THE CHURCH IN POLAND - Communist spies!

Things are happening in Poland that are of great interest to me and in my view, may change the way the Catholic Church is treated and perceived in that oh, so Catholic country.

I am of Polish heritage, do business in Poland and have visited the country on many occasions. I also am a religious history nut as you know, especially Christianity, Catholicism and their roles today.

Poland has always been VERY Catholic. The people were/ are totally brainwashed and manipulated by the Church in Poland. The Church IS part of the government even though not elected and holds enormous influence in all sectors of Polish life and always has.

Priests in Poland are like royalty, their hands kissed by old ladies, every wish met and boy do the live the high life; the best of everything paid for by the citizens of Poland, some who can not afford to give but MUST.

The first modern non-Italian Pope was a Pole. He was also credited with destroying Communism in Poland as well as contributing to its demise in general.

Under the many years of communist dictatorship in Poland, the Catholic Church stood firm in opposition to the godless bastards. Cardinal Wyszynski spent many years under arrest just because he would not give in to the communist government demands; he was a saint in the eyes of Poles.

Recently Cardinal Glemp, the primate of Poland for 25 years decided to retire. He appointed Archbishop Wielgus to take his place. Just before he was to be installed as the primate of Poland a newspaper accused him of serving as a spy for the Polish Communist Secret Police during the 1970s.

He denied it – they produced documents with his signatures – he confessed but said he did not inform on anyone, he just did it to get permission to study abroad.

The papers screamed LIAR and HYPOCRIT and ordinary Poles started getting up in church and saying GO TO HELL.

The Church organization started spinning the matter and said the MEDIA is making this all up and also forging papers (but he confessed). Glemp said to ‘forget about it’ – it means nothing.

The Vatican panicked and told Wielgus to resign / step down; someone else has to take his place. The Church called out all the brainwashed peasants telling them Media is “trying to destroy your Church”. The peasants went to the media capital, Warsaw and started rioting, beating up all who opposed them or the Church. The Archbishop resigned.

Let me throw in another related issue. Another Bishop named “Janusz” of all things, just resigned also. Documents were found that also implicated him cooperating with the secret police. He informed on people buying masses (prayers) to free Poland from the communist oppression. I wonder what the secret police did with those holy Poles praying for freedom. The Bishop obviously did not care he got what he wanted; whatever that was.

To understand the emotions this issue is bringing out in Poland you have to empathize a little. Here you are being oppressed by the communists and the only Polish institution standing up to them is the Church. Going to church is YOUR ONLY way to protest the occupation.

You go to confession because that what a good Catholic is suppose to do and you confess your sins or maybe even crimes against the state, to a holy man, a confidant that is on your side, the side of God who will eventually defeat the communists. Now you find out he may have gone to the secret police to tell them about your crimes or anything else you may have said against the state –wow – what a revelation. Do you see why Poles are PISSED?

My mother, who is very Catholic, is also pissed. She always considered priests as MEN who behaved like MEN. She continues to pray to the Virgin Mary because she can “trust her” to help her; priests and the Church cannot be counted on – they are after all, human creations.

I have been talking to my friends in Poland and they admit that this is BIG and may change how the Church operates in Poland. The Church is strong and has the brainless droids it controls. This should be quite exiting – more as the story develops.

WHAT IF DADDY BUSH DEPOSED SADDAM?

In the midst of the Iraq war debate, I was asked if George Bush Sr. could have prevented the current debacle by going after Saddam when he had the chance.

As you remember, we had a pretty easy time in Desert Storm and basically dispatched the Iraqi army within the first hundred hours of engagement. They never really put up a defense and either gave up or ran. Our air force caught the remnants jammed on the highway to Baghdad and basically annihilated them; burned out shells of tanks and trucks littered the road.

Many people here said, you got them, now finish the job by going to Baghdad and overthrowing Saddam and his cohorts. Bush Senior declined and called our troops back. Was this a good decision?

Allowing our troops to go after Saddam meant we were invading Iraq and not merely throwing them out of Kuwait. Our Arab coalition partners would have objected and so would have the United Nations; they authorized only freeing Kuwait of Iraqi invaders.

Bush did signal to the Shiites and Kurds in Iraq that this is their chance to overthrow Saddam and when they tried, Saddam crushed them and Bush did nothing to help them; they assumed he would.

Bush was scared that if he had deposed Saddam, neighboring nations like Iran, Syria, Jordan and Saudi Arabia would move into the void and partition Iraq and therefore destabilize the region. Bush thought it would be better to allow Saddam to at least keep Iraq in one piece and stable, even though hundreds of Kurds were gassed and hundreds of Southern Shiites were executed to keep Iraq stable and under his boot.

If Bush Sr. did depose Saddam after Desert Storm the country would have broken up into Kurd, Shiite and Sunni regions and a civil war would have ensued mainly for control of the oil revenues and we now know how the rest of the story would have developed; we are seeing it develop right now.

So Bush Sr. probably made the right decision at that time and he did, belatedly, try to help the Kurds in the north and the Shiites in the south by establishing two (2) “no fly zones”; a little late but at least it was something.

If Bush Junior did not invade Iraq but contained and pressured Saddam while concentrating on wiping out Al Qaeda in Afghanistan and trying to make that country a self reliant democratic nation – well that would be a different story, one that could possible have seen a victory for all concerned but obviously, that is not how it happened.

STOP THE BASTARD!

President Bush will be revealing his new plan for Iraq this Wednesday.

We know what it will be as I mentioned before; more troops, more money, until they become perfect, peaceful democrats.

Anyway, the talk now is; how do we stop him. How do we get out? We cannot have another two (2) years of this stupidity.

Some Democrats are conceding that not much can be done in Congress because, after all Congress authorized the invasion of Iraq.

But Congress authorized the invasion based on faulty information; remember weapons of mass destruction? If Congress was duped into approving the invasion, can’t they go back and declare the vote null and void because Bush lied? I think this is possible.

They can also deny Bush money to fund the war. They can only do that if they repeal their invasion vote.

The last possible move is to impeach President Bush for violating our Constitution. It would be tough but hey, it can be done. This Sunday is the first time I have heard calls for impeachment in the main media.

If Clinton can be impeached for getting a blow-job and lying about it how about a president that did not get a blow-job but lied his ass off to Congress and the country and then killed 3,000 American soldiers and tens of thousands of Iraqis AND violated our civil rights. I bet we can find all sorts of things he violated.

I say STOP THE BASTARD before he does any more harm.

PRODUCT OF A VICIOUS CYCLE!

A recent murder in Detroit got me thinking.

Chris Chelios, a hockey player for the Detroit Red Wings, had two restaurants, one in Detroit next to the Comerica Ball Park.

A few days ago, a young (17), former bus boy at the restaurant that was fired for bad performance of duties, came to ask for his job back; he was black. The white kitchen manager said no so the kid stabbed him with a butcher knife 10 times. A white female manager heard the commotion and came to investigate and she was stabbed 10 times.

I don’t think race had anything to do with the crime but I mention it because I think it does have something to do with the whole affair.

The kid ran but was recognized and was picked up by the police a short time later – he confessed.

Our female, black police chief said something that struck me. She said that our kids (black kids in Detroit) are not taught peaceful conflict resolution. They are not taught how to interact with society. They are not taught basic rules of behavior.

The only family member that could be found was a grandfather. We will see if a caring father even exists or for that matter, a mother. The 17 year old kid said his girlfriend was pregnant and he needed a job. She too worked at Chelios but was fired for not doing her job.

Bill Cosby has been in Detroit numerous times lecturing on responsibility in the black community; a responsibility to raise responsible children that would create responsible families, etc.

I think a vicious cycle exists and the cycle is hard to break and unless we break it, these types of senseless crimes will just continue. Please give a thought to the two victims who were 52 and 49, at a time in their lives where they have achieved some success and were now just enjoying life –gone.

The cycle starts with this kid. He is 17 and has a pregnant girlfriend. He will go to jail for life and she will give birth and raise another black kid that will have basically no parents and therefore no guidance – and the cycle will repeat again when that kid goes to jail after getting his 14 year-old girlfriend pregnant and so on and so on.

Stop the pregnancies! Easier said than done; this is a democracy and people have civil rights BUT children? Well, define the age of consent! Plus getting pregnant in the black community is the normal thing to do. It is so accepted that there is no stigma for getting pregnant out of wedlock – also true for the white community.

Teach them responsibility in school? - Sex education? I don’t think so; teachers have trouble enough just keeping order in the classroom.

Is there a realistic way to break the cycle? Realistic means obeying the law so we cannot force specific behavior.

The answer starts with blacks being able to and forming family units, units that nurture a culture
of normalcy with rules and regulations of behavior that can be passed on and on. I am not saying the problem does not exist in the white community but we are talking about Detroit specifically.

I don’t have an answer but I will let you know when and if, I do.

THE AMERICAN VOTER SAID GET THE HELL OUT OF IRAQ!

President Bush realizes that the American voter is sick of the war in Iraq and wants him to do something about it. Next week he will tell us his new plan.

He has been leaking information about the new plan just to gauge what will fly with the voter and the new Democratic controlled Congress.

His plan is to make the Maliki Government work. To do this he will send more troops to Baghdad to stop sectarian (Shiite vs. Sunni) violence. He then will give the Maliki government billions of dollars to create a job for every Iraqi and put a lamb in every Iraqi pot. This will make them happy and they will quit killing each other and live happily ever after in a democratic nirvana.

In his “New Way Forward” plan he will win the war in Iraq and be crowned king of the world. He has also replaced his entire military command in Iraq since the current commanders think his plans were worth shit all along.

I don’t think his plan will work and I will tell you why.

We are not at war. We invaded Iraq to get rid of Saddam so we could then make them into a democratic nation. We were too stupid to realize we were only opening a can of worms.

So we cannot win a war that does not exist. There is a civil war going on and only one side can win that we are not one of the sides; only Shiites and Sunnis are and they will continue to fight until one side wins.

Bush feels that if he can stabilize the current Iraqi government (Maliki) then the whole country will stabilize.

The Maliki government is Shiite. Government Shiite troops have been involved in killing Sunnis. Maliki himself is known to have been involved in killing Sunnis. He may say he is for all Iraqis but he would be lying.

The clerics run the country and they will always run the country so a democracy is impossible – period. These clerics have huge militias. The Shiites are supported by Iran and the Sunnis are supported by Saudi Arabia. The government military is worthless and most of them belong to militias anyway so you know where their loyalty lies.

The Shiite majority will take all our money and still kill Sunnis until none are left.

The democrats say bring the troops home and just leave some to train the Iraqi army. Well, that’s better than the Bush plan because it will allow the Iraqi civil war to reach an end. The outcome is not in doubt and it will not result in a peaceful Iraqi democracy – never! BUT it would stop our soldiers from dying every day for a hopeless cause.

My original plan to divide the country into Shiite, Sunni and Kurd with a weak central government to distribute oil revenues equally (based on population) was rejected by Bush. Too bad, it would have worked.

The voters have spoken – GET THE HELL OUT OF IRAQ! I just hope the democrats have enough balls to do what we asked them to do, even if they have to impeach Bush as a danger to our democracy.

HAPPY NEW YEAR?

The start of a New Year has always been celebrated, even in ancient times. People look to the new year with anticipation and promise; a new chance! Let’s make this year the best ever!!!

Some of us look forward with trepidation. Is this year the year we lose our parents? We are also getting older so will my body hold up? Will my brain serve me well?

We celebrate at a hall with family and friends, dance, drink, eat and wish everyone the best possible New Year at the stroke of midnight; everyone is happy but also drunk.

The next day serious thoughts and plans start entering your brain; you can’t keep them out.

During the New Year Celebration the number of dead American soldiers in Iraq crept over 3,000. President Bush has promised a new Iraq strategy but experts say it will be the same ole’ “stay the course” nightmare and more and more American soldiers will die. Bush has two more years left; can the Democrats do something to stop the madness?

President Ford died while we celebrated the holidays. He was called a good and decent man that was needed after Watergate and Vietnam to unify us and bind up the nation’s wounds. We need such a man right now. Watergate was bullshit compared to what is happening now! Is there such a man or woman waiting in the wings to step forward?

Listening to all the eulogies at President Ford’s funeral I was mad at myself for not knowing how much Ford actually did for the nation. Saturday Night Live made fun of him and the perception of a klutz stuck with many including me. He did make that very stupid statement during his debate with Carter about Eastern Europe being NOT under Communist influence; it hurt him.

His pardon of President Nixon was justified and timely. The nation did not want this to drag out. Watergate became a media game and was never a serious, evil crime anyway.

We need to be optimistic. We have to be optimistic for the alternative is unacceptable. Personally, I CAN control myself and my surroundings. We can also influence or at least try to influence what goes on in our city and our country and in so doing, help influence what goes on in the world.

We have to believe that each of us can make a difference, even if miniscule.

Yup, I’ll perk up and face the New Year with joy and optimism; after all, my favorite quote is from Dylan Thomas:

“Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light”.

APOCALYPTO - MUST SEE MOVIE!

During this holiday movie season I saw Mel Gibson’s APOCALYPTO and all I have to say is wow!

Mel Gibson may be, no IS an ass, but boy can he make a movie.

I will warn the faint of heart that this is one hell of a bloody, violent movie but I think, it is true to history and offers a realistic view of Mayan civilization as it was at one point on the Yucatan Peninsula. The fact that I have studied this civilization and have actually visited Chichen Itza on the Yucatan Peninsula made the movie that much more thrilling for me.

People that see the movie will come away with varied impressions. The main story is of one man, his tribe and his horrific adventure. I am not sure what Mel was trying to say if anything but I got some messages from it.

It tells of families and friends, peace and joy and also of man’s inhumanity to man, death and suffering.

The Mayans were extremely advanced in astronomy, building, writing, math, etc. but their religion was violent and oh so bloody. When things went bad like drought or sickness, the priests called for sacrifice to the gods. They would capture warriors of small tribes and subject them to a sacrificial ritual where their beating hearts are cut out of their bodies and offered up to the gods in the hope that this would appease the gods and restore tranquility.

Sacrificing to the gods is actually a common ritual among human societies throughout our history even up to the present. We may not be as violent in our sacrificial rituals where prayers are offered instead of bleeding hearts but our recent history is filled with acts of violence in the name of god(s) so really, things may not be as different as we want to believe.

The Mayans sacrificed out of ignorance. They did not know why a drought occurred or why people contracted disease, the priests assumed the gods were punishing them for some transgression and they wanted to appease those gods. The Jews followed a similar belief, blaming themselves for their awful plight including the Holocaust, some still hold to that belief.

Religious and political leaders use the people’s ignorance and superstition to their own advantage – to this day.

At the end of the movie, the main character and his family see strange looking ships and people landing on their shores. This was the Spanish invasion and on the landing craft you saw monks holding large crosses. The man’s wife asks if they should go to these people and greet them and he replies, no let us go back into the jungle and start a new beginning.

History tells us that the Spaniards brought small pox that decimated the remaining Mayan population and they did not come to win new souls for Christ, they really came for gold and they would kill for it.

I mentioned that the Mayan civilization was very advanced and left many objects for us to study but alas we will NEVER be able to know their meaning because we cannot translate their images.

You see the holy Spanish Christian/ Catholic monks considered the books that would have enabled us to translate the Mayan symbols as products of paganism that would insult the Catholic God and so they BURNED every one of the thousands of books of an entire civilization.

You see those monks were also acting in ignorance and I feel religions to this day, base their operations on people’s ignorance and superstition a subject I will be addressing more fully in the coming year.

So did Mel, the devout Catholic have an anti-religion message in his book? I don’t know. He may have just made a good movie with a compelling story. I will keep my eyes open for other reviewers of this movie to see what they speculate.

A MUST see movie ! ! !

AND SO SADDAM IS DEAD!

And so Saddam Hussein is dead. How come I don’t feel any joy? It appears many of us in the U.S. don’t see how his death will have any affect on the miserable situation we and Iraq are in.

Bush made such a big deal about Saddam and why we have to invade Iraq but we now know it was all about Bush; Saddam just provided a convenient excuse that Americans bought hook, line and sinker.

Saddam was evil and ruthless and deserved execution for his crimes against his own people but 3,000 American soldiers did not need to die to bring Saddam to justice, his own people would have eventually seen to that.

Former President Ford, in interviews that could only be released upon his death, told President Bush not to go freeing oppressed people around the world unless there is a direct threat to our national security. We now know that Saddam was never a threat to our national security.

Maybe President Ford should have voiced his opinions while still alive, maybe his words would have done some good but alas, Gerald Ford was too nice of a guy.

TYPICAL POLITICIAN FROM DETROIT

Saturday, December 30, 2006

To: The Detroit Free Press
Re: “Conyers to monitor staff”, Dec. 30.

I found your headline “Conyers to monitor staff” amusing since it is his staff that turned him in for ethical misconduct. Shouldn’t your headline read: staff to monitor Conyers?

THE WILL OF THE PEOPLE?

Saturday, December 30, 2006

To: The Detroit Free Press
Re: “U.S. panel rejects a delay for Prop 2”, Dec. 30.

George Washington, an attorney for the pro-affirmative action group By Any Means Necessary had the nerve to call a federal appeals court’s ruling against delaying the implementation of Proposal 2 an “arrogant opinion”. To me, the height of arrogance is in trying to block and undermine the expressed will of the people of Michigan.

Thursday, December 28, 2006

To: The Detroit News
Re: “Military weighs adding more noncitizen soldiers”, Dec. 28.

Upon reading “Military weighs adding more noncitizen soldiers”, Dec. 28, I was reminded that a big factor in the downfall of the Roman Empire was reliance on armies populated primarily by non Romans.

THE POPE AND HIS CHURCH IRRELEVANT!

Can’t let ole’ Benedict XVI off the hook this Christmas season; he and the Vatican need a slap on the head.

An Italian named Pier Giorgio Welby (60) lay dying of muscular dystrophy. He asked his doctor to unplug his respirator because he has had enough. His doctor did and the Pope immediately denied him a religious burial ceremony.

When the Pope delivered his annual Christmas message “Urbi et Orbi” some in the audience held up signs saying “Church, shame on you” and I second that sentiment.

My mother who is a loyal and devout Catholic said what is wrong with them. She expressly put in her will a proviso that I would have the power to pull the plug on her if I felt it necessary. She does not want to vegetate – she said that is not living.

Mr. Welby’s case maybe a little different; yes, he was dying and muscular dystrophy made his body useless but his mind was sound and he made a decision of sound mind to no longer live his life in his body. The Pope has always said that only God can end life and obviously the Pope speaks for God and so Mr. Welby committed a sin by going against Church teaching and he needs to be denied a Church burial so he can go straight to Hell – lovely.

The Pope said “What are we to think of those who choose death in the belief that they are celebrating life”. He is a smart man, a theologian and philosopher and he can’t see why a person would want to give up their life of suffering and go out as a real person and not a vegetable? I guess the Pope, of sound body and mind, cannot stoop to empathize with a suffering, dying human being.

The Catholic Church is painting itself into a corner. Most practicing U.S. Catholics do not follow Church doctrine; they consider it devoid of common sense. The Pope and his Church are in danger of becoming irrelevant.

MUSLIMS IN CONGRESS! RUN!!!

A note about the Muslim congressman from Minnesota, Keith Ellison, about whom I have written before; he’s the one that wants to use the Quran instead of the Bible in his swearing –in ceremony:

Remember that Ellison is actually a black from Detroit that converted to Islam while attending college so we are not talking about Osama here or even an immigrant.

Representative Virgil Goode of Virginia (R) sent out a letter to his constituents telling them to wake up to the Muslim invasion of Congress (Ellison was the first and only one in our history).

If we don’t stop Muslims from immigrating here we will have many more in Congress which would endanger the values and beliefs traditional to the United States of America.

Keith Ellison was legally elected by voters in his Minnesota district, the majority of who were not Muslims.

Virgil Goode is a good example of a mindless reactionary that is a member of our Congress. It is hard to judge if he is using xenophobic scare tactics for his own political benefit or if he really believes in what he is saying.

Number one, we freely vote for our representatives. Is he saying that Muslims will trick us into voting for them? Or that people in Dearborn, Michigan (largest Middle Eastern population in the U.S.) cannot elect some one like them to represent them?

Here in Detroit, the Polish community in the past has always voted for one of their own – had to have a “ski” at the end of their surname; same for the Irish, Italians, and etc. but that was some time ago, we don’t really have specific European communities like we used to.

But new immigrants do appear to congregate in communities by ethnicity and/or religion. They are doing what Poles, Germans, Irish and etc. did hundreds of years ago.

Is that the problem with Virgil Goode; he is scared Europeans/Christians are being diluted into minority status by them thar’ non-Christian feriners? – Probably so.

Mr. Goode would rather things didn’t change; we were a nation of immigrants and our immigrant forefathers build this country and their kin (us) helped make it the greatest country in the world.

But we cannot be a nation of immigrants anymore? We must stop the influx on non-Europeans?

I will be the first to admit that we as a nation we have immigration problems – big time – and something has to be done about illegal immigration first and tightening up and policing legal immigration second but we cannot just close the door!

Immigrants are what made this country great and new immigrants will make it greater.

I can kind of understand where Representative Goode is coming from and I feel that religion plays a big factor in his anger but I personally fear fundamentalist Christians like Bush and his hordes a lot more than I do Muslims, Buddhists or any other religious groups.

Keith Ellison the Muslim from Minnesota has sworn to defend our Constitution above all else and I believe he will. The Bush Administration, on the other hand, has abused our Constitution and the rights it grants us. If Bush won’t defend our Constitution, maybe a Muslim from Minnesota will.

HOME FOR CHRISTMAS!

“I’ll be home for Christmas, if only in my dreams”. The words of one of my favorite carols always bring a tear to my eye. I feel very sad for people that cannot be home for Christmas.

I remember a time when I could not be home for Christmas. I was in the Air Force in the 60s. I don’t remember why but I was not granted leave and even though I celebrated with my buddies that were stuck along with me, far away from home, my thoughts were always of home and my family.

Since we celebrate a very traditional Polish Wigilia in my family, you can actually visualize the gathering and smell and taste the traditional foods.

My heart goes out to especially the soldiers far away from home. I know that we have a volunteer military and it is their chosen profession unlike the draftees in our previous wars, but still they are at the mercy of a lunatic president that thinks nothing about placing them in harm’s way, far, far away from home on Christmas for reasons only he apparently knows.

In a quiet moment this holiday week, I will raise a glass of the best vodka and drink a toast to those who cannot be home for Christmas.

CHRISTMAS MESSAGE #1

Here it is, Christmas 2006. How do I feel? Well, I feel many different ways.

It’s raining so no white Christmas but I don’t really care. The family is here and all will attend our traditional Polish Wigilia celebration which is a Christmas Eve gathering we have been doing like forever – I really care about that.

Part of the tradition is a ceremony called OPLATEK. Everyone takes a piece of special wafer (oplatek) and exchanges pieces of this wafer with everyone in the family. During the exchange you wish each other a great new year. Traditionally at this ceremony, all hard feelings are put to rest between family members; start fresh and happy, all is forgiven. Anyway, that is the way it is suppose to happen.

We have a lot of children in the family and keep adding new ones each year; we celebrate that and rejoice at the growing of the family. This year my first grandson BEN will be celebrating his first Christmas.

We also have the elders. My father-in-law is 86 and my mother is 84 – wow, how many Christmases have they celebrated and how many more will they celebrate. That does enter my thoughts more and more these days. In my usual speech before dinner I mention the family members that have departed and my mother says a prayer in Polish for them, for us and in thanks for the dinner we are about to enjoy.

My mother is probably the last member of the family that adds some religious content to our holiday celebrations and of course the Polish language.

We used to be 100% Polish and then through marriage we have become somewhat international. My niece married a Frenchman and my daughter a Scotsman. We have had both families over and the French have attended a few Wigilia celebrations – it was nice to have them.

The dinner is different because no meat is served. We have a variety of fish dishes (pickled herring being my favorite). Everyone brings a dish of some sort and by tradition kielbasa and ham are available after midnight.

The midnight Catholic Mass tradition has gone and caroling is not really done. When my father was alive, everyone gathered around the piano and sang Polish carols, he of course led the singing.

Children open a few presents after dinner and then play with them. The grownups spend time talking about their lives with relatives that they do not see as often as one would like – we are all sooooooooooo busy.

So if I was to say what is Christmas to me, I would have to say FAMILY above all else and our hope is that our children will carry on the WIGILIA tradition long after we are no longer here.

Christmas my ass!

Every year at this time I hear the same ole’ shit about Christmas being too commercial and that Christ is being taken out of Christmas.

Every year I write to the papers and remind these so called Christians that this time of year was a pagan holiday for thousands of years; the Romans called it Saturnalia.

It was a “natural” holiday celebrating the end of one year and the start of a new year. People were happy and they celebrated.

In come the Christians – let us put a stop to all this vile, pagan merriment making – let us turn it into a Christian holiday! How about celebrating the birth of Jesus – but we don’t know when he was born – so what, we can make it up and those idiots will have to believe us and then this pagan celebration will be a Christian celebration – the end justifies the means – right?

We still have a lot of pagan traditions left over (Yule log, tree, etc.) but those that bitch about how the holiday is celebrated need to learn the facts about it before they go on gripping that Christ is left out.

We are after all, natural pagans just doing what comes naturally.

Christmas is nearly here and President Bush has decided not to rush things as far as Iraq is concerned. He agrees that changes need to be made but why rush; after the New Year will be soon enough. In the meantime, U.S. soldiers and countless Iraqis die on a daily basis. Kind of reminds you of Nero fiddling while Rome burned, doesn’t it?

Bush has already indicated he did not like suggestions that did not spell victory in Iraq. He likes the suggestion Senator McCain made about sending another 30-40,000 troops to put a stop to all the sectarian violence and allow the Iraqi government to do its job.

What Bush and McCain do not realize is that more troops on the ground means more U.S. troops dead. What do you think more troops will do? Will we put a soldier in each house? How about a soldier on every street corner? And what is the Iraqi government suppose to do in the meantime? The government is basically Shia and support killing Sunnis – is that not being sectarian?

The stupidity of this whole Iraq thing is continuing with no end in sight, well maybe in two years when Bush leaves. The Democrats, come January, will have to pressure Bush to start thinking realistically; obviously the Iraq Study Group Report had no affect on him.

The shifting political sands in the Middle East need a Kissinger to handle the diplomatic front; Condoleezza is obviously no Kissinger and cannot handle the growing Lebanese situation and the growing possibility of a Palestinian civil war. A smart diplomat could use all this to our advantage in Iraq but we have no smart people in the White House – sad.

You notice that Afghanistan is getting worst and Pakistanis are helping the Taliban and Al Qaeda – remember them?

No, as far as I am concerned Bush is allowing the whole world situation go to hell in a hand basket – while he fiddles.

There is a current issue that has caught my interest. It is a case before the Supreme Court about school integration plans in Oregon and Kentucky.

White parents have gone to court to challenge school plans in their districts that use race to achieve a racial balance in line with the racial ratio of the community. In doing so, they are prohibiting parents from sending their children to schools that they want, specifically, to the schools in their own districts and therefore close to home.

Historically, certain states in the union separated children according to race when it came to education. In these states you had black and white schools or the separate but equal formula. The Supreme Court in the Brown vs., Board of Education landmark ruling said the practice was despicable and violated the equal treatment under the law provision of our Constitution.

The court found that indeed the black schools were separate but not equal and that forcibly separating the races in schools negatively impacted the black students. For this reason they banned the use of race as a factor in how our school systems operated.

Following that decision, we had a pretty contentious time when federal courts ordered “forced busing” in an attempt to desegregate the schools in the country.

Since those days, the need for court ordered school desegregation has gone. Schools are legally prohibited from segregating according to race.

But what has happened in our society is that people settled in communities according to race so you have black, white and mixed communities. In the black and white communities, the schools are de facto segregated. Detroit is a good example where 80% of the population is black and so are the schools. In fact in Detroit, the schools are more like 90% black since many white parents and some black, send their children to private schools.

Communities like Seattle and Kentucky where the racial divide is not so one sided but maybe 60/40 either way, feel it beneficial to maintain that ratio in their schools even if they have to bus children out of their own school district.

There is no argument that a racially diverse school population is good for the students; that has been proven over and over again. But if race is legally NOT to be used as a governing factor in how schools are populated; can the school plans be challenged legally.

I think parents have every right to send their kids (K-12) to the nearest school to their home, if that is what they wish. Many move to certain communities specifically to be part of that communities’ school system. I know here in Canton-Plymouth, the excellence of the school system is what drives the property values higher and higher and attracts parents looking for good schools. Is that a problem? Many black families move here for that very reason, well maybe not that many but some.

Diversity is good for our school children but should it be forced? I think legally, the Brown vs. Board of Education decision should be closely read as no race factor allowed.

Should society be allowed to develop naturally or do we want to meddle with it – good question.

I hate to even bring up the Iraq mess anymore but we have to keep talking and writing if we want something positive to occur.

I hope the Iraq Study Group report would give our president a way out of the quagmire. It does make 79 suggestions but he spits on them all – why? – Because the report does not have a plan for a victory in Iraq – a victory?

The “victory” cry was echoed by all the right-wing pundits in unison. I was disappointed to hear Senator McCain joined the group. My hearty endorsement of him for president in 2008 has been put on hold – for the time being.

I can understand the call for a victory; we all can. Bush absolutely needs a victory otherwise over 3,000 American soldiers died for nothing. On the other hand many more died in Vietnam and we still pulled out without a victory. Actually we suffered a defeat in Vietnam; plain and simple. The difference is that the pullout and defeat did not happen to the president that started the mess. Here Bush is absolutely the one responsible for everything that has happened in Iraq; hell, he invaded Iraq – remember? It would be HIS defeat!

I have maintained that the plan to invade Iraq and by doing so, create a democracy in the Middle East that would then spread democracy to other countries in the region was a silly, ignorant delusion. If that is what Bush defines as victory; it will never happen and it had no chance of happening from the start.

Reports from U.S. soldiers on the ground in Iraq (not general that serve at the pleasure of the president and say what he wants to hear) have confirmed that the Iraqi soldiers they are training do not, and will not, have any loyalty to Iraq. Their loyalty is to their religious group; Sunni or Shia. This one fact is what prevents us from ever having a victory in Iraq and what made a victory impossible from the start.

The idiots that are demanding a stable, democratic Iraqi government are in a state of denial. They have a bunch of lessons from past and recent history and they still refuse to learn.

Recently, news came of the Saudi government offering support to the Sunni insurgents in Iraq. Syria also is supporting the Sunnis and Iran obviously the Shia. Iraq is already divided and yet we continue to believe we can create a unified, peaceful Iraq.

Interviews with ordinary Iraqis confirm the fact that the country is already divided. The police are Shia and kill Sunnis at their checkpoints, so is the army. The Sunnis have only their militias to protect them and remember the Sunnis are in the minority. The government is basically Shia and will protect and enrich their own. So you see the division I called for in my past blogs is a reality; we just don’t know it.

NO WIN IN IRAQ POSSIBLE!

Saturday, December 09, 2006

To: The Detroit News
Re: “Reject study group’s lack of principle, reality in Iraq”, Dec. 8.

Frank Beckmann is the one that needs a healthy dose of reality for suggesting a victory in Iraq is the only acceptable plan, “Reject study group’s lack of principle, reality in Iraq”, Dec. 8.

The old geezers in the Iraq Study Group are wise enough and politically independent enough, to call it as they see it and the war in Iraq can never be “won” and in hindsight, was un-winnable in the first place.

Mr. Beckmann needs to get of his high horse of principals and admit that the war was a mistake, a terribly ignorant miscalculation that needs to come to an end, if for no other reason than to save lives.

IRAQ STUDY GROUP SUGGESTIONS?

I told you about the bipartisan Iraq study group of Baker and Hamilton and how they are suppose to give President Bush a game plan of how to get the hell out of Iraq without causing too much damage – too much damage? I have hoped that this wise group would make some commonsensical suggestions like to divide Iraq, like I have suggested, but I am starting to have my doubts.

Some leaked information is pointing to a suggestion to get Syria and Iran involved. Well, since they are the countries that were and probably are, sending in rebels to destabilize Iraq, it seems kind of ironic.

Iran, a theocracy is dangerous. As long as the clerics are in power and they will be in power for a very long time because the people, who want to be modern, just are not strong enough to overthrow the clerics. I hope I am wrong and something is fomenting there but right now, we cannot see any ray of hope there.

Iran has a madman for president and he can and will do anything to advance his and Iran’s power and influence. They are Shiite Muslims, sworn enemies of Sunni Muslims (the factions slaughtering each other in Iraq).

Iran would love to add Iraq as another Shiite brother theocracy. They still aim to destroy Israel and this would make them more powerful and when they get the atom bomb – watch out world.

Syria officially is secular or non-religious. Syrians are mostly Sunni Muslims and believe me, the regular people ARE probably religious; a factor to keep in mind.

Syria also wants to destroy Israel and control Lebanon. Ceding Iraq to Iran may not be in their best interest but this is where it gets a little complicated because we do not know what kind of deal they can make with each other; we give you Iraq if you give us Lebanon?

What would the U.S. want to talk to these two about - ask them to quit sending terrorists to Iraq? Ask Iran to quit supporting the Shiite insurgents? I don’t really know and have no ideas. Hopefully the Baker report will make it clear what they want these two countries to do in this mess.

My idea of dividing Iraq is not such an easy solution. Each division would come under influence by more powerful countries. The Shiite part would automatically become an Iranian protectorate. The Sunni’s would come under Syria and the Kurds would be hated by all and probably attacked by all – they have the oil.

The U.S. would still be involved if they wanted to protect each division and allow each division to become an independent country. The Kurds have the best and probably only chance of forming a semblance of a democratic form of government. Bush’s whole reason for going into this war fiasco was to introduce democracy into the Middle East with the hope of it spreading. The Kurds would be his only chance of that ever happening.

More and more though, it is looking like we cannot win no matter what we do. Let the civil war play out till the bitter end? Well at least we would not be losing our soldiers on a daily basis and all those billions of dollars.

The Bush legacy; who gives a fuck, he will already go down in history as the biggest idiot president who damaged this country and the world because of his ignorance EVEN though he had good intentions.

POLITICS & RELIGION AGAIN!

Now that the Republicans have been shown the door, religion in politics should be a dead issue – wrong! Keith Ellison, newly elected Democratic member of the House of Representatives from Minnesota is causing a stir because he wants to be sworn in using the Koran or Quran.

Now Mr. Ellison is originally from Detroit and probably part African-American so it isn’t as if he was some cleric from the Middle East. He probably converted to Islam in later life.

First some background about the swearing in ceremony. All new members of the House are sworn in en masse, i.e. all together. They then can stage “photo-ops” by posing for an “individual” swearing in ceremony. Usually, in these photo-ops, they have a hand on the Christian Bible; at least that is how it always has been done – tradition.

Sine Ellison is the FIRST Muslim ever to be elected; he can start his OWN tradition for the future Muslims that may be elected to Congress – as I see it.

But NO – an angry column by Dennis Prager on Townhall.com argues that Ellison’s ceremony “undermines American civilization”. In his mind, American values can only be defended by people that swear to do so on America’s holy book; the Christian Bible.

Well, I disagree. The Christian Bible is NOT America’s holy book. It has, by tradition, been the book all swearing in ceremonies use. That is because Christians were the majority of early immigrants to this country and remained the majority in the early years. But now, things they are a changing and have changed.

It only makes sense to use a book that would matter to the most people even though obviously it REALLY does not matter since members of Congress lied, cheated and sinned like hell after they swore on the Bible.

The last few words of a swearing in ceremony are “so help you God” or something like that. Anyway, this would not carry a lot of weight with an atheist but with religious people, yes it would. But with all the different religions in existence here, the Christian Bible does not necessarily carry the same weight for everyone – obviously!

I personally, would want someone swearing to uphold American laws and not to harm America in any way, swear on something that he or she really believes in and something he or she holds very holy in their belief system otherwise it is like swearing on a Sear’s Catalog.

I am all for tradition but only when it makes sense. In this case, I don’t think it does and I think the Holy Roller conservatives need to pipe down and get a life.