I will first relate a story in that has only a little to do with the point I am trying to make, but what the hell.
Over thirty years ago my friends Seymour and Annie had a mischievous and fun beagle named Daisy. As an indication of the dog's persona; they had a sign in their driveway that said "a rotten dog lives here." Daisy would escape the premises as often as possible in order to eat the dog food put out for all of the neighbors dogs, and no matter what they did, Daisy would disappear several times a week and not return until she had "consumed all of the neighbors dog food."
One day, Seymour was driving home and a couple of blocks away from his house, and there was Daisy, sitting under a tree, Seymour retrieved the dog and put her on the front seat of his car next to him and admonished Daisy all the way home. The dog appeared to be forlorn, and Seymour carried her into the house, all the while berating the dog.
Imagine his surprise when he walked in the door and the real Daisy came prancing down the front stairs. Seymour realized that he had been admonishing the wrong dog, and tried to apologize be giving the dog a bunch of dog treats and taking the dog back to the scene of her "dognapping."
I expect that if there is any parallel at all to what I am about to relate is that everyone should be careful about who they admonish, as well as why and when.
I was watching CNN a few minutes ago and they were showing footage of the horrible destruction taking place in Gaza. I will not dwell on the appropriate or inappropriate behavior of the parties in the Middle East. I will however be critical of the critics.
While I am as usual not thrilled by the coverage of this by CNN, I am unusually miffed by stuff carried by the New York Times. It would appear to me that "history counts" and that everyone needs to be responsible for what they did yesterday as well as the most recent "ten thousand yesterdays"
While I don't think that I have previously quoted Jesus, this will be a good first time.
"He that is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone at her."
I wonder if Jesus believed that there was a statute of limitations about sins.
And I now will pose a few simple questions.
Did CNN lose their file footage of the bombing of Baghdad by aircraft belonging to the United States?
Did the BBC manage to lose the pictures that they might still have had of the firebombing of Dresden in the Second World War?
Do the American Broadcast Networks and newspapers recall our carpet bombing in Vietnam during our minor war with these people who we were trying to protect from Communism?
Do the Germans remember the "justifiable" mass murder caused by their bombing of London and Coventry?
And the grand daddy of all of the questionable mass killings within a short period of time; did the United States need to drop two nuclear weapons on Hiroshima AND Nagasaki?
As a hopefully reasonable person, I wonder how these "historical national transgressors" can complain when the Israelis attempt to stop the missile and mortar attacks by Hammas.
I wonder when it was that the UN criticized the US for bombing civilian targets in North Korea.
I wonder when it was that the UN criticized the US for bombing civilian targets in North Vietnam.
I wonder when it was that the UN criticized the US for bombing civilian targets in Iraq.
I wonder when it was that the UN criticized the US for bombing civilian targets in Afghanistan.
War and killing people is a horror.
In that the United States and Great Britain have their own not so nice histories are being critical of what Israel is doing shows chutzpah or better said they are incredibly hypocritical.
And now I will demonstrate how politically aware I am and acknowledge with all due modesty that it has always been thus.
This is a solution to all of the problems we face.
Paraphrasing the words of Zero Mostel in the Broadway musical Fiddler on the Roof... "Let me tell you the answer to the problems and turmoil in the world ... I don't know!"