Quit Yer Bitchin’…

Stop complaining. It could have been worse.

Was the Man Catcher Voodoo Kit under your tree?

Did anyone give you a personal, portable bidet?

We cannot fathom the need for a, uh, personal appearance enhancement kit. Really.

For the masses that need it, butt lifting lingerie.

Of course, for your cousin (that’s right, the cousin you think we don’t know about), there’s this meaningful gift.

Short on flair?

Quit complaining about those blank VHS tapes, regifted Feng Shui for Dummies book or unidentifiable kitchen tool with the ‘Dollar Store’ Bargain Bin half price sticker almost all scratched off.

“As someone who thought he knew a fair bit about Israel before going there, I came away with a sense that I really didn’t know the half of it.”

From Adam Daifallah

Just under 10 days isn’t a lot of time to travel a lot a whole country. But our little groujust under 30 Québec university students — travelled from one end of Israel to the other in that time span, managing to visit many points in between. In that time we saw, amongst others: Old Jerusalem, a Christmas church service at Abu Gosh, the Israeli Supreme Court, the Knesset, Yad Vashem, the security fence/wall/barrier, a kibbutz, Mettula, Haifa, Caesarea, Ben Gurion University, Sederot, Ma’ale Adumim (a “settlement” in the West Bank that is more like a small town) and Be’er Sheva. We talked with scholars, journalists, students, politicians and activists from all corners of the Israeli political spectrum.

It would take too much time and I would bore you to death if I went through every detail of what we learned. So I will just offer my overall impressions of this country, which I was seeing in person for the first time.

Israel is a fascinating country. Its people are friendly, knowledgeable, westernized — and most of all, tolerant. They have an amazing sense of purpose and resilience in the face of daily threats to its very existence. That’s something no other country really has to grapple with, and I think it takes visiting there to fully understand the feeling of what that’s like. The security barrier has put a virtual halt to suicide bombings, and security is tight: most restaurants, clubs and other public buildings have a security guard that pats down people before they enter, and some even have metal detectors. Still, how much can you really prevent? On New Year’s Eve, we were dancing at a club in Tel Aviv. Security was tight. But if someone had wanted to drive by and chuck a grenade through the window, could anyone really have done anything? Doubtful.

Anyway, my two main thoughts: First, Israel must be supported.

I have no problem saying this as someone who is of partly Palestinian ancestry. Israel is a democratic, pluralistic western outpost in the middle of a cesspool of tyranny and despair. The image you get on TV of Israel as a country full of religious people is wrong. Israel is actually quite a secular country, and its inhabitants come from all different faiths. There are a million or so Arab Israelis inhabiting its lands, many of whom are Muslim. There are Christians, Druze, Zoroastrians — and lets not forget the bedouins. When we visited a hospital, we met a bedouin woman who, while still living the traditional nomadic life, was being trained as a doctor by Jewish doctors.

As someone who thought he knew a fair bit about Israel before going there, I came away with a sense that I really didn’t know the half of it. I think it probably takes a visit there to truly appreciate the nuances and intricacies of this country.

After all the terror and the two intifadas, it was amazing to see and hear so many Israelis still so committed to peace and willing to do just about anything to achieve it. If the Palestinians and their leadership would truly recognize Israel’s right to exist tomorrow, I have little doubt a state would follow very soon. This is not just rhetoric. It is the sense I got from almost every Israeli we talked to, from the leftwingers on the kibbutz to the Likudnik settlers. Everyone wants peace, but it takes two to tango. The peace partner on the other side is simply not there.

Second thought, and this hit me hard when we visited the Holocaust museum at Yad Vashem: the world must never turn a blind eye to evil. Seeing prima facie exhibits and evidence of what happened in Nazi Germany rekindled thoughts of the modern genocides in Yugoslavia, Rwanda, the Sudan and many others. It even made me think of Jack Layton and his insane idea to break bread with the Taliban.

How do we let this happen? How is it that the lessons of history are so often ignored? Why is there such a willingness to appease and placate evil, especially in the West? I don’t know – I don’t understand it and I never will. But if more people visited Israel, I think more people would understand the need for vigilence and to stand up to wrongness and evil. War is ugly, but there are situations in the world in which no other option exists. Sometimes war is necessary to bring peace. Always has been, always will be.

Always try to remember: freedom isn’t free. To many people don’t.

Freedom Of Religion, Freedom Of Speech And The Freedom To Be

The Baron, at Gates of Vienna has published a most provocative and thoughtful post, Free To Say What?, in which he illustrates a few simple truths. With clear and pointed reasoning he highlights and illustrates the deconstruction of American values that has become a reality in our times.

That ideas that ‘All men are created equal‘ and ‘One nation under God,’ are being sorely tested. The Baron discusses John Conyers proposed

kid-gloves-for-the-Koran resolution, H. Res. 288 (the full text is here):

Simply put, there is an overt attempt to force the nation to accept the elevated status of one religion over another. The Baron concludes:

This is pernicious on so many levels that it’s hard to know where to start. It asserts that one person’s right to be respected overrides another person’s right to speak freely. It singles out a single religion, Islam, for special treatment. It accords the holy book of the Muslims more respect than is owed the flag of the United States.

This is a CAIR-sponsored Trojan horse, ready to be rolled through the gates into the First Amendment. And its sponsor is about to become chairman of the House Judiciary Committee.

What is left undiscussed is the fallout from such legislation. Can ‘affirmative action‘ programs for Muslims be far behind? Will calls for Sharia Laws allowed to supersede our own legal system be heeded? Will non Muslims be forced into Sharia courts if they are in a legal dispute with a Muslim? Will FGM be considered a ‘cultural expression’ only? Will child marriage be another such expression (in Nebraska, that position has already been presented before a court, so as to justify child marriage)?

These questions are not academic- they have already been asked in Western countries all over the world, as many in the Muslim community demand their ‘rights.’ The Baron notes too, that

Even though Muslims come in as many races as other human beings, even though Christians, Jews, and Hindus have no such protections, Islam has claimed for itself the same status as blacks, Hispanics, Native Americans, etc. It’s a shrewd move, one that has been patiently and painstakingly crafted over the last ten or fifteen years by CAIR and similar organizations.

The Baron’s post is a provocative and important read.

It is with this in mind that we take another look at what American rights, equality and values really are- and the what is the role of the federal government in defining the ‘borders’ or frame of our society.

Thomas Jefferson saw and understood freedom as a negative liberty. No ifs, and or buts about that. Freedom was continually under assault from the overwhelming power of a coercive federal government.

Clearly, Jefferson feared that steamroller effect of the federal government. It is also clear that Jefferson feared the momentum of religious ecstasy and excess, using the power of the state. No religion was to be used to gain a self serving foothold in American society. On the heels of the Enlightenment, these ideas were not new or novel. Certainly, smaller religions and newer religious sects (among them, Baptists) shared Thomas Jefferson’s views: Religious liberty was understood to be the absence of open and overt compulsion by the State- that is, the State was understood to be the primary instrument and force, behind all coercion.

It is that view of the State we have today- a beast that needs constant taming or an evil that needs containment, on an ever growing basis. If lest unchecked for a moment, many believe, the state will devour her inhabitants, and thus remove precious liberties and freedoms. Elements on both the right and left defiantly stand guard against anything they see as an infringement of ‘rights’ The State, as they see it, has but a singular purpose and meaning- to provide, protect and maintain ‘rights.’

In fact, that view of the State- and more importantly, that interpretation of Jefferson’s view, is erroneous.

That view only perpetuates the notion that the State and the Law are never to be trusted. They are both seen as instruments of coercion and at the same time, they are regarded as the instruments that are antithetical of freedom. Nowhere in those definitions are to be found the powers for good that the state was endowed with- the powers to create and modify and improve those things that make our level of comfort and our lives, that much easier.

The moral blessing of shared purpose, the glue that has bound nations, peoples and cultures, is deliberately and pointedly absent from the everlasting debate of rights and freedoms. We aspire to have our differences retain a higher status than our similarities. This is in reality, an example of an extremist idea gone mainstream and is antithetical to Jefferson’s meaning in the definition of our State.

In fact, Jefferson’s celebration of the individual was not a rejection of family, literal or communal, any more than it was a rejection of religion. In celebrating the individual’s rights, Jefferson was in fact, strengthening the community. No matter what the belief of the meaning of the State, in the end, each individual decides for himself his own beliefs and his own conscience. As the State cannot impose religion, neither can it impose a value system. In other words, the celebration of religion- or of non-religion- cannot be foisted on the community. Each has equal standing. The attempt to impose either of those beliefs by way of legal coercion upon adherents of opposing believers, is a misuse of government.

The Declaration of Independence is quite clear- ‘We hold these truths to be self evident.’ The declaration is just that- a declaration of truths, and not ideals. All men- and all their ideas, are equal in status under the Law. That does not mean those beliefs (or non beliefs) can be imposed on others.

The Declaration doesn’t (and Jefferson) do not talk about ‘preferences’ or the ’subjective.’ They speak in terms of the truths, which remain inviolate. Those truths are the moral compass of the Nation. They are not suggestions, nor are they weapons to subjugate others. If anything, the are the foundation of the American consciousness. The we in ‘We hold these truths’ means that the truths upon which the nation was founded, will prevail- and not the ‘we’ of a particular generation or a temporal mob.

‘We the people’ are and remain, equal- all of us- notwithstanding the deliberate attempt to make ‘these truths’ optional or to have them redefined. We are first and foremost, called to form a community. Our individual rights are derived from our standing within that community.

 

Swingin’ In The Wind…’ The verdict is in. Assemble the people’

The verdict is in. Assemble the people.

The latest Sanity Squad podcast offers up commercial-free, thoughful opinion and insight into the trial and execution of Saddam Hussein.

Neo, Shrinkwrapped, Dr Sanity and Institutes’s Board of Directors come together and prove once more that wisdom is but a mouse click away. Dinner can wait (a few hunger pangs never killed anyone) and the housework can be delayed (like you care) . You can slack off a bit at work (unless you got a Wall Street size bonus, the company you work for doesn’t appreciate you, so screw ‘em).

Left unspoken is our collective hat tip to Gagdad Bob, as we also discuss how the cosmos always manages to restore balance and offer up Divine Justice.

The Sanity Squad podcast will make you a better citizen of the world- and as an bonus, will provide you with enough zingers to slap your critics silly and pass yourself off as well informed, brilliant and svelte.

If you find brilliance, pleasure and chocolate addictive, the Sanity Squad archives can be found here.