free society you can't have one without the other. You're always going to have the wild-eyed democrats on one end and the fanatical legalists on the other. I mean, look at Wisconsin.

Anyway, we Americans need to support the thrust of democratic reform in Egypt. And if we must take sides as events further unfold, I say it is necessary for the cause of freedom that we support fully the young secular whippersnappers with their tweets and facebooks.
http://blogs.aljazeera.net/middle-east/2011/02/15/live-blog-egypt
When the time comes for Egyptians to select between them and the Islamists, the young democratic-republicans need to have our full support, lest the "brotherhood" muscle their way into a new repression based on Khomeini-style religion instead of human (and I believe, Creator-endowed) rights.

There are of course many dark clouds on the horizon.

Daniel Greenfield opines on the Bahrain situation, which is very different from Egypt, for numerous reasons, the two major ones being 1.) puppeteering hegemony between Saudi Arabia and Iran, and 2.) the labor  constituency in Bahrain being largely foreign ( ie Pakistani) imported labor, instead of native citizenry.

 Mr. Greenfield also links to a report on a Tunisian mob gathering vindictively outside a synagogue in Tunis, which is quite alarming when you think about it from an historical standpoint, pogromically speaking. And Mr. Greenfield also mentions the emergence, back in Egypt,  of one Qaradawi, whose  high-profile leadership in the Muslim Brotherhood could indicate what direction that well-organized force will take in politics along the Nile.

The energetic impulse for political reform in the middle east is forged, like ours was, partly upon religion. But this time the religion is not a blooming protestant Christianity tempered with latent humanistic rationalism, but rather a fierce Islam that considers itself restricted by the historical dominance of Europe and USA.
The rolling revolutions in North Africa and the middle East--are they Islamist or democratic?
They are both. But for the sake of true political freedom, that's a chance we'll have to take.

Glass half-Full

the 9/11 Dilemma

These days, people in the western world don't put much stock in sacred texts. Since we've evolved beyond all that quaint mythology and hocus pocus, we prefer not to acknowledge the the very real forces of spiritual contention that strive beneath our tragic history.
As literate as we are, we have not yet figured out that probably half of the world, myself included, is still bound up in the traditions of ancient religions. Most of the devout folk who derive their morality from these diverse streams of human spirituality congregate in their respective synagogues, mosques, churches and temples. By gathering together, believers reinforce their faith, multiply it, and extend it.
The educated members of our species eschew the old associations, and view them as divisive.

Certainly, human history reveals that religions are divisive. But the cold, hard, inconvenient truth is that if we weren't killing ourselves over religion, we'd be whacking each other over something else, like oil,  food,  real estate, or each other's spouses.

As a believer, I find myself here, September 11, 2010, on the tail end of the Judeo/Christian tradition. That particular stream of faith documents, among other events, many historic disputes that have arisen among various luminaries of the faith, most notably these two: Jacob/Esau, Isaac/Ishma'il.
 

But hey, the most recent offshoot of the Abrahamic tradition is, alas, Islam. Read em' and weep, all ye Christians and Jews. Torah/Bible says God ordered the patriarch to go up on the mountain to sacrifice his son, Isaac, whereas the Q'uran identifies the prospective sacrifice as the other son, Isma'il. Islamic tradition says that Mohammed was taken up by Allah at the rock, which is now within the Dome of the Rock. Christian revelation specifies the next ridge over, the Mt. of Olives, as the location for Christ's second coming. The Jews, meanwhile, are down at the wall wailing and crying for Messiah to show his face.

Among modern readers of these texts, people who are literate beyond religion tend to allegorize, or reject altogether, the spiritual truths that have been brought forth. Among literal-minded readers, however, steadfast faith leads to scriptural doctrines that can prove to be quite dogmatic.

When a fundamentalist of one sect burns, or threatens to burn, the sacred texts of another, swords--these days guns and bombs-- come out of the sheaths.  The cool-headed members of our species consign such stunts to vain sound and fury, signifying nothing. Nevertheless, most of the religious folk of our world are still taking sides on these issues.

Excuse me, but I am one of those dreaded religious relics of the human race who favor faith over diversity. Although I'll try to tolerate anyone who doesn't want to explode me, I'll not concede that anything goes in the universe of truth.
Therefore, even as coolly objective as my secular, multiculturalized rose-colored-glasses-wearing better-angels would like to persuade me to be, I nevertheless take my place on the great mandala by sharing this song, which I laid down a few years ago with some friends of mine in David Browne's studio.
We've got a song to sing.