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Showing posts with label Military. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Military. Show all posts
American Youth
I am doing some research about the American Flag and came across this letter. O, how I wish this could be said with certainty today.
Letter from a Navy Pilot -
Letter from a Navy Pilot -
Battle of Midway
Anonymous
The Fates have been kind to me. When you hear people saying harsh things about American youth, you will know how wrong they all are. So many times that now they have become commonplace, I've seen incidents that make me know that we were never soft, never weak.
Many of my friends are now dead. To a man, each died with a nonchalance that each would have denied was courage, but simply called a lack of fear and forgot the triumph. If anything great or good has been born of this war, it should be valued in the youth of our country, who were never trained for war, who almost never believed in war, but who have, from some hidden source, brought forth a gallantry which is homespun, it is so real.
Out here between the spaceless sea and sky, American youth has found itself, and given of itself, so that a spark may catch, burst into flame, and burn high. If our country takes these sacrifices with indifference it will be the cruelest ingratitude the world has ever known.
You will, I know, do all in your power to help others keep the faith. My luck can't last much longer. But the flame goes on and only that is important.
History, Nationalism, Pacifism and Thomas Sowell
Here is an amazing article by Thomas Sowell that traces the significant reaction of France after WWI as it relates to the ideas of patriotism and pacifism. History is so critical to remember, lest we repeat its worst episodes! From the article:
"In France, after the First World War, the teachers’ unions launched a systematic purge of textbooks, in order to promote internationalism and pacifism.
Books that depicted the courage and self-sacrifice of soldiers who had defended France against the German invaders were called “bellicose” books to be banished from the schools.
Textbook publishers caved in to the power of the teachers’ unions, rather than lose a large market for their books. History books were sharply revised to conform to internationalism and pacifism.
...
In Britain, Winston Churchill warned that a country “cannot avoid war by dilating upon its horrors.” In France, Marshal Philippe Petain, the victor at Verdun, warned in 1934 that teachers were trying to “raise our sons in ignorance of or in contempt of the fatherland.”
But they were voices drowned out by the pacifist and internationalist rhetoric of the 1920s and 1930s.
Did it matter? Does patriotism matter?
France, where pacifism and internationalism were strongest, became a classic example of how much it can matter.
...
During the First World War, France fought on against the German invaders for four long years, despite having more of its soldiers killed than all the American soldiers killed in all the wars in the history of the United States, put together.
But during the Second World War, France collapsed after just six weeks of fighting and surrendered to Nazi Germany. At the bitter moment of defeat the head of the French teachers’ union was told, “You are partially responsible for the defeat.”
Charles de Gaulle, Francois Mauriac, and other Frenchmen blamed a lack of national will or general moral decay, for the sudden and humiliating collapse of France in 1940.
At the outset of the invasion, both German and French generals assessed French military forces as more likely to gain victory, and virtually no one expected France to collapse like a house of cards — except Adolf Hitler, who had studied French society instead of French military forces.
Did patriotism matter? It mattered more than superior French tanks and planes. ..."
Books that depicted the courage and self-sacrifice of soldiers who had defended France against the German invaders were called “bellicose” books to be banished from the schools.
Textbook publishers caved in to the power of the teachers’ unions, rather than lose a large market for their books. History books were sharply revised to conform to internationalism and pacifism.
...
In Britain, Winston Churchill warned that a country “cannot avoid war by dilating upon its horrors.” In France, Marshal Philippe Petain, the victor at Verdun, warned in 1934 that teachers were trying to “raise our sons in ignorance of or in contempt of the fatherland.”
But they were voices drowned out by the pacifist and internationalist rhetoric of the 1920s and 1930s.
Did it matter? Does patriotism matter?
France, where pacifism and internationalism were strongest, became a classic example of how much it can matter.
...
During the First World War, France fought on against the German invaders for four long years, despite having more of its soldiers killed than all the American soldiers killed in all the wars in the history of the United States, put together.
But during the Second World War, France collapsed after just six weeks of fighting and surrendered to Nazi Germany. At the bitter moment of defeat the head of the French teachers’ union was told, “You are partially responsible for the defeat.”
Charles de Gaulle, Francois Mauriac, and other Frenchmen blamed a lack of national will or general moral decay, for the sudden and humiliating collapse of France in 1940.
At the outset of the invasion, both German and French generals assessed French military forces as more likely to gain victory, and virtually no one expected France to collapse like a house of cards — except Adolf Hitler, who had studied French society instead of French military forces.
Did patriotism matter? It mattered more than superior French tanks and planes. ..."
The Dumb Ox by G.K. Chesterton
Reading this book about Saint Thomas Aquinas by GKC was an odd experience for me. First, I was reading about a man whom I knew very little about, which gave me a great perspective. Some actually consider this book the best book about Aquinas to be written. But what made this truly odd was that I possibly thought as much about GKC as I did Aquinas as I read. GKC has such a brilliant mind, and thus, writing style, that I had to refrain from highlighting every sentence. To learn a fact about one man while admiring, and being amazed by, the man writing about the man is a unique encounter for me. Hopefully in the following quotes you will see what I mean.
Additionally, it was amazing how often I thought of myself as I read about Thomas (not with grandiose familiarity, but an odd "oh, there's someone else like that..."). And then there were the moments I found St. Thomas wholly unique, as when GKC described him as "one of those large things who take up a little room" (130). A few delightful bits of insight about Aquinas that encouraged me were:
1) "He maintained controversy with an eye on only two qualities; clarity and courtesy. And he maintained these because they were entirely practical qualities..." (140). For regular readers of this blog you will recognize the similarity of this trait with another man I highly respect - Dennis Prager.
2) "Aquinas is almost always on the side of simplicity" (150). Also for frequent readers, you will recall my fondness for the quote by Oliver Wendell Holmes: "I would not give a fig for simplicity on this side of complexity. But I would give my right arm for simplicity on the other side of complexity."
3) Something that my Seminary preaching prof taught -- the importance for preachers to understand humanity, both his nature and condition -- was also underscored in this book. He prescribed reading good literature to aid this pursuit. Interestingly, GKC explained, "...there ought to be a real study called Anthropology corresponding to Theology [as opposed to corresponding to biology]. In this sense St. Thomas Aquinas, perhaps more than he is anything else, he is a great anthropologist" (161).
I wish I could have met St. Thomas, and look forward to the day I will. There is much to learn from him and I hope to marinate in his life story a bit for that purpose. Here are the excerpts I underlined:
About St. Thomas' Personality:
Thomas actually studied under Albert the Great. And being known to be shy, Albert lured Thomas out of his shell by exercising his great knowledge, as GKC explains: "He had studied many specimens of the most monstrous of all monstrosities; that is called Man. He knew the signs and marks of the sort of man, who is in an innocent way something of a monster among men"....And because of Thomas' shyness, he had earned the nickname 'the dumb ox'. But Albert declared: "You call him a Dumb Ox; I tell you this Dumb Ox shall bellow so loud that his bellowings will fill the world" (71). And he was right.
"St Thomas was always ready, with the hearty sort of humility, to give thanks for all his thinking" (71).
"He had been a man with a huge controversial appetite, a thing that exists in some men and not others, in saints and in sinners" (96).
"...when he was reluctantly dragged from his work, and we might almost say from his play. For both were for him found in the unusual hobby of thinking, which is for some men a thing much more intoxicating than mere drinking" (97).
"But there is a general tone and temper of Aquinas, which it is as difficult to avoid as daylight in a great house of windows. It is that positive position of his mind, which is filled and soaked as with sunshine with the warmth and wonder of created things" (119).
"...if his daydreams were dreams, they were dreams of day; and dreams of the day of battle. If he talked to himself, it was because he was arguing with somebody else. We can put it another way, by saying that his daydreams, like the dreams of a dog, were dreams of hunting; of pursuing the error as well as pursuing the truth; of following all the twists and turns of evasive falsehood, and tracking it at last to its lair in hell" (125,126).
"He was interested in the souls of all his fellow creatures, but not in classifying the minds of any of them; in a sense it was too personal and in another sense too arrogant for his particular mind and temper" (128).
"... and he goes out of his way to say that men must vary their lives with jokes and even with pranks" (131).
St Thomas' faith was very intellectual, to say the least. However, that doesn't mean it was only intellectual. There was an emotional element to it for him, although "it would always have embarrassed him to write about [this emotional side] at such length. The one exception permitted to him was the rare but remarkable output of his poetry. All sanctity is secrecy; and his sacred poetry was really a secretion; like the pearl in a very tightly closed oyster" (140). "It may be worth remarking, for those who think that he thought too little of the emotional or romantic side of religious truth, that he asked to have The Song of Solomon read through to him from beginning to end [on his deathbed]" (143).
"...this philosopher does not merely touch on social things, or even take them in his stride to spiritual things; though that is his direction. He takes hold of them, he has not only a grasp of them, but a grip. As all his controversies prove, he was perhaps a perfect example of the iron hand in the velvet glove. He was a man who always turned his full attention to anything; and he seems to fix even passing thins as they pass. To him even what was momentary was momentous" (187).
"It never occurred to Aquinas to use Aquinas as a weapon. There is not a trace of his ever using his personal advantages, of birth or body or brain or breeding, in debate with anybody" (196).
About St. Thomas' Philosophy:
It was not only a primary idea of Thomist doctrine that a central common sense is nourished by the five senses, but "a truly and eminently Christian doctrine" as well. Unfortunately, GKC comments, "For upon this point modern writers write a great deal of nonsense; and show more than their normal ingenuity in missing the point" (32).
"Thomas was a very great man who reconciled religion with reason..., who insisted that the senses were the windows of the soul and that the reason had a divine right to feed upon facts, and that it was the business of the Faith to digest the strong meat of the toughest and most practical of pagan philosophies" (32,33).
"...the philosophy of St. Thomas stands founded on the universal common conviction that eggs are eggs.... The Thomist stands in the broad daylight of the brotherhood of men, in their common consciousness that eggs are not hens or dreams or mere practical assumptions; but things attested by the Authority of the Senses, which is from God" (148).
"...I am not so silly as to suggest that all the writings of St. Thomas are simple and straightforward; in the sense of being easy to understand. There are passages I do not in the least understand myself;...there are passages about which the greatest Thomists still differ and dispute. But that is a question of a thing being hard to read or hard to understand: not hard to accept when understood. that is a mere matter of "The Cat sat on the Mat" being written in Chinese characters; or "Mary had a Little Lamb" in Egyptian hieroglyphics. The only point I am stressing here is that Aquinas is almost always on the side of simplicity, and supports the ordinary man's acceptance of ordinary truism" (150).
"This is, in a very rude outline, his philosophy; it is impossible in such an outline to describe his theology. Anyone writing so small a book about so big a man, must leave out something. Those who know him best will best understand why... I have left out the only important thing" (181).
Below are some general thoughts by GKC that seem to be as relevant today as they were when he wrote and as much as they applied to the days of St. Thomas:
About the recent SCOTUS Decision...
"...he is emphatic upon the fact that law, when it ceases to be justice, ceases even to be law" (188).
About China...
"...things which men produce only to sell are likely to be worse in quality than the things they produce in order to consume" (189).
About The War in Iraq...
"War, in the wide modern sense, is possible, not because more men disagree, but because more men agree. Under the peculiarly modern coercions, such as Compulsory Education and Conscription, there are very large peaceful areas, that they can all agree upon War. In that age men disagreed even about war; and peace might break out anywhere" (56). It may be that we are seeing a repeat of that era when there was more disagreement, and thus the more difficulty in finding a consensus regarding war.
About Global Warming...
"...most men must have a revealed religion, because they have not time to argue. No time, that is, to argue fairly. There is always time to argue unfairly; not least in a time like ours.... As a matter of fact, it is generally the man who is not ready to argue, who is ready to sneer. That is why, in recent literature, there has been so little argument and so much sneering" (127).
"Behold our refutation of the error. It is not based on documents of faith, but on the reasons and statements of the philosophers [or environmentalists] themselves. If then anyone there be who, boastfully taking pride in his supposed wisdom, wishes to challenge what we have written, let him reply openly if he dare. He shall find me there confronting him, and not only my negligible self, but many another whose study is truth. We shall do battle with his errors or bring a cure to his ignorance" (94). Unfortunately, Al Gore has consistently refused to debate anyone publicly. I guess that's why he can say the debate is settled - since it never actually started.
GKC responded to this reaction by observing: "After the great example of St. Thomas, the principle stands, or ought always to have stood established; that we must either not argue with a man at all, or we must argue on his grounds and not ours" (95,96).
About The Emergent Church...
"In short, a real knowledge of mankind will tell anybody that Religion is a very terrible thing; that it is truly a raging fire, and that Authority is often quite as much needed to restrain it as to impose it. Asceticism, or the war with the appetites, is itself an appetite. It can never be eliminated from among the strange ambitions of Man. But it can be kept in some reasonable control..." (104).
"In truth, this vividly illuminates the provincial stupidity of those who object to what they call 'creeds and dogmas.' It was precisely the creed and dogma that saved the sanity of the world. These people generally propose an alternative religion of intuition and feeling. If, in the really Dark Ages, there had been a religion of feeling, it would have been a religion of black and suicidal feeling. It was the rigid creed that resisted the rush of suicidal feeling.... A thousand enthusiasts for celibacy, in the day of the great rush to the desert or the cloister, might have called marriage a sin, if they had only considered their individual ideals, in the modern manner, and their own immediate feelings about marriage. Fortunately, they had to accept the Authority of the Church, which had definitely said that marriage was not a sin.... when Religion would have maddened men, Theology kept them sane" (110,111).
About Feelings vs. Intellect in Faith...
"Mystics can be represented as men who maintain that the final fruition or joy of the soul is rather a sensation than a thought. The motto of the Mystics has always been, 'Taste and See'.... [It] is equally right in saying that the intellect is at home in the topmost heavens; and that the appetite for truth may outlast and even devour all the duller appetites of man" (73,74).
About Knowing History - Remembering...
"Perhaps there is really no such thing as a Revolution recorded in history. What happened was always a Counter-Revolution. Men were always rebelling against the last rebels; or even repenting of the last rebellion.... Nobody but a lunatic could pretend that [modern trends of rebellion toward the last generation] were a progress; for they obviously go first one way and then the other. But whichever is right, one thing is certainly wrong; and that is the modern habit of looking at them only from the modern end. For that is only to see the end of the tale; they rebel against they know not what, because it arose they know not when; intents only on its ending, they are ignorant of its beginning; and therefore of its very being" (76, 77).
About The Debate Between Science and Religion/the Church...
"Albert, the Swabian, rightly called the Great, was the founder of modern science. He did more than any other man to prepare that process, which has turned the alchemist into the chemist, and the astrologer into the astronomer.... Serious historians are abandoning the absurd notion that the medieval Church persecuted all scientists as wizards. It is very nearly the opposite of the truth. The world sometimes persecuted them as wizards, and sometimes ran after them as wizards; the sort of pursuing that is the reverse of persecuting. The Church alone regarded them really and solely as scientists" (66).
"...private theories about what the Bible ought to mean, and premature theories about what the world ought to mean, have met in loud and widely advertised controversy, especially in the Victorian time; and this clumsy collision of two very impatient forms of ignorance was known as the quarrel of Science and Religion" (88).
"It is the fact that falsehood is never so false as when it is very nearly true. It is when the stab comes near the nerve of truth, that the Christian conscience cries out in pain." This was proved by St Thomas' final stand against heresy in his day. "He had cleared the ground for a general understanding about faith and enquiry; an understanding that has generally been observed among Catholics, and certainly never deserted without disaster. It was the idea that the scientist should go on exploring and experimenting freely, so long as he did not claim an infallibility and finality which it was against his own principles to claim. Meanwhile the Church should go on developing and defining, about supernatural things, so long as she did not claim a right to alter the deposit of faith, which it was against her own principles to claim. And when hd had said this, Siger of Brabant got up and said something so horribly like it, and so horribly unlike, that (like Antichrist) he might have deceived the very elect.
Siger of Brabant said this: the Church must be right theologically, but she can be wrong scientifically. There are two truths; the truth of the supernatural world, and the truth of the natural world.... It was not two ways of finding the same truth; it was an untruthful way of pretending that there are two truths.... Those who complain that theologians draw fine distinctions could hardly find a better example of their own folly. In fact, a fine distinction can be a flat contradiction" (92,93).
About Past Ages...
"The saint is a medicine because he is an antidote. Indeed that is why the saint [and maybe we could also use the word prophet] is mistaken for a poison because he is an antidote. He will generally be found restoring the world to sanity by exaggerating whatever the world neglects, which is by no means always the same element in every age.... Christ did not tell his apostles that they were only the excellent people, or the only excellent people, but that they were the exceptional people; the permanently incongruous and incompatible people..." (23).
"...as the eighteenth century thought itself the age of reason, and the nineteenth century thought itself the age of common sense, the twentieth century cannot as yet even manage to think itself anything but the age of uncommon nonsense" (25). And what would GKC think of the twenty-first century?
"Nobody can understand the greatness of the thirteenth century [when St. Thomas lived], who does not realize that it was a great growth of new things produced by a living thing. In that sense it was really bolder and freer than what we call the Renaissance, which was a resurrection of old things discovered in a dead thing" (41).
"That is what makes the riddle of the medieval age; that it was not one age but two ages. We look into the moods of some men, and it might be the Stone Age; we look into the minds of other men, and thy might be living in the Golden Age.... There were always good men and bad men; but in this time good men who were subtle lived with bad men who were simple" (63,64).
"I think there are fewer people now alive who understand argument than there were twenty or thirty years ago; and St. Thomas might have preferred the society of the atheists of the early nineteenth century, to that of the blank sceptics of the early twentieth" (126).
Referring to the Reformation of Martin Luther, "It had a peculiar horror and loathing of the great Greek philosophies, and of the Scholasticism that had been founded on those philosophies.... Man could say nothing to God, nothing from God, nothing about God, except an almost inarticulate cry for mercy and for the supernatural help of Christ, in a world where all natural things were useless. Reason was useless. Will was useless. Man could not move himself an inch any more than a stone. Man could not trust what was in his head any more than a turnip. Nothing remained in earth or heaven, but the name of Christ lifted in that lonely imprecation; awful as the cry of a beast in pain" (194,195).
Additionally, it was amazing how often I thought of myself as I read about Thomas (not with grandiose familiarity, but an odd "oh, there's someone else like that..."). And then there were the moments I found St. Thomas wholly unique, as when GKC described him as "one of those large things who take up a little room" (130). A few delightful bits of insight about Aquinas that encouraged me were:
1) "He maintained controversy with an eye on only two qualities; clarity and courtesy. And he maintained these because they were entirely practical qualities..." (140). For regular readers of this blog you will recognize the similarity of this trait with another man I highly respect - Dennis Prager.
2) "Aquinas is almost always on the side of simplicity" (150). Also for frequent readers, you will recall my fondness for the quote by Oliver Wendell Holmes: "I would not give a fig for simplicity on this side of complexity. But I would give my right arm for simplicity on the other side of complexity."
3) Something that my Seminary preaching prof taught -- the importance for preachers to understand humanity, both his nature and condition -- was also underscored in this book. He prescribed reading good literature to aid this pursuit. Interestingly, GKC explained, "...there ought to be a real study called Anthropology corresponding to Theology [as opposed to corresponding to biology]. In this sense St. Thomas Aquinas, perhaps more than he is anything else, he is a great anthropologist" (161).
I wish I could have met St. Thomas, and look forward to the day I will. There is much to learn from him and I hope to marinate in his life story a bit for that purpose. Here are the excerpts I underlined:
About St. Thomas' Personality:
Thomas actually studied under Albert the Great. And being known to be shy, Albert lured Thomas out of his shell by exercising his great knowledge, as GKC explains: "He had studied many specimens of the most monstrous of all monstrosities; that is called Man. He knew the signs and marks of the sort of man, who is in an innocent way something of a monster among men"....And because of Thomas' shyness, he had earned the nickname 'the dumb ox'. But Albert declared: "You call him a Dumb Ox; I tell you this Dumb Ox shall bellow so loud that his bellowings will fill the world" (71). And he was right.
"St Thomas was always ready, with the hearty sort of humility, to give thanks for all his thinking" (71).
"He had been a man with a huge controversial appetite, a thing that exists in some men and not others, in saints and in sinners" (96).
"...when he was reluctantly dragged from his work, and we might almost say from his play. For both were for him found in the unusual hobby of thinking, which is for some men a thing much more intoxicating than mere drinking" (97).
"But there is a general tone and temper of Aquinas, which it is as difficult to avoid as daylight in a great house of windows. It is that positive position of his mind, which is filled and soaked as with sunshine with the warmth and wonder of created things" (119).
"...if his daydreams were dreams, they were dreams of day; and dreams of the day of battle. If he talked to himself, it was because he was arguing with somebody else. We can put it another way, by saying that his daydreams, like the dreams of a dog, were dreams of hunting; of pursuing the error as well as pursuing the truth; of following all the twists and turns of evasive falsehood, and tracking it at last to its lair in hell" (125,126).
"He was interested in the souls of all his fellow creatures, but not in classifying the minds of any of them; in a sense it was too personal and in another sense too arrogant for his particular mind and temper" (128).
"... and he goes out of his way to say that men must vary their lives with jokes and even with pranks" (131).
St Thomas' faith was very intellectual, to say the least. However, that doesn't mean it was only intellectual. There was an emotional element to it for him, although "it would always have embarrassed him to write about [this emotional side] at such length. The one exception permitted to him was the rare but remarkable output of his poetry. All sanctity is secrecy; and his sacred poetry was really a secretion; like the pearl in a very tightly closed oyster" (140). "It may be worth remarking, for those who think that he thought too little of the emotional or romantic side of religious truth, that he asked to have The Song of Solomon read through to him from beginning to end [on his deathbed]" (143).
"...this philosopher does not merely touch on social things, or even take them in his stride to spiritual things; though that is his direction. He takes hold of them, he has not only a grasp of them, but a grip. As all his controversies prove, he was perhaps a perfect example of the iron hand in the velvet glove. He was a man who always turned his full attention to anything; and he seems to fix even passing thins as they pass. To him even what was momentary was momentous" (187).
"It never occurred to Aquinas to use Aquinas as a weapon. There is not a trace of his ever using his personal advantages, of birth or body or brain or breeding, in debate with anybody" (196).
About St. Thomas' Philosophy:
It was not only a primary idea of Thomist doctrine that a central common sense is nourished by the five senses, but "a truly and eminently Christian doctrine" as well. Unfortunately, GKC comments, "For upon this point modern writers write a great deal of nonsense; and show more than their normal ingenuity in missing the point" (32).
"Thomas was a very great man who reconciled religion with reason..., who insisted that the senses were the windows of the soul and that the reason had a divine right to feed upon facts, and that it was the business of the Faith to digest the strong meat of the toughest and most practical of pagan philosophies" (32,33).
"...the philosophy of St. Thomas stands founded on the universal common conviction that eggs are eggs.... The Thomist stands in the broad daylight of the brotherhood of men, in their common consciousness that eggs are not hens or dreams or mere practical assumptions; but things attested by the Authority of the Senses, which is from God" (148).
"...I am not so silly as to suggest that all the writings of St. Thomas are simple and straightforward; in the sense of being easy to understand. There are passages I do not in the least understand myself;...there are passages about which the greatest Thomists still differ and dispute. But that is a question of a thing being hard to read or hard to understand: not hard to accept when understood. that is a mere matter of "The Cat sat on the Mat" being written in Chinese characters; or "Mary had a Little Lamb" in Egyptian hieroglyphics. The only point I am stressing here is that Aquinas is almost always on the side of simplicity, and supports the ordinary man's acceptance of ordinary truism" (150).
"This is, in a very rude outline, his philosophy; it is impossible in such an outline to describe his theology. Anyone writing so small a book about so big a man, must leave out something. Those who know him best will best understand why... I have left out the only important thing" (181).
Below are some general thoughts by GKC that seem to be as relevant today as they were when he wrote and as much as they applied to the days of St. Thomas:
About the recent SCOTUS Decision...
"...he is emphatic upon the fact that law, when it ceases to be justice, ceases even to be law" (188).
About China...
"...things which men produce only to sell are likely to be worse in quality than the things they produce in order to consume" (189).
About The War in Iraq...
"War, in the wide modern sense, is possible, not because more men disagree, but because more men agree. Under the peculiarly modern coercions, such as Compulsory Education and Conscription, there are very large peaceful areas, that they can all agree upon War. In that age men disagreed even about war; and peace might break out anywhere" (56). It may be that we are seeing a repeat of that era when there was more disagreement, and thus the more difficulty in finding a consensus regarding war.
About Global Warming...
"...most men must have a revealed religion, because they have not time to argue. No time, that is, to argue fairly. There is always time to argue unfairly; not least in a time like ours.... As a matter of fact, it is generally the man who is not ready to argue, who is ready to sneer. That is why, in recent literature, there has been so little argument and so much sneering" (127).
"Behold our refutation of the error. It is not based on documents of faith, but on the reasons and statements of the philosophers [or environmentalists] themselves. If then anyone there be who, boastfully taking pride in his supposed wisdom, wishes to challenge what we have written, let him reply openly if he dare. He shall find me there confronting him, and not only my negligible self, but many another whose study is truth. We shall do battle with his errors or bring a cure to his ignorance" (94). Unfortunately, Al Gore has consistently refused to debate anyone publicly. I guess that's why he can say the debate is settled - since it never actually started.
GKC responded to this reaction by observing: "After the great example of St. Thomas, the principle stands, or ought always to have stood established; that we must either not argue with a man at all, or we must argue on his grounds and not ours" (95,96).
About The Emergent Church...
"In short, a real knowledge of mankind will tell anybody that Religion is a very terrible thing; that it is truly a raging fire, and that Authority is often quite as much needed to restrain it as to impose it. Asceticism, or the war with the appetites, is itself an appetite. It can never be eliminated from among the strange ambitions of Man. But it can be kept in some reasonable control..." (104).
"In truth, this vividly illuminates the provincial stupidity of those who object to what they call 'creeds and dogmas.' It was precisely the creed and dogma that saved the sanity of the world. These people generally propose an alternative religion of intuition and feeling. If, in the really Dark Ages, there had been a religion of feeling, it would have been a religion of black and suicidal feeling. It was the rigid creed that resisted the rush of suicidal feeling.... A thousand enthusiasts for celibacy, in the day of the great rush to the desert or the cloister, might have called marriage a sin, if they had only considered their individual ideals, in the modern manner, and their own immediate feelings about marriage. Fortunately, they had to accept the Authority of the Church, which had definitely said that marriage was not a sin.... when Religion would have maddened men, Theology kept them sane" (110,111).
About Feelings vs. Intellect in Faith...
"Mystics can be represented as men who maintain that the final fruition or joy of the soul is rather a sensation than a thought. The motto of the Mystics has always been, 'Taste and See'.... [It] is equally right in saying that the intellect is at home in the topmost heavens; and that the appetite for truth may outlast and even devour all the duller appetites of man" (73,74).
About Knowing History - Remembering...
"Perhaps there is really no such thing as a Revolution recorded in history. What happened was always a Counter-Revolution. Men were always rebelling against the last rebels; or even repenting of the last rebellion.... Nobody but a lunatic could pretend that [modern trends of rebellion toward the last generation] were a progress; for they obviously go first one way and then the other. But whichever is right, one thing is certainly wrong; and that is the modern habit of looking at them only from the modern end. For that is only to see the end of the tale; they rebel against they know not what, because it arose they know not when; intents only on its ending, they are ignorant of its beginning; and therefore of its very being" (76, 77).
About The Debate Between Science and Religion/the Church...
"Albert, the Swabian, rightly called the Great, was the founder of modern science. He did more than any other man to prepare that process, which has turned the alchemist into the chemist, and the astrologer into the astronomer.... Serious historians are abandoning the absurd notion that the medieval Church persecuted all scientists as wizards. It is very nearly the opposite of the truth. The world sometimes persecuted them as wizards, and sometimes ran after them as wizards; the sort of pursuing that is the reverse of persecuting. The Church alone regarded them really and solely as scientists" (66).
"...private theories about what the Bible ought to mean, and premature theories about what the world ought to mean, have met in loud and widely advertised controversy, especially in the Victorian time; and this clumsy collision of two very impatient forms of ignorance was known as the quarrel of Science and Religion" (88).
"It is the fact that falsehood is never so false as when it is very nearly true. It is when the stab comes near the nerve of truth, that the Christian conscience cries out in pain." This was proved by St Thomas' final stand against heresy in his day. "He had cleared the ground for a general understanding about faith and enquiry; an understanding that has generally been observed among Catholics, and certainly never deserted without disaster. It was the idea that the scientist should go on exploring and experimenting freely, so long as he did not claim an infallibility and finality which it was against his own principles to claim. Meanwhile the Church should go on developing and defining, about supernatural things, so long as she did not claim a right to alter the deposit of faith, which it was against her own principles to claim. And when hd had said this, Siger of Brabant got up and said something so horribly like it, and so horribly unlike, that (like Antichrist) he might have deceived the very elect.
Siger of Brabant said this: the Church must be right theologically, but she can be wrong scientifically. There are two truths; the truth of the supernatural world, and the truth of the natural world.... It was not two ways of finding the same truth; it was an untruthful way of pretending that there are two truths.... Those who complain that theologians draw fine distinctions could hardly find a better example of their own folly. In fact, a fine distinction can be a flat contradiction" (92,93).
About Past Ages...
"The saint is a medicine because he is an antidote. Indeed that is why the saint [and maybe we could also use the word prophet] is mistaken for a poison because he is an antidote. He will generally be found restoring the world to sanity by exaggerating whatever the world neglects, which is by no means always the same element in every age.... Christ did not tell his apostles that they were only the excellent people, or the only excellent people, but that they were the exceptional people; the permanently incongruous and incompatible people..." (23).
"...as the eighteenth century thought itself the age of reason, and the nineteenth century thought itself the age of common sense, the twentieth century cannot as yet even manage to think itself anything but the age of uncommon nonsense" (25). And what would GKC think of the twenty-first century?
"Nobody can understand the greatness of the thirteenth century [when St. Thomas lived], who does not realize that it was a great growth of new things produced by a living thing. In that sense it was really bolder and freer than what we call the Renaissance, which was a resurrection of old things discovered in a dead thing" (41).
"That is what makes the riddle of the medieval age; that it was not one age but two ages. We look into the moods of some men, and it might be the Stone Age; we look into the minds of other men, and thy might be living in the Golden Age.... There were always good men and bad men; but in this time good men who were subtle lived with bad men who were simple" (63,64).
"I think there are fewer people now alive who understand argument than there were twenty or thirty years ago; and St. Thomas might have preferred the society of the atheists of the early nineteenth century, to that of the blank sceptics of the early twentieth" (126).
Referring to the Reformation of Martin Luther, "It had a peculiar horror and loathing of the great Greek philosophies, and of the Scholasticism that had been founded on those philosophies.... Man could say nothing to God, nothing from God, nothing about God, except an almost inarticulate cry for mercy and for the supernatural help of Christ, in a world where all natural things were useless. Reason was useless. Will was useless. Man could not move himself an inch any more than a stone. Man could not trust what was in his head any more than a turnip. Nothing remained in earth or heaven, but the name of Christ lifted in that lonely imprecation; awful as the cry of a beast in pain" (194,195).
Liberal Journalist: Bush Did NOT Lie to Us About Iraq
Here is a great article by James Kirchick, an assistant editor of the New Republic, explaining the obvious distinction between faulty information and intentional deception. In part:
"Four years on from the first Senate Intelligence Committee report, war critics, old and newfangled, still don't get that a lie is an act of deliberate, not unwitting, deception. If Democrats wish to contend they were "misled" into war, they should vent their spleen at the CIA.
...This may sound like ancient history, but it matters. After Sept. 11, President Bush did not want to risk allowing Hussein, who had twice invaded neighboring nations, murdered more than 1 million Iraqis and stood in violation of 16 U.N. Security Council resolutions, to remain in possession of what he believed were stocks of chemical and biological warheads and a nuclear weapons program. By glossing over this history, the Democrats' lies-led-to-war narrative provides false comfort in a world of significant dangers.
...[It may be justifiable to say] -- given the way it's turned out -- that they don't think the effort has been worth it. But predicating such a reversal on the unsubstantiated allegation that one was lied to is cowardly and dishonest...."
...This may sound like ancient history, but it matters. After Sept. 11, President Bush did not want to risk allowing Hussein, who had twice invaded neighboring nations, murdered more than 1 million Iraqis and stood in violation of 16 U.N. Security Council resolutions, to remain in possession of what he believed were stocks of chemical and biological warheads and a nuclear weapons program. By glossing over this history, the Democrats' lies-led-to-war narrative provides false comfort in a world of significant dangers.
...[It may be justifiable to say] -- given the way it's turned out -- that they don't think the effort has been worth it. But predicating such a reversal on the unsubstantiated allegation that one was lied to is cowardly and dishonest...."
Give the Speech!
From the Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer:
"...Obama and the Democrats would forfeit every one of these successes to a declared policy of fixed and unconditional withdrawal. If McCain cannot take to the American people the case for the folly of that policy, he will not be president. Nor should he be.
Give the speech, senator. Give it now."
John McCain's POW Experience
Here is an autobiographical account of John McCain's experience as a POW in Vietnam originally published in the US News and World Report in May 1973. It's a fascinating story and says a lot about a man's character. Some interesting excerpts:
But I knew that the Code of Conduct says, "You will not accept parole or amnesty," and that "you will not accept special favors." For somebody to go home earlier is a special favor. There's no other way you can cut it.
...
If these men are tried, it should not be because they took an antiwar stance, but because they collaborated with the Vietnamese to an extent, and that was harmful to the other American POW's. And there is this to consider: America will have other wars to fight until the Communists give up their doctrine of violent overthrow of our way of life. These men should bear some censure so that in future wars there won't be a precedent for conduct that hurts this country.
...
By the way—a very interesting thing—after I got back, Henry Kissinger told me that when he was in Hanoi to sign the final agreements, the North Vietnamese offered him one man that he could take back to Washington with him, and that was me. He, of course, refused, and I thanked him very much for that, because I did not want to go out of order. Most guys were betting that I'd be the last guy out—but you never can fathom the "gooks."
...
Now that I'm back, I find a lot of hand-wringing about this country. I don't buy that. I think America today is a better country than the one I left nearly six years ago.... I think America is a better country now because we have been through a sort of purging process, a re-evaluation of ourselves. Now I see more of an appreciation of our way of life. There is more patriotism. The flag is all over the place. I hear new values being stressed—the concern for environment is a case in point. Even back in 72?
...
My own plans for the future are to remain in the Navy, if I am able to return to flying status. That depends upon whether the corrective surgery on my arms and my leg is successful. If I have to leave the Navy, I hope to serve the Government in some capacity, preferably in Foreign Service for the State Department.
I went back to him three nights later. He asked again, "Do you want to go home?" I told him "No." He wanted to know why, and I told him the reason. I said that Alvarez [first American captured] should go first, then enlisted men and that kind of stuff. I am instantly reminded of the most recent POW situation of British soldiers held by Iran. Either there's a vast discrepancy between the American and British codes of conduct, or a vast discrepancy between the military training of McCain's day and now. Either way, it is a sad observation.
...
I was finding that prayer helped. It wasn't a question of asking for superhuman strength or for God to strike the North Vietnamese dead. It was asking for moral and physical courage, for guidance and wisdom to do the right thing. I asked for comfort when I was in pain, and sometimes I received relief. I was sustained in many times of trial.
...
This brings me to something that I want to discuss in more detail:
As you may know, back in 1954, the North Vietnamese had a big hand in toppling the French Government in Paris because the French voters had no more stomach for the Vietnam war their Government was waging at the time. That was the way the North Vietnamese won in 1954—they didn't win in Vietnam.
The French agreed to pull out of Indo-China with no questions asked when they signed the agreement. As a result, they got back just one third of their POW's.
I'm convinced that Hanoi hoped to win in our case by undermining morale among the people at home in America. They had to marshal world opinion on their side. I remember in 1968 or '69 [North Vietnam Premier] Pham Van Dong's speech to the National Assembly, because we were blasted with these things on the loud-speakers. The title of his address was, "The Whole World Supports Us," not, "We Have Defeated the U. S. Aggressors," or anything like that.
...
In March of 1971 the senior officers decided that we would have a showdown over church. This was an important issue for us. It also was a good one to fight them on. We went ahead and held church. The men that were conducting the service were taken out of the room immediately. We began to sing hymns in loud voices and "The Star-Spangled Banner."
...
All through this period, the "gooks" were bombarding us with antiwar quotes from people in high places back in Washington. This was the most effective propaganda they had to use against us—speeches and statements by men who were generally respected in the United States.
They used Senator Fulbright a great deal, and Senator Brooke. Ted Kennedy was quoted again and again, as was Averell Harriman. Clark Clifford was another favorite, right after he had been Secretary of Defense under President Johnson.
When Ramsey Clark came over they thought that was a great coup for their cause.
The big furor over release of the Pentagon papers was a tremendous boost for Hanoi. It was advanced as proof of the "black imperialist schemes" that they had been talking about all those years.
...
It was obvious to us that negotiation was not going to settle the problem. The only reason why the North Vietnamese began negotiating in October, 1972, was because they could read the polls as well as you and I can, and they knew that Nixon was going to have an overwhelming victory in his re-election bid. So they wanted to negotiate a cease-fire before the elections.
...
Force is what they understand. And that's why it is difficult for me to understand now, when everybody knows that the bombing finally got a cease-fire agreement, why people are still criticizing his foreign policy—for example, the bombing in Cambodia.
...
I asked one young pilot—class of '70 at West Point—"How did your outfit feel when you were told that the B-52s were going to bomb Hanoi?" He said, "Our morale skyrocketed."
I have heard there was one B-52 pilot who refused to fly the missions during the Christmas bombing. You always run into that kind. When the going gets tough, they find out their conscience is bothering them. I want to say this to anybody in the military: If you don't know what your country is doing, find out. And if you find you don't like what your country is doing, get out before the chips are down.
Once you become a prisoner of war, then you do not have the right to dissent, because what you do will be harming your country. You are no longer speaking as an individual, you are speaking as a member of the armed forces of the United States, and you owe loyalty to the Commander in Chief, not to your own conscience. Was this a direct comment about John Kerry and his kind?...
If these men are tried, it should not be because they took an antiwar stance, but because they collaborated with the Vietnamese to an extent, and that was harmful to the other American POW's. And there is this to consider: America will have other wars to fight until the Communists give up their doctrine of violent overthrow of our way of life. These men should bear some censure so that in future wars there won't be a precedent for conduct that hurts this country.
...
By the way—a very interesting thing—after I got back, Henry Kissinger told me that when he was in Hanoi to sign the final agreements, the North Vietnamese offered him one man that he could take back to Washington with him, and that was me. He, of course, refused, and I thanked him very much for that, because I did not want to go out of order. Most guys were betting that I'd be the last guy out—but you never can fathom the "gooks."
...
Now that I'm back, I find a lot of hand-wringing about this country. I don't buy that. I think America today is a better country than the one I left nearly six years ago.... I think America is a better country now because we have been through a sort of purging process, a re-evaluation of ourselves. Now I see more of an appreciation of our way of life. There is more patriotism. The flag is all over the place. I hear new values being stressed—the concern for environment is a case in point. Even back in 72?
...
My own plans for the future are to remain in the Navy, if I am able to return to flying status. That depends upon whether the corrective surgery on my arms and my leg is successful. If I have to leave the Navy, I hope to serve the Government in some capacity, preferably in Foreign Service for the State Department.
I had a lot of time to think over there, and came to the conclusion that one of the most important things in life—along with a man's family—is to make some contribution to his country.
Kennedy Started the Vietnam War!?
Did his meeting with Khrushchev provoke Kennedy into concluding that he needed to confront Communism in Vietnam? So implies the history review in this article by Hugh Hewitt. Hewitt is quoting another article, written by Scott Johnson of The Daily Standard, summarizing the historical/political events surrounding the Vienna talks between Kennedy and Khrushchev. That article concludes:
"Summarizing Kennedy's own evaluation of the aftermath of the Vienna conference in his 2003 biography of Kennedy, Robert Dallek writes that Kennedy "now needed to convince Khrushchev that he could not be pushed around, and the best place currently to make U.S. power credible seemed to be in Vietnam."
In short, the Vienna conference resolved no issue between the United States and the Soviet Union. On the contrary, if anything, it precipitated crises that were resolved through the display and use of military force.
What harm can possibly come of a meeting between enemies? There are many, like Obama, who say that no harm can come from talking. To paraphrase JFK's June 1963 Berlin speech, let them come to study the Vienna conference."
Abuse By UN Peacekeepers
The BBC reports on the wave of abuse taking place at the hands of UN Peacekeepers. According to an inset in the article:
So the UN's Human Rights Committee is a sham and their Peacekeepers (of course not all) are guilty of injuring those they were meant to protect. I found this comment particularly interesting:
"Impossible to ensure zero incidents"? Tell that to those who slandered all US troops regarding the shameful Abu Grab Prison scandal. So now it's OK for the UN to say this behavior by the minority is impossible to prevent.
As to their zero tolerance policy, when are they going to start their own investigation instead of just relying on a report submitted by an NGO? And when will the US take this seriously and withhold its support (25% of the UN budget) until this gets resolved?
2003 - Nepalese troops accused of sexual abuse while serving in DR Congo. Six are later jailed 2004 - Two UN peacekeepers repatriated after being accused of abuse in Burundi 2005 - UN troops accused of rape and sexual abuse in Sudan 2006 - UN personnel accused of rape and exploitation on missions in Haiti and Liberia 2007 - UN launches probe into sexual abuse claims in Ivory Coast
So the UN's Human Rights Committee is a sham and their Peacekeepers (of course not all) are guilty of injuring those they were meant to protect. I found this comment particularly interesting:
"A UN spokesman, Nick Birnback, said that it was impossible to ensure "zero incidents" within an organisation that has up to 200,000 personnel serving around the world.
"What we can do is get across a message of zero tolerance, which for us means zero complacency when credible allegations are raised and zero impunity when we find that there has been malfeasance that's occurred," he told the BBC."
As to their zero tolerance policy, when are they going to start their own investigation instead of just relying on a report submitted by an NGO? And when will the US take this seriously and withhold its support (25% of the UN budget) until this gets resolved?
National Alzheimer's
Memorial Day is the day of "memory" for our nation. It actually started after the Civil War, in 1866 as Decoration Day with Americans going to cemeteries to decorate the graves of soldiers in honor of their sacrifice. It eventually became Memorial Day, a day of remembrance. Dennis Prager was talking today and mentioned the idea that our memory is what makes us who we are. If we ever lost our memory we would lose our identity, very much like a victim of Alzheimer's, who forgets not only who he is but also who everyone else in his life is.
On a national level, when we lose our memory, we also lose our identity. There are many famous quotes about those who fail to learn from history (our memory) are doomed to repeat it, etc. Well, connecting this with one of my other favorite quotes about remembering, I found Prager's comments quite profound.
One of the interesting components of our history, our national memory, that I have learned lately, especially as it relates to war, is that we WON the Vietnam war. Seriously, check out your history. The problem was the "won, now run" policy that our decision-makers implemented prevented Vietnam from stabilizing the peace and getting up on its feet. Thus, "in early 1975 the communists launched a massive attack. President Gerald Ford asked for $1 billion in supplemental funds to help the South Vietnamese, and Congress refused. They had already pulled the plug on the U.S.-supported government of Lon Nol in Cambodia. Ford had no choice but to order the evacuation of remaining U.S. personnel."
Now, this is important to our national identity because people are claiming Iraq is the new Vietnam. The parallels are striking. But have we learned the lessons? If we win the peace, but leave as soon as it looks certain, without staying long enough to secure it, will Iraq become the new Vietnam for certain?
Obama claims that if we have not been able to stabilize Iraq in 7 years, we won't be able to do it in 14, 21, or 54 years. Really?! Well, how does he explain Korea? It's not that we failed in the Korean conflict, ultimately, as much as our presence there helps maintain the peace we secured. This precisely is John McCain's point about being in Iraq for 50 or 100 years, if necessary.
It's a shame to see one so young suffer from such a horrible disease - Alzheimer's. I pray on this day of memory, we as a nation, will not fall victim to it as well.
Thank you to all who have served and are serving.
On a national level, when we lose our memory, we also lose our identity. There are many famous quotes about those who fail to learn from history (our memory) are doomed to repeat it, etc. Well, connecting this with one of my other favorite quotes about remembering, I found Prager's comments quite profound.
One of the interesting components of our history, our national memory, that I have learned lately, especially as it relates to war, is that we WON the Vietnam war. Seriously, check out your history. The problem was the "won, now run" policy that our decision-makers implemented prevented Vietnam from stabilizing the peace and getting up on its feet. Thus, "in early 1975 the communists launched a massive attack. President Gerald Ford asked for $1 billion in supplemental funds to help the South Vietnamese, and Congress refused. They had already pulled the plug on the U.S.-supported government of Lon Nol in Cambodia. Ford had no choice but to order the evacuation of remaining U.S. personnel."
Now, this is important to our national identity because people are claiming Iraq is the new Vietnam. The parallels are striking. But have we learned the lessons? If we win the peace, but leave as soon as it looks certain, without staying long enough to secure it, will Iraq become the new Vietnam for certain?
Obama claims that if we have not been able to stabilize Iraq in 7 years, we won't be able to do it in 14, 21, or 54 years. Really?! Well, how does he explain Korea? It's not that we failed in the Korean conflict, ultimately, as much as our presence there helps maintain the peace we secured. This precisely is John McCain's point about being in Iraq for 50 or 100 years, if necessary.
It's a shame to see one so young suffer from such a horrible disease - Alzheimer's. I pray on this day of memory, we as a nation, will not fall victim to it as well.
Thank you to all who have served and are serving.
A Brief History Review for Obama
Here's a great post on HA to help explain 20th century history to Obama. HOPEfully it will help him CHANGE his policy of negotiating with terrorists, something every DEMOCRAT president has held as official policy (except Carter, but including Kennedy - whom they say Obama reflects).
France Finally Gets It!
Here is an interesting article discussing France's initiation of strengthening it's national, and regional, defense efforts. It's about time that Europe step up and start managing/handling defense needs in it's own backyard instead of expecting the UN/Nato (and by default, the U.S. which supplies the majority of assets for military/peace-keeping efforts by both bodies) to do the job, all the while complaining that America wants to be the world's policeman!
You Could Have Heard a Pin Drop
Yes, I'm actually posting an email forward on my blog. Four great reminders that America is not all that bad and that sometimes those with a poor opinion of us just don't have/can't remember all the facts.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Then there was a conference in Europe where a number of international engineers were taking part, including French, German, and American. During a break one of the French engineers came back into the room saying 'Have you heard the latest dumb stunt Bush has done? He has sent an aircraft carrier to Indonesia to help the tsunami victims. What does he intended to do, bomb them?'
A Boeing engineer stood up and replied quietly: 'Our carriers have three hospitals on board that can treat several hundred people; they are nuclear powered and can supply emergency electrical power to shore facilities; they have three cafeterias with the capacity to feed 3,000 people three meals a day, they can produce several thousand gallons of fresh water from sea water each day, and they carry half a dozen helicopters for use in transporting victims and injured to and from their flight deck.
We have eleven such ships to help those in need; how many does France have?'
You could have heard a pin drop.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A U.S. Navy Admiral was attending a naval conference that included Admirals from the U.S., English, Canadian, Australian, Italian and French Navies. At a cocktail reception, he found himself standing with a large group of Officers that included personnel from most of those countries. Everyone was chatting away in English as they sipped their drinks but an Italian admiral suddenly complained that, 'whereas Europeans learn many languages, Americans learn only English.' He then asked, 'Why is it that we always have to speak English in these conferences rather than speaking French or Italian?'
Without hesitating, the American Admiral replied 'Maybe it's because the Brits, Canadians, Aussies and Americans arranged it so you wouldn't have to speak German.'
You could have heard a pin drop.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A group of American, retired teachers, recently went to France on a tour. Robert Whiting, an elderly gentleman of 83, arrived in Paris by plane. At French Customs, he took a few minutes to locate his passport in his carry on. "You have been to France before, monsieur?" the customs officer asked sarcastically.
Mr. Whiting admitted that he had been to France previously.
"Then you should know enough to have your passport ready."
Mr. Whiting said, "The last time I was here, I didn't have to show it."
"Impossible. Americans always have to show their passports on arrival in France!"
The senior Mr. Whiting gave the Frenchman a long hard look. Then he quietly explained. "Well, when I came ashore at Omaha Beach on D-Day in '44 to help liberate this country, I couldn't find any damn Frenchmen to show it to."
You could have heard a pin drop.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
When in England at a fairly large conference, Colin Powell was asked by the Archbishop of Canterbury if our plans for Iraq were just an example of 'empire building' by George Bush.
He answered by saying, 'Over the years, the United States has sent many of its fine young men and women into great peril to fight for freedom beyond our borders. The only amount of land we have ever asked for in return is enough to bury those that did not return.'
You could have heard a pin drop.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Then there was a conference in Europe where a number of international engineers were taking part, including French, German, and American. During a break one of the French engineers came back into the room saying 'Have you heard the latest dumb stunt Bush has done? He has sent an aircraft carrier to Indonesia to help the tsunami victims. What does he intended to do, bomb them?'
A Boeing engineer stood up and replied quietly: 'Our carriers have three hospitals on board that can treat several hundred people; they are nuclear powered and can supply emergency electrical power to shore facilities; they have three cafeterias with the capacity to feed 3,000 people three meals a day, they can produce several thousand gallons of fresh water from sea water each day, and they carry half a dozen helicopters for use in transporting victims and injured to and from their flight deck.
We have eleven such ships to help those in need; how many does France have?'
You could have heard a pin drop.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A U.S. Navy Admiral was attending a naval conference that included Admirals from the U.S., English, Canadian, Australian, Italian and French Navies. At a cocktail reception, he found himself standing with a large group of Officers that included personnel from most of those countries. Everyone was chatting away in English as they sipped their drinks but an Italian admiral suddenly complained that, 'whereas Europeans learn many languages, Americans learn only English.' He then asked, 'Why is it that we always have to speak English in these conferences rather than speaking French or Italian?'
Without hesitating, the American Admiral replied 'Maybe it's because the Brits, Canadians, Aussies and Americans arranged it so you wouldn't have to speak German.'
You could have heard a pin drop.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A group of American, retired teachers, recently went to France on a tour. Robert Whiting, an elderly gentleman of 83, arrived in Paris by plane. At French Customs, he took a few minutes to locate his passport in his carry on. "You have been to France before, monsieur?" the customs officer asked sarcastically.
Mr. Whiting admitted that he had been to France previously.
"Then you should know enough to have your passport ready."
Mr. Whiting said, "The last time I was here, I didn't have to show it."
"Impossible. Americans always have to show their passports on arrival in France!"
The senior Mr. Whiting gave the Frenchman a long hard look. Then he quietly explained. "Well, when I came ashore at Omaha Beach on D-Day in '44 to help liberate this country, I couldn't find any damn Frenchmen to show it to."
You could have heard a pin drop.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
When in England at a fairly large conference, Colin Powell was asked by the Archbishop of Canterbury if our plans for Iraq were just an example of 'empire building' by George Bush.
He answered by saying, 'Over the years, the United States has sent many of its fine young men and women into great peril to fight for freedom beyond our borders. The only amount of land we have ever asked for in return is enough to bury those that did not return.'
You could have heard a pin drop.
America, the Midwife of Democracy
Here is a great article in the WSJ by Fouad Ajami from Johns Hopkins University called No Surrender. (Excerpt):
"In those five years, the scaffolding of the war came under steady assault. People said that there was no connection between al Qaeda and Saddam, that no "smoking gun" had been discovered, and that the invasion of Iraq had turned that country into a breeding ground of jihadists.
But those looking for that smoking gun did not understand that the distinction between secular and religious terror in that Arab landscape was a distinction without a difference. The impulse that took America from Kabul to Baghdad was a correct one. Radical Arabs attacked America on 9/11, and a war of deterrence had to be waged against Arab radicalism.
Baghdad was the proper return address, as a notice was served on the purveyors of terror that a price would be paid by those who aid and abet it. It was Saddam Hussein's choice -- and fate -- that he would not duck and stay out of harm's way in the aftermath of 9/11. We have not fully repaired the ways of the radicals in the intervening years. But the spectacle of the dictator's defeat, and the sight of him being sent to the gallows, have worked wonders on the temper of the Arab street.
So we did not turn Baghdad into a democratic city on a hill, and we learned that the dismantling of Sunni tyranny would leave the Arab world's Shiite stepchildren with primacy in Iraq. A better country has nonetheless risen, midwifed by this American war. It is not a flawless democracy. But compare it to the prison it was under Saddam, the tyranny next door in Damascus and the norms of the region, and we can have a measure of pride in what America has brought forth in Baghdad."
Bumper Sticker Rhetoric
I saw a bumper sticker a while ago that said:
"IT'LL BE A GREAT DAY WHEN SCHOOLS HAVE ALL THE MONEY THEY NEED, AND THE AIR FORCE WILL HAVE TO HOLD A BAKE SALE IN ORDER TO BUY A BOMBER."
Well, so did this guy. The difference is that he actually was able to come up with some cold, hard facts to engage the sentiment. I just thought the person was naive and moved on. So please read his article to learn what I would have liked to say, had I had the opportunity to talk to the owner of the bumper sticker.
"IT'LL BE A GREAT DAY WHEN SCHOOLS HAVE ALL THE MONEY THEY NEED, AND THE AIR FORCE WILL HAVE TO HOLD A BAKE SALE IN ORDER TO BUY A BOMBER."
Well, so did this guy. The difference is that he actually was able to come up with some cold, hard facts to engage the sentiment. I just thought the person was naive and moved on. So please read his article to learn what I would have liked to say, had I had the opportunity to talk to the owner of the bumper sticker.
Why Obama Can't Win in 52 Seconds
It's amazing he actually put this in one concise declaration, but here it is:
So do you think he has a clear understanding of the threats against us and a mature view of world politics? Stunning!
So do you think he has a clear understanding of the threats against us and a mature view of world politics? Stunning!
Co-ed Combat by Kingsley Browne
I heard the author of Co-ed Combat: The New Evidence That Women Shouldn't Fight the Nation's Wars being interviewed on the Dennis Prager show today. It was a pretty impressive interview and it seems that the author has done a lot of research to write this book. This piqued my interest because of my previous post on the same issue from a biblical perspective (via John Piper). An excerpt from the publisher on Amazon:
More than 155,000 female troops have been deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan since 2002. And more than seventy of those women have died. While that’s a small fraction of all American casualties, those deaths exceed the number of military women who died in Korea, Vietnam, and the Gulf War combined.
Clearly, women in combat isn’t a theoretical issue anymore. Women now fly combat aircraft and serve on warships. Even the remaining all-male corners of the military are blurring the lines in Iraq. And for many advocates, this trend is considered progress—toward a better, “gender neutral” military.
Co-ed Combat makes the opposite case, based on research in anthropology, biology, history, psychology, sociology, and law, as well as military memoirs. It asks hard questions that challenge the assumptions of feminists.
For instance:
• Has warfare really changed so much as to reverse the almost unanimous history of all-male armed forces?
• Are men and women really equivalent in combat skills, even leaving aside physical strength?
• Do female troops respond to traditional types of motivations?
• Can the bonds of unit cohesion form in a co-ed military unit?
• Can an all-volunteer military afford to reject women?
From a Publisher's Weekly review:Clearly, women in combat isn’t a theoretical issue anymore. Women now fly combat aircraft and serve on warships. Even the remaining all-male corners of the military are blurring the lines in Iraq. And for many advocates, this trend is considered progress—toward a better, “gender neutral” military.
Co-ed Combat makes the opposite case, based on research in anthropology, biology, history, psychology, sociology, and law, as well as military memoirs. It asks hard questions that challenge the assumptions of feminists.
For instance:
• Has warfare really changed so much as to reverse the almost unanimous history of all-male armed forces?
• Are men and women really equivalent in combat skills, even leaving aside physical strength?
• Do female troops respond to traditional types of motivations?
• Can the bonds of unit cohesion form in a co-ed military unit?
• Can an all-volunteer military afford to reject women?
Women serving in the armed forces deserve their nation's thanks, law professor Browne announces in his first paragraph, quickly adding that they are unfit to be soldiers. To support his argument, Browne presents an avalanche of intriguing psychological and military studies that examine male-female differences. He points to evidence that men are generally better able to carry the necessary gear, and that although even noncombatant women must be prepared to fight hand-to-hand, they are generally more cautious: we would rather solve the situation; if somebody has to die, then nobody really wins, explains one. Men have superior hand-eye coordination and situational awareness as well as a greater willingness to take risks and function better in hierarchies, he says. Women are more democratic and tend to resent taking orders, especially from other women, but overwhelmingly oppose complete equality (e.g., being assigned combat roles involuntarily on the same basis as men). Since Browne makes no secret of his opinion and is a lawyer, readers may suspect they are hearing only one side of the case. Still, the question of how women should be treated within the military is timely. (Nov. 1)
A Just War?
Here's a great article by Russel D. Moore on a balanced perspective between pacifism and warmongering. The conclusion of the article states:
In truth, the guy with the "Visualize World Peace" bumper sticker is partly right. And so is Toby Keith when he talks about justice raining down with vengeance on the enemies of what's good and true. Both are grasping at something that can only be found in the gospel story of Christ Jesus. War is sometimes necessary, and we as Christians should be willing to support, fight, and die for our country in those times.
But every time we see a war-even a just and necessary one-we should be reminded that it means we're still living in a world groaning under the weight of sin.
We shouldn't tie dye our shirts and pretend a United Nations enforced peace can end bloodshed. But neither should we callously cheer the violence of war, as if it were a video game. Yes, we should visualize peace-but only a real peace, when the true Emperor of the universe rules over a world so pacific that we cannot even imagine the violence we once saw on CNN, or on Animal Planet. On that day, and maybe not until that day, there won't be the sound of rattling swords, firing guns, or bombs bursting in air.
Peace in Iraq
Christians and Muslims restoring a cross on St. John's dome in Baghdad. Check out original story here. They wanted to express their great appreciation for what the Americans had done to bring peace to their land. Amazing!
Letter from a Soldier
My friend Jeremy posted a letter from his buddy Scott who is returning from a tour in Iraq. His letter is a great explanation of the struggle to love our enemies in a very real context.
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