Topic: Iraq
Dried Up Tears This is a response to Michael Savage's observation on last week's massacre of Israeli schoolchildren. He may be right. Perhaps I don't have enough tears.by Bob Nightingale
(libertarian)
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Conservative talk show host Michael Savage went on a rant last Friday (3/8/08) about how the media was so concerned about the horserace for the American presidency, that they couldn't make time to adequately cover the insane attack on Mercaz Harav seminary in West Jerusalem. A report at Gulf-News.com says that 8 people were killed and 35 were injured. A previous report at the same website says that over 100 people were killed in Hamas-occupied Gaza strip by the Israeli army.
No doubt these are sad events. But you can drop all of Israel into Lake Michigan. It's a small country on the other side of the world. It's a regional conflict by two groups of people who look pretty much the same to me.
I wouldn't really care so much, but Israel receives over a billion dollars a year from the United States. Secretary Rice has proposed giving half a billion dollars a year to the former PLO government right next to Israel (my earlier article "Rice's Extremism"). American financed bullets are in the Israeli Army's guns that shot those Palestinians. I don't want to pay for that anymore.
I don't want our government taking sides in civil wars of other countries, period. I thought we learned that several times, in such places as in Lebanon in 1983, Mogadishu in 1993, and Serbia in 1914. These are regional conflicts, involving ethnic and religious hatreds, going back centuries.
Another place that Mr. Savage asks for tears is the Sudan. Of course it's sad. But the current civil war is a continuation of the first civil war from 1950s and 1960s! For that piece for desert, these people know nothing but war.
My grandfather came to this country as a teenager after WWI. He was drafted into the Kaiser's army at age 13. He fought on the Russian front until his unit was wiped out. He came back to his family apartment near Berlin to find that there was no food. His family had cashed in his insurance policy because he was MIA. He came to this country to escape that insanity.
No Mr. Savage, I don't have enough tears. We are already engaged in a civil war in Iraq. My heart goes out to the 4,000 families in this country who have lost a father, or a son, or a brother in that conflict. My tears are reserved for the families of the Guardsmen and Reservists who are slipping into poverty because their breadwinners are called up repeatedly. I'm sickened by the story this week of an Army sergeant who had to come back from Iraq to bury her son, who was killed in a gang shooting in California.
We have plenty of senseless violence in this country without having to export it in other countries. We have enough killing by the insane at the schools of Northern Illinois, Virginia Tech, and Columbine. We need to take care of the people in this country first, before I can get emotionally attached to those in Tibet, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, or a hundred other places. The people of New York at still grieving from the tragedy of 9/11/01. But that should not be the justification for creating more war.
Closer to home, I have children who are becoming draft age. If these wars continue in Iraq and Afghanistan, those soldiers will have to be replenished. I beg you not to take my children to fight your causes of liberation.
When my father died, I saw the sadness in my grandmother. There is no deeper sorrow than to bury your own child.
Before we get involved with the children of the world, let's not make new orphans in this country.
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"I've come to conclude that Israel is simply our insurance policy for ME oil."
Jim, you may well be right, but there is also a lot of support from a large number of religious folks that have bought into the Premillineal doctrine that was popularized around 1830 that have a great deal invested in physical Israel.
I don't believe the doctrine has any merit at all and that all of the promisies concerning the land and population made to Abraham were completely fulfilled thousands of years ago. (Josh 23:14) Further, the true Israelite is the Christian. (Gal 3:26-29)
I was on commenting on FreeRepublic some time ago and suggested that in the interest of peace we should move Israel to Baja. All the killing would stop and we would get a great resort as soon as the Jews put up all the high rises. You should have heard the uproar. And, the owner of the site threw me off.
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