AND SO IT GOES

 Thank you, Rabbi Billet, for inserting the short but unfortunately true pasuk reminding us, warning us that our worst enemies will come from within, vipers within the nest. Unfortunately, this has been true Since the beginning of time One can cite the incident of Joseph being sold into slavery by his brothers, to the Arev Ra of the time of exodus. To Israelites and/or Jews who cooperated with our enemies to further their own situation. Converts to other religions who spoke ill and with great lies of their former neighbors and friends and family. Ghetto police and Jewish Kapos. Ancient Israelites who helped our enemies find ways to get into Jerusalem, destroy our Temples and exile our people from our homeland.

We have had Jews from right to extreme left outspoken against the resurrection of our homeland for religious reasons, for selfish reasons and through a fog of misunderstanding, and ignorance of history, Our history, your history, ours forever. These days, we find you immersed within, swallowed up or displayed in the front lines of people protesting the fight of Israel to survive, to defend its citizens, to create a peaceful and prosperous Middle East. You stand there and chant for your death, for the death of your families, for the death of each and every Jew upon the face of this earth. With your grossly erroneous behavior nations now feel free to tear off the fragile curtains behind which they hid their antisemitism. Now look around and see what you have done. Yes, you, perhaps mistakenly thinking you were doing the right thing, but so manifestly the wrong, and it is time for you to understand exactly what you have done.

Praised the slaughter of innocents of October 7 and before and after and ever ongoing. You have colluded with our enemies to starve and torture our own; look at the pictures of our Holocaust survivors of today and know that this is what you have done. Watch the family and the video of October 7, the two young boys seeing parents killed before their eyes, pleading for their lives and begging, shouting, they wanted to go home. See and understand what you have done and continue to do. You have turned in your dangerous misthinking and actions against the very nation which watches over you and all of us round the world, a haven over the years for persecuted Jews.

Others who know better have equally taken the wrong road. The recent letter of purportedly Modern Orthodox Rabbis condemning Israel using the words of our enemies, who would cheerfully and viciously see you and yours dead - Chilul Hashem to the nth degree. You have failed your congregations. You have failed the classes you teach, be they child or adult. You have failed your people, and you are among those false leaders in our history who did us massive, major harm. For sure there are major bones to pick with you. But I also do have a bone to pick with Michael for his comments about modern orthodox. Claiming they're lacking a great deal, bringing them down to a level of not being good Jews in observance and feeling, even perhaps one can interpolate the comments to the point of accusation of not worshipping their Lord properly with the correct mindset.

This dangerously supports the condemnation that we, as Jews, are facing today, and in particular, that the Modern Orthodox are facing today. First we have lost our own sense and definition of what it means to be modern orthodox, even and especially modern orthodox of my time, those who sang joyfully in the synagogue, where women attended synagogue every Shabbat and brought the children with them from infants in arms to pre bar mitzvah, unless the children had already gone with their father. Judaism and worship are and always have been and are meant to be a family activity where children are welcomed to learn of the joy, of the obligations, of all that it means to be Jewish, and to join in the post prayer mingling, to be of the Jewish community. These Modern Orthodox are those who delighted in observing the rituals, those who shared with their friends the joy of the keeping of the mitzvot.

That joy is missing in many of those calling themselves Modern Orthodox today, for there is less joy, almost no singing, children are almost deemed contraband, interfering with the prayers, even as the minyans, the group of worshippers these days often praise the faster one, even on the Shabbat, the special day of rest and worship. Today's modern orthodox unfortunately have begun to copy customs and rules and regulations, adopt practices, which actually have nothing to do with religion and the joys of the holiday. Observances have become too often matters of display sending wrong lessons down the line.

Those who refuse to follow that path and who try to remain as such are denigrated by those of other sects of Judaism, from yeshivish to Chassidic and back again all the way to the barely there Jew. Told they are doing too much or too little and then feeling guilty and so small, insufficient and incorrect in their observance of Judaism. And they begin to believe what they are being told. I believe that we would all be better off if we all minded our own business, do what you believe and let others do as they believe. It should be a live and let live without harm and leave all consequences, if any, to the final Judge of all.

We, all of us, from Chasid to Humanist Jew, have forgotten what it means to be a Jew. The joy and the responsibilities, the ancient long and proud history, the deep, sincere and true knowledge that we have an eternal homeland and the injunction upon us to fight the wars we must, to defend ourselves and to defeat the enemy. At times of crisis there is an injunction upon us to defeat the enemy to the last one and when we do not follow that injunction we are asking for trouble in the future. We did not listen to that command when we fought Amalek and that one survivor brought forth upon the Jewish nation horror, hate, death and destruction in every generation.

We are Jews. First, last and always, no matter what disguise we don, no matter where we live, always, no matter our accomplishments and contributions. If one forgets that fact he will surely be reminded by others. The rabbis are incorrect in their opinion, misquoting or ignoring complete injunctions Equally as many rabbis as bright, equally as erudite, can come up with all of the verses within the entire Bible, the Tanach, and refute their erroneous letter. Yes, welcome the stranger within their midst but not to welcome their enemies, not to make their enemies feel at home. Give charity, help those in need, of all denominations and ethnicity, walk in the ways of the Lord but not to commit suicide by strengthening the enemy or by ignorance of the necessity to fight all those who wish to have us gone - forever. Peace - yes but after the victory.

So it was yesterday; so it is today; let us hope it is not so tomorrow.

Am echad, Lev echad.

Hinei mah tov oohma'naim,

shevet achim gam yachad.

SO. IF...

  Yesterday I was asked a question based on the posting I did. It was thus, so if I am so questioning of war and why it happens, and seemingly so confident in the possibility of ending it, then why am I not saying the same about the war in the Middle East between Israel and the numerous Arab/Moslem nations there? Why can this war not be fixed, resolved, all the underlying issues taken into account? 

The crux of the matter is that is not a war like other wars. There have been other wars of long duration: The Hundred Years War, The Seven Years War, The Cousin's War, World War II from its official inception and even its prologue. Civil wars within many nations, including ours, also lasted through multiple years. In some cases, the causative issues have not yet been resolved, including right here in the good old USA. 

But the war in the Middle East is different. It is a war that began multiple millennia ago, when the Lord Above spoke to Abraham, the first Jew, and promised him and his descendants the Promised Land, the entirety of the land then called Canaan, to be the new homeland of His people, the Jewish nation. Forever. This is the same G-d of the Christian religions and the Muslim sects, whom they call Allah, the first two letters meaning the same - Above, incorporating the belief that G-d was above all. Both of those religions derived from or were born from the original one - Judaism.

 Abraham was then told by G-d to leave his homeland, the land of his forefathers and go to the Promised Land. Thus began a long, long journey of thousands and thousands of years. Many times, for various reasons, the majority of Jews were exiled from that land but always and forever they returned. There was never a time when two things were not true. The first is that there were always Jews residing in Israel. Always. The second is that Jews never abandoned Israel as their promised homeland, no matter how well settled in and loyal to the lands they were in which they sheltered. Always incorporated in their prayers was a desire to return. Always they prayed in the direction of that land, their homeland and in the darkness and the hell of the Holocaust in a secret synagogue they prayed to return to Zion. In the massacres and expulsions from lands of the Diaspora, their prayers remained the same.

Christians and Muslims then took the upon themselves the claim that the land was their promised land and for hundreds of years, they fought over that belief even as they knew that it was not so. It had been promised to another nation, so stated in the same Holy Book they all venerated. That original nation had no objection to their presence, to their habitation within the land, as long as the truth was always first and foremost: the land of the Israelites by word of G-d. 

Over the centuries many Jews made the holy trek to the site of the two temples, built and rebuilt on the same site of the near sacrifice of Isaac, the main sanctuary of Israel, the Mishkon, before the building of the Temples. The site of the Holy of Holies only to be entered after long and careful preparation by the Highest Priest of the land and there to commune with the Lord.    

Thousands upon thousands of archeological relics prove the presence of the Jewish nation in this land. That we built the temples. That we always were in the land. No matter how hard the Christians denied it. Or claimed we did not deserve it as we refused conversion to Christianity, and as the Moslems felt the same way. No matter how many of those pieces of evidence were and are crushed, discarded, as the Muslims continue illegal, immoral digging and discarding in the depths of their mosque, as they profane its holiness by bringing in weapons and set up ambushes from within, dishonoring the site of supreme holiness belonging to the nation of this land.  

The Jewish nation. 

The People of the Book.

The Nation of the Promised Land.

Ours yesterday-

Ours today.

Ours tomorrow.

Ours for all days to come.

So said the Lord.

So promised the Lord.

So continues the Lord to say.

 The next posting will continue to develop the reasons why there is a difference between this war and the other wars of humanity.

 

APPARENTLY

 Apparently, we have all forgotten how to break things down into parts and pieces so that we can understand the causality, the motivations, the outcomes, the issues, and the possible solutions that could stand the test of time and sense and reality. This is extremely clear when one delves into situations within the world which can possibly set off inadvertent consequences greatly hostile to a safe and secure world. 

Worse is when these consequences are meant to happen even as the instigator dons a cloak of surprise and regret - though never enough as to ameliorate the matter and bring it to a safe and mutually satisfactory conclusion which will lead to a permanent peace. This situation most often occurs when biases interfere with logical and fair thinking and a lack of understanding of the causalities and the truths of the matter. What develops then is a situation which defies resolution and the bloodshed continues without any visible paths to the end. 

There are many such situations round our small globe which defy any and all attempts to resolve the issues. The causalities are many and deep: clan and religious conflicts, apparent insults to honor, the taking of revenge, greed for land, ambition for more wealth and power, desire to return to a "better"   time, tribal differences and so many more, as many as can be ginned up by a willing advocate of war.

War can be beneficial to a nation, to its ruling class, to a politician looking to deflect blame, or one looking to climb the rungs to power. It can be for need of a suddenly precious mineral or access to a shipping lane. It can be for reasons unfathomable or buried so deep in the past that it cannot be found nor understood. War can arise when we ignore history or pick and choose pieces of history which support our points and ignore any which would prove hostile to it and then refuse to end the matter. To concede defeat is out of question and thus on the bloody matter goes. And on and on. 

Areas and regions of conflict can all be exacerbated to the point where the opposing sides are so confused and apparently it is beyond their ability to find a resolution; hence on it goes and it feeds upon itself. Those who see personal and national benefit in its continuation manage to keep it going. Unresolvable, it just gets worse and worse and drags more and more people into it. Each new character entering the stage generally does nothing to the benefit but rather adds to the harm and the exacerbation and confusion and makes resolution even more difficult.

With some effort we could solve some of the decades long, ongoing issues - Somalia, Somaliland, South Sudan, Sudan, Ethiopia, Armenia, Georgia, Pakistan, India, Philippines etc. for the guidelines are there. The wishes, the hopes are clear and justice can be found. For that to happen there must be compromise, at times, difficult, even painful, but it is certainly better than a constant war, a constant shedding of blood, a constant lack of a future for so many. 

However, there are conflicts which seem to defy all matter and manner of compromise and resolution. Too many within those difficult conflicts have no honesty in their words or intents and desire the whole rather than finding some hidden pathway to mutual satisfaction and a permanent realistic path to where wars will not be a seemingly natural occurrence every few years, and where peace will be possible, not merely a holding place till war seems beneficial to the instigator. 

China and Tibet. Russia and Ukraine. Multiple Arab and Moslem nations and Isreal. Turkey and Greece. These are areas where peace never breaks out in any permanent manifestation The aggressors are clear. The violations and denials of history are clear. Yet the world does not see through the fog and larger and more powerful entities enter the fray, claiming to have the answers, the key and yet all they do is exacerbate the situation. They add to this boiling pot of troubles their own personal issues, rubbing the sore spots and aggravating all the irritations already there. 

These areas become proxy wars for these powers testing themselves against each other, trying to prove to the world who should be the boss. They become testing grounds for new military equipment so much better at killing people. Any cessation of conflict is destined to be temporary for these powers need to flex their muscles, to be top dog, the alpha of the world.  They shout at each other and the world flinches and reacts. These reactions are often based on the thinking of the times, by which hands hold the reins of power and by the trends of thought sweeping the globe. 

The dogs of war are constantly unleashed, and the Horsemen of the Apocalypse are riding fast, the hooves of their steeds pounding the ground beneath, ever closer, louder, powerfully. The venom of hatred rises, ever more intense and toxic with no antidote available nor any on its way. 

Unfortunately, millions of people are caught up in these situations and are too often left to their own devices to figure out how to survive. Survival on its very basic level. Food to keep body and soul together. Access to clean water. Some kind of shelter from the elements. Dreams of a future for themselves or their children discarded, unrealistic.  Aid from those nations which can afford to send aid, who should send, is almost spastic in flow. Political affairs within those countries affect its flow. Even if actually getting to these countries, rebels or terrorists within often gain control of it, keep it for themselves or sell it on the black market. Medical aid is also severely restricted, insufficient even at the most basic level, nor necessarily what is most needed.  

Wars and areas of conflict, full blown or small, simmering away, are growing exponentially. Simply pay attention to the news, listen to the claimed issues and not understand why we cannot find another way to resolve matters, why we cannot learn to share our finite resources and lands, why we cannot work together to build rather than destroy.

Why can we not use the wisdoms of yesterdays combined with the powers and possibilities of todays and build secure, peaceful, productive tomorrows?

Answers, anyone?

 

"IT'S ALL LOVE..."

 And ain't that just a perfectly beautiful statement Imagine, a world encased in a glove of love with a golden aura, a stunning halo surrounding the Earth. A beautiful role model for all the universes yet to be found and a worthwhile urged attempt to match the dreams of Lennon's Imagine". That is until one reads the addition to the statement and the halo tarnishes, proven to be fool's gold, and it crumbles into useless pieces of disappointment and despair. Oh, what is the second part? This: ...'it's all support for Palestine".

Now the whole thing just implodes as people ask the question: Where is love when violence is urged, when old, boring, yet deadly tropes of antisemitism are revived and applied to Israel and Jews in general? When a prominent supporter of the murderous Palestinian terrorists, the same ones who planned and committed the massacres and abominations of Oct7, who manually strangled   infants, who continue to hold captives and torture and starve them to the point of death - admits that "We are not fighting Israelis; we are fighting all Jews.".   

As the world stood still, stood by, or roared against all Jews, well- where and when does this ever end? The same deeply disturbing pseudo-science of eighty years ago in dire and vivid reality again, and the core of every decent human being should be shaking in disbelief and despair that such an ugliness, a total devaluation of humanity, this deadly Deja vu, continues to be alive and well, rather than a starving despised outcast from humanity. 

So where exactly is the love? Certainly not at the concerts of the twisted, perverted hatemongering group known as the Kneecap, a very telling name, as to kneecap someone is to permanently, painfully cripple a person. Certainly, most conducive of engendering a despairing mood, a "yeh-ush" so deep, so bone tiring that there is no other word for it. It is a cry to the heavens, involving the entire being, all mental and physical faculties, mouth open wide, arms raised as high as they can go, and then some, and the heart is broken, shattered, unfixable.

Where can we turn? To whom do we turn for aid, for shade on a hot summer day that has lasted for way over two millennia. Doctors are told they are bloodsuckers. Teachers are finding insults scrawled on the boards of classrooms. Children are called names long thought to be entries in the dead word dictionary. Economic boycotts are called for and politicians are harassed until they fall in line with the haters. Jewish institutional buildings are vandalized, and Jews themselves have become targets of violence, even death. 

No, this is not all love but rather its very opposite. It is the sanctioned, even urged, violent release of all negative emotions and inclinations in a paroxysm of all that is incompatible with the claimed "love". All the while this release of hate focuses on Jews. Even those who have benefitted from time and money given by Jewish people, by Jewish organizations, which have no bias and fund all in need, have joined in with this ugliness and shout loud and clear words of threat and violent intent. Even as they are aided by the battles fought in their name and in the name and cause of all, these beneficiaries turn on those who have given of themselves to them, for them, been warriors for them in the streets and in the courts.  

Can our leaders help the matter, or do they make it worse? Are they actually actively involved? Sad to say -yes, they are, and more fall in line day by day, seeking assurance they will be reelected and maintain their little murky pond of power. Today, the very air is rank with the odor of cowardice, hypocrisy and greed. Any moral spine of the majority of the politicians and the lawmakers has been negated by the baser instincts and desires residing within these people. In fact, it appears that only the judiciary, and not all of them, have the courage to stand up against and to Trump and all he has enabled.  

Yes, all that he has enabled, for though at present he appears to be supportive of Israel, he has let loose the dogs of hate and violent prejudice. All those right-wing groups and militias whose chants spoke of hate and violent plans for Jewish people, all those who joined in with his attempted rebellion, now they appear to spin away a bit from him in his current - current - supportive position for Israel.    

There are already hints of softening, a weakening of his support for Israel. This grossly impatient man who deems himself a ruler, walks in the steps of the ancient pharaohs and in the steps of modern-day dictators - as they say, so shall it be done, so it shall happen with very little distance between the one and the other. When there is that distance and edicts do not happen in the blink of an eye, there is a withering of support. That is the current situation today, like it or not. 

He boasts of being the source of the release of all the hostages, but not so. Perhaps the shouting, his boasting and his demands and threats and flight with the Israelis actually worked for release of hostages in February but he had naught to do with what came before. He obviously has not managed to gain the release of the rest, despite the horrific videos emerging of Holocaust survivors in the form of young Israelis, just edging into adulthood, torn away from the world and thrust into a world, a Hell, of yesteryear. 

There they remain, dying, tortured, and all the hot air boastings and threats of Trump have amounted to a storm in a teacup, at present. Hamas hunkers down, ever more stubborn, for they see the threats for what they are - hot air amounting to a storm in a teacup. Deadlines of two weeks for something to occur have routinely passed by with nothing happening other than anguish and horror for the hostages and their families. 

As for the world, well, all they do is ramp up support for the murderers, the Beasts who attacked the sovereign nation, who deny the legitimacy of that nation, clearly enunciate their goal as the elimination of Israel and in fact the entire Jewish people. Each nation who has fallen like dominoes in a row into the camp of support for these murderers, has given these animals the strength and determination to continue this war. It incentivizes them to resist surrender, for the longer this situation continues, the more they are given, the more their lies are given validity as truth, the more they are treated as the victors. 

Hamas is then emboldened to continue on its road of blood, and the world goes along, gets along. All the while they claim they are combating Anti Semitism and supporting Israel's right to exist, to defend itself, however, not like this and not with our support equipment to be sold to you. Nor with any action taken to defend Jews under attack, their communities vandalized and threatened.      

This is a world in a vicious state of topsy turvy belief and action. Loyalty to truth, honor, legitimacy, and history are abandoned along the roadside of current civilization. In a world, which boasts of progress it has made, of the steps they have taken to advance civilization, all that is actually mirrored back to us is a degeneration, a turning away from truths newly uncovered and acknowledged. Back to lies and memes of ancient history and errors long overdue for internment. 

Now apparently, we have returned to a world of dictators and barbarians who wreak havoc and hell upon all. The fetid ugliness and odors of hate and corruption, the awful coppery smell of spilled blood, infuse the air until one is forced to run, escape, and spew out all that the world has become.

Led by untrustworthy weak spined leaders who shame that word, the world is in a bad spot. Frankly, I see no way out of an inevitable war. Waged in ways and methods and modalities which will bring us back to the age of barbarians, we will see and know the truth of our thinking or lack thereof, but it will be too late. The damage will have been done. I wonder. Will it be possible for humanity to rebuild in a better way, given a second chance? Wonder what G-d thinks of that!  

On the recent trips I have taken I have been carrying a new burden. Truly, knowingly, I have been more watchful, seeking for doors and exits, eyeing people, checking them for kaffiyehs or pins or shirts of hate towards me and mine. I know of two glaring ones but also know of support as found in idle conversation or by questions re the necklaces I wear.   

Is there hate? Oh yes. For sure. Are there those who are still sane and good? Yes. But are they powerful enough, determined and motivated enough to defeat the forces of evil and negativity?  Of the answers to those questions I either do not know or I hesitate to verbalize. Much too frightening.

All the yesterdays,

All the todays,

All the tomorrows

What will be?

WORLDS AND CHOICES AND US

  Good day, everyone. I'm back. I said I'd be back on Tuesday but find myself able to post today so I hope you will all reach out today or tomorrow and once again share with me the topic(s) of the day.  One of the interesting thought-provoking activities was the chance to squeeze in some pages in two books in between festivities. 

 One book I already had begun, and I've written before about the author, John Connolly, continued the rather dark, but mixed explication of life even as he tosses in some sparks of light, albeit the sparks have themselves some moments of dimming as well. His introductory quote is an oral/written representation or interpretation of his novels and the messages and warnings he telegraphs to us via his characters.

 “I prefer winter and fall - when you feel the bone structure of the landscape, the loneliness of it, the dead feeling of winter.

 Something waits beneath it, the whole story doesn't show." (Andrew Wyeth) 

The next echoing words in my head, which I both deny and accept, dispute and agree with, depending upon my mood - optimism or pessimism, I find myself in a game called Uncertainty. I am uncertain as to its depth of meaning and to the possible impact of understanding, and the importance and possibility or impossibility of all that it lays out before me. In other words, is there a lesson for me I could take and run with? Help me to have a better life? Or is it merely the writings of a talented writer and really there is little to no connection to me at all? I certainly have never lived any of the lives that the characters of these books have lived so what and how could I possibly extrapolate? Nevertheless, the words of Andrew Wyeth found a home in me.

 The other thoughts which caught my eye come from a book called It's OK That You're Not OK.  It's basic topic deals with grief and loss, and how to help the grieving understand what has happened. How it is possible to go on without guilt, even with some comfort, as life continues, changed, yet there, along with the grief for the lost person or lost 'something'. Even to create or synthesize something better, positive, contributory and honoring whom or that which was lost.

Charles Dickens writes in A Tale of Two Cities a famous introductory paragraph which sticks to even the most reluctant reader. He writes a paragraph of comparison and contradiction, of a world so confused and confusing, dramatic contrast of hopes and dreams of the top and the despair of the hopeless bottom class of society, two protagonists so opposite in character, of two opposing lives and upbringing. Two cities, two worlds, at one and the same time. The best of times. The worst of times.

 That is, I believe, the message that all three of these authors wish to convey to their readers and audiences and are long lived and very successful in that ambition, regardless of the surface differences of them. It all portrays an eternal issue and question of life, no matter time or place, no matter the society. The sooner we recognize and internalize its truth, the sooner we can address it, fix it, and provide understanding and comfort to those in need.

 "There a twin paradox in being human. First, no one can live your life for you - no one can face what is yours to face or feel what is yours to feel - and no one can make it alone. Secondly, in living our one life, we are here to love and lose. No one knows why. It is just so."

Two lives, two people or more, two choices, two and two and two. To be good, or to be bad, to justify the means for the end or find another path. To choose the wrong path - always and forever or to try to do better, to reform. To love and share, to remember and honor. To love forever and forgive life's errors. Yours and one who has gone on, if necessary or to thank that one for the precious gift and joy he gifted you and shared with you. To emulate that person.  

To keep a smile on your face, as a beautiful couple marry, with G-d in their hearts, with family and friends sharing the moment, even as the tears roll down your face because one is missing, leaving a gaping hole behind. But we all take comfort in that the one who has left us has also left behind the warmth of the memories shared, the character so golden, everything so wonderful, and all that is so terribly sad in the absence.

But yesterday, all those that have passed, all the todays we continue to live with the memories in our hearts, so bright and clear, all the tomorrows forever to be a part of us, never to be gone, long and deep in our hearts, These are thetwo Yitzys the two Yitzys we hold tight, never to let go. The one eternal, watching over us with those who have gone before and the one who remains always with us as we talk of him and remember him, and laugh and cry, all at the same time.  

Lives are different, lives are unexpected in the turns they take. 

We can take advantage of the time we have and make our lives and the lives of all who love us, who we love, who have come and gone before us, or who are with us now, take that opportunity to walk in the different worlds we meet, take the best of  them, honor their purity and goodness. Do not shame their memories and turn all they have left behind for all of us, all that we hope to do good and honorable in our time on this earth, all that is so possible for the future. 

Do not shred and disrespect the values of those who watch from above. Choose the lives and the worlds we are given for our lives, and carefully and always do the best we can, even if they are hard worlds. 

We in our family and those who were blessed with the gift of knowing Yitzy, feeling his glow, his goodness - remain true to his values, what his life represented. His absolute trust in G-d, accepting the decision about his life and reassuring all that we should and must trust in the decisions decreed by He who knows best.    

In truth we do not know if we get more than one life, so we must be the best we can in the world we know. We are not meant to walk alone nor to let others be alone.

It is a better world where love and sharing and goodwill and kindness are valued traits, in words and deeds. Where people try to do their best and keep the nasty second world far away, even nonexistent.   

Love and life.

Sharing and comfort.

 Walk with others so they walk with you.

Honoring those who came before and contributed to a better world.

Remember Yitzy and keep him close even as he kept all in his world close, always kind, ready to help, modest, loved to share his jokes, to be the best boy he could be.  

This is why his loss was so deeply felt.

This is why people came to share and comfort.

To remember and honor.

Thís is why I cried at the wedding ceremony.

 So happy for the couple, but so missing Yitzy.

Unable to close the gap in the picture.

He was stronger than I, for I am still struggling with the decision which robbed us of him in this world.  

We will always love him.

 Always and forever a part of us.

In any and all worlds.

NO POSTS UNTIL TUESDAY

 No posts until Tuesday. Travel and Weddings. All good things

TO WIT

 Some readers have asked me why I continue to stress on and about Trump. Why do I constantly criticize him? After all, he is not the only power player in the world, is he? He is not the only head of government who is disappointing in their lack of leadership, their dullness and consistency in choosing the wrong path, opting for the wrong philosophy, and choosing to return to and spout loudly of an undeservedly long lived trope of hate which should long ago have been burned in the trash heap and smoldering fire of discarded aspects of humanity.   

Particularly during these rather uncertain times, it behooves the nations of the world to pick and choose wisely, carefully, for their leaders. Their very lives might be at stake. If an error in choice becomes very clear, then the people of the world need to be able and willing to discern their error and clean house, legally and as quickly as possible so as to avert possible violent consequences of inaction or delay in action, thus allowing for the wrong leader, enablers and sheep like followers to ensconce themselves deeper into seats of power,   making their rejection all the more dangerous and difficult. 

  These incompetents, ill informed, poorly thinking individuals who have become leaders in our times and at other times as well, are clever enough in a street-smart manner. They knew, know, how to appeal to the lowest common denominator among the population. They know how to rile the people up, one by one, grow these individuals into a mob and are quite clever at rabble rousing the mobs gathered and then set them loose upon the rest of the nation(s). Mob rule then prevails, grows ever stronger, and are invested with power and influence beyond, almost beyond, belief.

These mobs play a serious game of following the leader. They dance their ways through the streets of the towns and villages. Big and small. They gather up much of the refuse of the larger cities. They use the tactics of their leader: threats and blackmail; the Big Lie and its repetition; mercurial changes and shifts in position, creating confusion among opponents, for how is one to join with others, when they are not sure of exactly what it is they are opposing - at least for that hour or day! Confusion, the nacht und nebel of Hitler, always a winning tool of choice for the dictator. It joins together words and deeds in a powerful evil synergy meant to confuse and dishearten, to frighten people and in crossing of lines once thought impermeable, beyond the behavior of mankind. 

Well, we have bloodily, violently, learned otherwise - and then we go and forget it, over and over, again and again and yet again. We find ourselves back where we once were, seemingly meant to return to this vicious nasty barbed wire fenced in circle, trapped within due to our errors. Awaiting these errors are dangerous salivating wannabe dictators, drooling at the sight of their prey soon to be feasted upon as their latest dish upon which they will feast with great gluttony.  And not a one of us is immune to this fate for each and every one of us can find oneself on the receiving end of the knife, of disappearance. NO immunity - ever.  

With each successive despot the lines never to be crossed grow ever more distant. Hitler's concentration camps and sites of mass murder. The bloody violence in the war between Serbia and Kosovo. In the fate of Argentina's Desaparecidos.  The disappeared of Iran, of Pakistan, of China, of Russia. The slaughtered Tutsi. The constant warfare between the Hindu and the Moslems. The world vs the Jewish people. The specific tactics and timing and extent might differ, the targets possibly unique to a particular country. But the results are the same.

A cowed terrified despairing populace. And their own cowed, terrified leaders who imitate the stronger ones, and then generally all crowning One as Top Dog. The one with the best knowledge of application of blackmail and threats. Who has a bullying heart and a dark wizened soul. Who cares for naught other than himself, even as he pretends to. As ugly inside as out. A person with no morals, no concerns other than himself and accumulation of personal wealth, and power. Mannerisms are often crude and boorish with peculiar tastes and overgrown ego, hubris beyond that of any character in an ancient Greek play. One who deems himself worthy of any and all honors and is not shy at all in making that known to others, even demanding it of them. 

These leaders are often strange characters, often criminal in intent and actions, many times even convicted of such deeds yet managing to avoid consequences and willing to commit further misdeeds in the name of disguising more serious wrongs committed by him. There are a clear lack of morals and a generous heaping of strange personal habits and fetishes, warped in thinking and shorn of true values, they often go for the short cut, the deal, the 'bargain' with no care for an understanding of long-term effect.   

People who aspire to such a position desire to leave behind a legacy. However, due to their own vices and arrogance their legacy is negative. Their crude erroneous hunger for worship and idolization, of complete obedience by others, becomes clearer, even to the ones deluded and the truth of history will emerge, as always. No matter how intense the efforts to change it, the truth will out.   

Such a man is Donald Trump. A man whose words are not to be trusted, even when they are   ostensibly, on one's side, for that will be the side which is beneficial to him and his plans - at that moment. Should, when, the situation change, so will he if it is to his benefit. Such a moment is now with Israel. With the rest of the world indulging themselves in yet another paroxysm of hate and murderous intent towards the Jewish people, it behooves him to take up for them- to a degree. Even now, his words change often as his threats and promises are meaningless, as one day threatened to rain down hell on Hamas if they do not return the hostages immediately, yet months later, they remain, tortured, starving to death, and WHERE IS THE HELL? WHERE? WHEN?  

How long can we rely on your backup? Will you sell us out to people who invaded us, who deny our legitimacy? What is now happening with Ukraine and Russia?  

Time now for the world, for the people of America, to take this man down and place him where he belongs. Out of office. Time to call him to account for all that he has done wrong. Time to take his enablers and fellow traitors to account. Time to impeach and convict. Time for him to pay the piper for his crimes. Time to rid ourselves of a foolish yet dangerous man of orange face and newfound full head of blonde hair. Time to deny him his legacy along with those of his ignorant, incompetent crooked judges and legislators.  

I believe that Trump is the source of much that has gone wrong these past few years. He has taught others that bullying is acceptable, even to be praised. He has taught the world that selfishness is the name of the game, not brotherhood and unity for progress. He has trashed allies and befriended dictators. He has here, in the United States, along with his enablers, revived suppression and oppression, encouraged censorship and reduction of rights and aid to those who need it in one way or another - but not to the wealthy. I truly believe that his campaign against antisemitism, necessary, has an underlying purpose as well - that of repression and censorship. In going to the extreme in threats and imposition of breaking back fines, he is furthering the spread and intensity of antisemitism to JewHatred as more and more are now placing blame for all this on the Jews, exacerbating the situation and boding no good for the Jews, in fact and in truth. This could have been done in much better, calmer manner.  Done in a positive way without the negative.   

He has brought the once proud nation of the United States of America down upon its knees. No longer a role model, only a nation which has shed its glories and turned to ignorance and selfishness. We have gone from the likes of JFK and RFK to Trump and RFK Jr.   

I, and many others, want our nation back.

We want all that we gained from our yesterdays, the promises of the todays we once had, and the positive tomorrows ahead. 

Robbed from us by the thief in charge.

I want them back.

We need them back.

And that is why I write about Trump.   

EENY, MEENY, MINEY, MO ...

  There is another topic of interest related to the topic of Trump's damaged intelligence. That is the sad fact that neurodegenerative diseases be it ALS or Alzheimer's, Lewy Body, or Parkinson's, or any other syndrome within those parameters are increasing, becoming among the most common and growing diseases. That is what we and in fact, the world is facing, even as we refuse to admit this, refuse to recognize its immediacy, and we are left with a growing crisis of many fronts. Foolishly, we hide its prevalence and growth within senior citizens, let alone in early onset cases. We hide it and fail to address it. We are ashamed and whisper about our family and friends who suffer from these neurodegenerative syndromes. That exacerbates the situation for the individuals for it means delay in treatment so critically needed.

People use the excuse of the permanence of these    neurodegenerative diseases; claim it would be a case of throwing good money after bad. Treatment will neither cure nor stop it so why not spend the funds on curable diseases where there is not an inevitable death resultant from them. But that is not truly so, for there is help. Though the inevitable progression through stages cannot be halted in its tracks, it can be slowed down. It can be ameliorated and not merely in small degree. 

It may be held at bay for years, allowing for further research, for treatment, for prevention, for living with it in productive manner. To extend life itself and give hope to those who suffer from them and for their families and friends and allow for more productive years. Most important, when that extension of time is combined with deep and serious research, miracles can happen. Strong symptoms can be suppressed. New treatments can be applied to the individuals. This is what is happening now. Even extending to efforts to prevent these diseases in the first place. That would be the best news of all.   

Sadly, we are not there yet. Research grants and funding must remain in place, even extended. But   why then are we not doing so? Imagine a world where these scourges are gone. Understand the benefits of an acknowledgement of these afflictions and the importance, the necessity, to treat them. To treat them hard, aggressively and immediately upon diagnosis. Understand the benefits of an acknowledgement and the crucial need to diagnose those afflicted and to remember to continue to include them in the lives and plans of families and friends. Doing so is of great benefit to one and all. 

Do not encourage nor allow them to hide, to entomb themselves. Afraid and ashamed to venture out. It is in fact upon friends and families to make their own adjustments so as to include them in the life continuing. In a life of value with much joy awaiting them. Do not take upon yourself the old. outmoded attitude of shame and concealment. This is not a punishment for some vague sins. This is merely a biological inconvenience. Were we to treat it as such, attack it as it should be, we would be in a better place already.  

 Rather than expending effort in the wrong direction, take positive steps. Sympathy, yes, but pity - no! Instead, take these efforts and energies expended and do what we can to alleviate inevitable complications within life. We can drive people to therapy - occupational, physical, speech and cognitive when necessary. We can take them to movies. To libraries. Engage them in intelligent discourse. Make time allowances for slower feet and hands caused by stiffening muscles. Have patience. Help when asked and do not force it upon them. It is hard enough for them to know and admit they do indeed need help with everyday activities once automatic. Be gentle in your assistance so that it does not come across as an imposition forced upon you both.    

In all of these areas there is help. In all of these areas there is deep research going on. New medications, improved medications. And yet it is not enough. We could be doing so much more. We need to recognize its onset and not shout it as a curse or denigration of humanity, as the lesser for having one syndrome or another.  

On the other hand, we must recognize what is there, what is fact and what is needed? To ensure. the best life possible. To ensure proper cognitive ability to carry out jobs and tasks undertaken or assigned. And to be able physically to endure whatever strain it places on one's body. For the safety of all, know when it is time to step down. We must be able to distinguish case, causes, levels, consequences and actions called for one from the other, call it out as necessary and allow for functioning within the society without shame but also without danger for others.

And so. To real life. Unfortunately, one of the most blatant places where we allow for visible degeneration, particularly of cognitive ability and lack of physical endurance, of weaker body, mind and soul is within the government.  We have legislators with no age ceiling, known to be incompetent, unable to function on the level necessary and yet they get reelected year after year after year. Until they finally drop in the traces. But by then it is too late, the harm already done. The same case with the judges not up to the challenge of the complex issues brought before them. 

While it can be found in other areas, it is more prevalent within the government. More difficult to shift positions around where and when necessary.  Or so present in bizarre statement and actions, in rents and raves, word salad speeches, the bizarre rage always there, that it is clearly discernible, even as we refuse to admit it due to misplaced reasoning or worse, due to nefarious plans of one's own. The drain of cognitive ability from the mind is reflected with and by the deterioration of the physical aspect, particularly if one has never lived a healthy life.  

Unfortunately, one such blatant and egregious situation is to be found at the head of our nation's government, the challenged in every way possible man who would be Ruler, Trump. Even while his dementia has long been noticed, even called out, there are those who refuse to acknowledge that fact, perhaps doing so for their own nefarious reasons. They place our nation and the world in immediate jeopardy. More and more are recognizing his dementia and the danger he represents for this nation, but there are those who continue their foolish and dangerous path and they are taking us all along with them on this so very wrong road.   Truly, he is well beyond his sell by date. Observe him closely and then you too, shall see the truth.  A man trying to find his way through the fog around him. And yet we continue to allow this man to make existential decisions for us. Why is it so? 

It's because we, the people of this nation, refuse to see through our own fog to the truth waiting there for us. We have not lived up to our responsibilities, perhaps even suffering from a similar, national degenerative disease. We too seem to be suffering from some national mass degenerative syndrome, this one with shuttered eyes. Affecting us at ever faster rate. Is there some medication out there that can wake us up. Let us see what is going on, to smell the rot, to see past the lies to the truth. To the ambition of this man to be the Ruler - not the president.   

Cancel yesterday.

Wipe out today. 

Create a future bleak and hopeless. 

Or not. 

Up to you and me and all of us. 

Eeny, Meeny, Miney Mo - 

Where exactly do we go?

 

  

NO POST TODAY

 NO POST TODAY  COMPUTER BROKEN

"FIRE BURNING ON THE DANCE FLOOR!"

 The rest of that line of a popular song of many a year ago, is “Call 911”. Actually, my granddaughter did exactly that because she said she wanted to see what would happen if she actually called 911. As she was a very young child at that point in time, the detectives who showed up wanting to know if somebody had made a call from here, understood that. They spoke very gently to her and dried her tears, reassuring her that she was not going to jail for the call made, as she feared.. Unfortunately, the time for gentle words is long past time as we see our world afire, in  so  many ways. The world is afire and all we do is stand there, looky-loos - and all we do is watch and add fuel to the fire. Deliberately? Unknowingly? Accidentally?

The answer to those questions are difficult to find. Even more difficult to accept. Should we come to the worst conclusions? Are we that stupid? Dumb to our own actions and the consequences from them, of them? Do we not see what we are doing? Literally and figuratively. Whatever the answer is to that question, it is not good.

 If we are doing this unknowingly, why the hell do we not know? If we are doing this deliberately, well, what more can be said about that? If we are doing it accidentally, how is it that all these accidental moments are converging at the same time, burning up this very challenged globe we live upon. There are other questions, unanswerable, for our behavior is both despicable and dangerous to life and limb and to the continued existence of the human race. 

For whatever reason, humanity seems to be indulging itself in suicidal manner and intent. The result is a scorched earth policy. We are burning the land behind us. We are burning out our cities and forests. We are burning up the sources of oxygen. We are depleting all that we need to live as even the lowest form of life is threatened. All is consumed as the roaring fires race around the world in a scorched earth policy. Even should we wake up and understand  the situation, the eminent peril it poses for us, even accept blame, seriously, is there any effective tool, any manner of thought and action, of realization and acceptance of our reality as is, not as we make it to be, that could stop the conflagrations in its tracks? I am not convinced there is a true possibility of that happening.

So. In literal terms our lands and forests are burning up. We cannot keep up with the fires, and before we can beat one down another flares up. Worse than the other. Our homes, recreational venues in the midst of these forest fires are lost, unfortunately accompanied with the death of civilians and first responders, of the smokejumpers and firemen  who combat these flames so powerful they suck the very oxygen from the air. We further compound the disasters  and let our anger overcome our common sense as we set our own homes on fire, destroying them. Is there any other creature on earth that will do that as a way in which express their anger or grievances? 

We are killing ourselves, and doing it with an apparent relish. Furthermore, we indulge in the invention of new weapons, ugly, significantly more deadly weapons, even converting a child's toy into a dastardly weapon of death and destruction. We kill each other with equanimity, maybe shed a tear or two and then, well, life goes on. But we are not immune from the consequences as they spread to the furthest corners of our lands and take these hostilities into space, under the oceans, to the highest points of the world, the driest deserts. We are touched by them and overwhelmed by them. Why then do we persist in this homicidal and suicidal behavior?  Beats me. 

Even as we consume, beyond the breaking point, the insensate and the sensate treasures of this world, we breach the  borders of sensibility and lose ourselves in a vortex of horror, impossible to escape or avoid. Furthermore, we are not content to leave it at that or even try to remedy  the situation.  We simply persist in boxing ourselves into corners from which we cannot emerge. 

To that we add the sharpest side of our tongues. We use words which cannot be revoked. We use words  which hurt and harm more than sticks and stones.    These words, these threats, are words which preclude any settlement acceptable and healing enough between enemies and even allies. There is nothing to justify these types of behavior and harm incurred. And yet, on it goes. Over and over and over again. We ignore history. We ignore diplomacy and we place emphasis on the wrong, the selfish, in a brutal selfish quest for ever more wealth and power.  Dominion over all.

In the late news of the night a considerable segment was devoted to the question of Dementia and whether it is indeed already well ensconced in the bizarre brain, that which remains, of Donald Trump, unfortunately now sitting in the Oval Office. Shamelessly using that office to sell America. To enhance his family's businesses. To partner with any and all who would partner with him with the motivation to make a deal, no matter how shady, how compromised and compromising it is. All to increase their wealth. Along with the motivation, particularly within Trump to wreak revenge upon those who displeased him, upon those  who could with the proper organization and will actually unseat him. So on he slashes and bites  and wreaks havoc. All the while we, apparently, have and will continue to allow it. Are we that afraid of the damaged man? 

Is Trump demented? For sure. He has been so for a number of years. Yet all who fell for his ugly words of hate and extremities now refuse to acknowledge what they know and continue to excuse his trips, his falls, his misused and misplaced words. His rambling on. His inability to keep to a topic. Or to segue properly in a logical manner from one topic to another. He misnames groups and people. He shouts to the world of how wonderful he is, how deserving he is of all honors and awards. He is crass, a boar and a bore, and a sexual pervert and convicted felon on 34 counts. 

Via and due to his dementia, we, the people, are suffering as our government is dismantled. As our foundational basis is under attack. Shattering by the minute. We lose the respect of the world even as we have lost respect for ourselves. Even as he endangers us with his grossly harmful policies and Cabinet and departmental appointees of incompetence, nastiness and sheer stupidity.  With  their ignorance and incompetence and their clear intentions to endanger the health and welfare of not only Americans, but of the entire world. All to benefit the filthy rich and deepen the poverty and struggles of the middle and lower class economic  classes.  

Is he demented? For sure. Get him to a neutral doctor. Give him a test, both oral and in writing, in various formats. The same for mental illness such as extreme narcissism. Perform an open, thorough and honest physical exam from top to bottom and    tell the true already known, obvious results. 

Then due to his egregious violations of sanctity of the nation, and the following, determine that he is unfit for office, for many reasons and unseat him.   

Due to clear intent to disobey and shred the Constitution;

 Due to clear intentions and actions to incite rebellion and to violently, with bloodshed, murder and rampages through the buildings of the nation, with threats pouring from the toxic, berserk, and bizarre mouths and minds of the crazed mobs of his adherents,

Due to clear intentions to incite the usurpation of legal powers of the legitimate  government;

Due to the desire and acts and threats meant to demean, corrupt and cause the legislators to become  powerless, paralyzed and unable to carry out their responsibilities; 

Due to the clear intentions, via words, actions, and pushed clearly unsuitable, insufficiently  knowledgeable and inexperienced appointments, to dismember the Supreme Court, particularly those justices who disagreed with him. 

Due to overt acts meant to demean and threaten all who opposed him, including private citizens, public servants, public personas, foreign nations and dignitaries, thusly endangering the world order and the safety of the nation; 

Due to the clear and exercised intent to direct the official military of this nation to act, to take arms  against civilians of their own nation. Generally because someone in power or position in that civilian entity had displeased Trump and thus was deserving of revenge wreaked upon said  'guilty' person.   

Due to the fact that he squanders public funds to benefit himself, as in his birthday parade, the paving of the Rose Garden (Also attributable to his  poor taste which is not impeachable.)  

Due to his highway robbery of overcharging the government for his trips during which he took  huge entourages, housed them in his hotels and overcharged for their keep. 

Due to his transparent ostensible government  purposed trips where he stayed in his various golf resorts, conducted a bit of  official duties, none very strenuous nor demanding of much time. Then conducted his private interviews beneficial to him and his business, but then again, does he not do that now,  huckstering his Bibles, his coins, his boots.

Due to his interference with the confidential functioning and papers of the government to which he either had no business or handled grossly incorrectly.  Hmmm- on purpose or through innate stupidity? 

Due to his interference in almost every single governmental department, His insistence on taking charge of where he has no business, no precedent for being there and interfering. His determination to change history and to ruthlessly suppress, oppress and censor anything displeasing to him and his perverted view of life. 

Due to the ruthless butchery of all federal departments, rippling through the nation, destroying the smooth functioning of the government leaving it unable to serve the public, its offices' responsibility.  

Is he demented? For sure, and it is time we accepted that, accepted that most of us made a mistake, (though not I), And it is time we stopped refusing to see the truth. Understand where we went wrong. What and how we must correct in order to forestall any more harm being inflicted upon us.    

 Time to salvage our  yesterdays. 

Time to redeem what we have left of our todays. 

So well past time to save our tomorrows.

  

DEEPER, DEEPER, EVERMORE

 So. Traveling home yesterday - the reason there was no posting - I nearly had apoplexy while reading the New York Times. In fact, I believe the only reason why I did not yell out loud in the deepest throes of despair is because I was in a plane with a full capacity of passengers and thought it would not go over well for a little old lady to explode as she sought to find where and why and how her country had gone astray. 

Why we had allowed it to do so? The thought, no, the knowledge, that this was nearly at point of no return, I barely kept my mouth shut, refraining from shouting to one and all to wake up. Smell the treachery. See the treason. Watch yourselves in the mirror as you, we, all of us, cave in to the Dictator, to the man now clearly desirous of total control over the land he supposedly led. The same man who swore to protect and serve, to defend from traitors and enemies within and without. He is the within so who is there to protect us, the people of the United States of America?

 In fact, who would see the nation through the throes of yet another Civil War? Would the forces of democracy be strong enough, or were the toadies of Congress, as the embattled judiciary and the weasel judiciary fought to the finish, will we, the people of this nation fight. We who know the necessity of remaining true to the principles upon which this nation was founded, will we have the willpower to remain strong and committed? Will we enlighten those who have walked deeper and deeper into the swamp of treachery, fallen victim to the false words and promises of a man demented. Crazed with desire to rule the world, to be written into history as the Great Peacemaker even as he incites more hatred, more violence, more despair and  more apathy, hopelessness within those who see him clearly.

There is little that is true and decent within this man's mind and soul, his blackened heart. He has modeled himself and his actions after earlier dictators who did as he is doing right now. That is using the very laws of the nation against that nation. Playing the nation against itself. Using the words of the law, aided and abetted by coopted judges and legislators, he cowed out all opposition  via threats, violence, and public humiliation, and climbed rung after rung on the ladder to the dark clouds of dictatorship, of American Fascism. Suddenly, there he was, a rung or two away from total mastery. 

We allowed this to take place. We are the ones who refused to see the truth? To acknowledge his ugly ambitions. We did. There is, was, no one else to blame but us. Either we did not see the ugly truth, or even after seeing it, refused to accept it. All on us. Too many accepted his words of explanation, remained blind to the increase of violence, of vicious JewHatred  spreading through the land and the world. Even as he claimed  to be the  protector of Jews, using that as the excuse to oppress and suppress all who opposed him. He used his powers and the weaknesses of others to censor all words of opposition, who tossed humans away like trash, who appointed incompetent fools, dangerous in their inability to do a proper job and their eager obeisance to all he demanded of them. To be his sacrificial lambs should anything go wrong.   

Claiming to be the savior of Israel, to stand with   her as other nations, one by one, walked away, set the stage for a second genocide of the Jewish people; he  set her up for disaster.  He supplied arms and ammunition, Spewed forth in pompous bombastic manner words and threats all leading to further incitement of Hamas and allies. They did not cave to his threats and called his bluff - and he walked away, stating it was now all up to Israel. To do whatever she wished. For he had had enough. So many other places of war and violence where he could meddle and play mediator and peacemaker. And so Israel now would stand alone. With such 'friends', surely there was no need for enemies. A  trite but true statement. 

All this was not enough. Nor fast enough. His humongous appetite for power and wealth could not be sated, even as he sold the nobility of America for his own bowl of lentil soup. He paraded us naked before the world. He meddled in the affairs of others, even to the point of ceding their land to invaders, all in the name of his reputation as 'Peacemaker'. Resultant question. Using a ceding of eastern Ukraine to Putin with the reasoning that it was part of traditional Russia why not these scenarios? Putin demands Alaska as part of traditional Russia as they first settled it. Why not for Mexico to demand the American Southwest   for they were there first? Why not for Native Americans to abandon reservations and demand the territory now known as the USA?  

This is a man who governs by blackmail and threats. This is a man who allows, encourages even the separation of children from parents. This is a man who incarcerates the innocent in filthy, shameful conditions. This is a man who calls out  the military to wage war, yes, war, upon fellow Americans. To take over a civilian entity, the capital of the United States, and flood it with the military and federal agents. To threaten to do the same to New York. To Chicago, to all who displease the mighty king.    

 Have we not learned better? Must we emulate the tragedy of Kent University? Are we to continuously and forever ignore the fact that this man incited violent treason against this nation on January 6?   Look aside from the fact that he is a convicted felon and should be behind bars at this point. That he is a sexual pervert? That he behaves as a shameless huckster selling baubles for his profit from the Oval Office and the golf courses of the world?    

At this point, we still have the legal power and ways and means to impeach, convict, and imprison  this felon and his abetting honchos for the crime of treason and treachery. Retract the pardons of those already convicted and serving prison terms for their participation in the rebellion of January 6th.   

 What are we waiting for? Until it will be too late? Until we will be too powerless, too stunned? Unable to react promptly and positively, to  restore our nation to what the Founding Fathers wished it to be? 

Are we going to throw all our yesterdays of democracy away, cancel the todays we thought we once were guaranteed, and fail all the tomorrows of our nation as it should be?

This is what we are doing now.  

Time to stand up and speak out. Time to demand our nation as it should be. An end to an imposition of dictatorship. An end to corruption and incompetence.  

Now.

Before time is up.  

Tick-tock. Tick-tock.       

GOOD MORNING - A TAD LATE IN THE POSTING

  Good morning, one and all. Sorry for the delay in posting after a day off but a person has limitations. Over the weekend we celebrated the marriage of one of my granddaughters. It was a beautiful affair. The  enthusiasm, the joy, the celebration of this event was heartwarming and soul fulfilling. It was not an over-the-top wedding where thousands upon thousands of dollars were spent. It was, in fact, a simple wedding but one so graced with all that money cannot buy and that made it in fact and in deed, an over the top wedding.  

A stranger standing unnoticed in the corner observing this beautiful affair would have marveled at the enthusiasm of the dancers, at the roar of the music, at the smiles on faces as they all shared in a communal rite:  the marriage of two young people, willing, even in this time, to unite and continue the chain. To add another link to the links of the chain of the Jewish nation forged by faith in their G-d, in the promises of the Bible and the archeological proof of such, along with a sheer stubbornness enabling them to survive all that a hostile world has thrown at them. 

All the threats and all the swords dangling over their heads, consigned to the dust of time, as this beautiful new couple merged, uniting two strands into a new one. Another moment of joy and   determination, Another toss of the head at the haters. Another in your face to those who would deny the legitimacy of Jewish  people, the promise  of their native and ancient homeland, and the assurance that they will be, even as their tormentors are no longer.

But what about the rest of the world? Why cannot they all, we all, engage in moments of shared celebration, of recognition that beneath and beyond all that distinguishes us one from another, lies the truth. We are, each and every one of us, born with the same dreams and the same needs. These   dreams and needs can be filled together, with the efforts of the individuals creating a synergy such as the world has never seen before. One that will impel the human race, as one, to move forward in the right direction. Then, maybe then, we could actually realize the reality of beating swords into ploughshares and  stop the needless shedding of blood in the name of hate and selfish greed and obscene lust for power and dominion over others. 

We have come close before, edging into this  thought, but we, the world, in one way or another, led by one nation or another, or under the terrible hypnotism of a deranged yet brilliant personality, have a perfect record of destruction of such possibility and gone back, down the road to perdition, To resoaking a land already overflowing with the casualties of the stupidities of mankind. And so, we keep on, embracing all  that is wrong, negating all that we have improved, all in the name of what!!!

Last night, as I joined in the singing and the dancing, as I watched the young faces alight with shared joy, with hopes for the future, I thought maybe, maybe, just maybe, if we could somehow package it all, all that so suffused the air, we could actually take steps forward.

But that was last night and today is another day

Today is a day after several days' separation, whereupon I return to the nastiness of the headlines. The cutting slashes and bites of angry words   meant to hurt and to harm and to raise the temperature of this world to a most  dangerous level. 

Would that we could take the happiness, the positivity, the dreams of yesterday, merge it with the hopes still new and fresh of today, and meld it into a brilliant tomorrow.

Would that we could.

 Maybe we could  -eventually - if we so desire.  

Maybe.

GREAT MINDS

  No, I am not including my mind with the great minds of some people that I wish to emulate today within this posting. So many times, even on ordinary days a certain mindset seems to be in place. The same idea seems to occur to various people at the same time. Simply put, take a look at some of the novels that have been written of late, or the movies, or the tv shows, and you will find that they are similarly themed. Missing teenager from a group of teenagers. Over and over and over again. A husband or wife disappearing and his loved ones find out that he had a secret life - over and over and over again. A person goes on a discovery journey at end of life and turns the life upside-down inside out. Over and over and over again. 

So why not some great minds, excellent writers well known for the quality and relevance of their writing, also visit a similar theme from somewhat differing viewpoints or points of emphasis. Put them together and voila! It says it all, clarifying much of one's own thoughts. Putting it all together from one's own stance makes a beautiful whole in the mind of the reader of these authors.

Of late, and not so late, in fact for quite some time, I have been wondering and marveling at the same time re certain thematic repetitions without satisfactory explanations combined with astonishment as to why no one seems to hit upon them. 

Surely there are others out there besides me who have the same questions, but the answers given are incomplete and way, way unsatisfactory. Personally, I find that many of these "answers” are dumbed down, as if assuming a lack of intelligence on the part of the one who asked questions. Or the answers are only topical, and do not truly delve into the meat of the question that lies right there beneath the surface. Most unsatisfactory, a waste of time and effort. Today, though, the effort was good, proved worthwhile.

So, the first and eternal question asked time and time again. Why the Jews? Why always the Jews? Yes, there are racially biased words and actions directed at some other groups, but it isn't a forever replicating theme within all cultures, even those who have never met a Jew in their lives. The Jewish people, and their indigenous ancient homeland, Israel, are favored targets of vicious vile hatred. These days the very air we breathe is suffused and overcome with chants of hate, of acts of hate and support of murderers. Those of Hamas, Hezbollah, those of Islamic Jihad, those of any terrorist organization that swears to bring about the slaying of Jews, spilling their blood and soaking the land beneath their feet. Their ugliness is rife upon the land. Again, why, always why?

And what do we Jews do? We try to 'understand'. What makes a person walk to such an awful beat. What makes them subscribe to this lust for the blood of Jews, age and gender making no difference. What twisted wiring in their afflicted brains and lack worthy souls has them thinking their plans re the Jewish nation, re the state of Israel are legitimate and praiseworthy?  How is it that media known for quality reporting have turned to the dark side and chase after Israel with a vengeance, refusing to ascertain the truth or falsehood of information. They merely take it and run with it. And if shown their error and they accept it, they publish a redaction in an almost invisible area. 

For example, take this imminent famine and this dire state of starvation. From October 8th, 2023, these claims were bruited about by the liars of Hamas, making good use of these claims for public relations. But also, by other nations, nations of the world who should know better. Behave better. Two days after they invaded another country, Hamas and their criminal, morally bankrupt enablers claim famine rife within their land. This even as the members of Hamas were nice and well fed. No signs of starvation. No sunken eyes, no dark circles, no bones protruding through skin, nearly broken through with the sharp points of those bones. No gaunt living skeletons, only those of their captives, their hostages whom they kidnapped from life and refused to return. 

These imminent famines and gross starvations never took flight for they were false. Were there no foods for feasting - probably, unless one bought in the highway robbery Hamas stores. How have we forgotten the truth of war, that in a nation at war, particularly one which instigated it, rationing occurs, a la Britain and the USA in WWII. No one in those nations, as hungry as they were, claimed starvation and famine. No feast, but also no famine upon the land. 'Merely' a war they supported and cheered in the streets as the hostages, dead and alive, clothed and naked, were paraded through their crowded streets. Held within their homes and in the godforsaken tunnels beneath their homes, to which they provided ingress and egress.

 A famine of humanity, yes, food perhaps not as plentiful, but who asked for this war? Whose skeletonized bodies are held out without shame to the world at large? Where are useful and actual and effective offended voices of the 'civilized' nations of the world? Nowhere. Absolutely nowhere. As usual.

It is not upon us to "understand” the depraved behavior of Jew haters. It is not upon us to explain to them what makes them tick, what makes their ticks go wrong. It is upon them to understand how wrong they are, how egregiously wrong, sinful, offensive they are. That time is over. 

Well past time for us to stand in defense against those who hate us, those who attack us and wish only to harm us to the point of death. Not 'only' individuals, but the nation as a whole

No, no more understanding. No more education hoping to detain the beasts. No more foul memories of yesterday. No more ugliness of the todays we live. No tomorrows tainted and stained with Jewish blood. 

 No, we will stand tall and proud and determined. If you insist upon attacking us, questioning our legitimacy to life we will prove you wrong. Manner and method of which will certainly make a deeper impression upon you. You hate us for defending ourselves, for not dying in numbers satisfactory to you. Too bad. No more pathetic useless efforts to 'explain' to you where you have gone wrong nor to 'understand' your nasty quirks. 

So deal with it.

 Time is up.

There is much more on this topic, but I will not be able to post until Monday due to a family celebration.

See you then.

Will you be one of the great minds?