And he thought of those he angered, because he was not a cruel man...

Normally it is my habit to publish a post and then move on to the next one without reflection or explanation as to why I felt the need to write a particular piece. Wednesdays post, “Have yourself a merry little Christmas...” drew a lot of email and I felt it was important that I address the number one question raised by those who responded to the article. That question was, “Why are you so angry?”

As I watch events unfolding in the Middle East I am increasingly saddened by the ever increasing Shiite dominance of the regions politics. From the Taliban in Afghanistan, the militant Shiite movement in Pakistan to the ruling aristocracy in Iran, Syria and down to the Hezbollah in Lebanon a major political machine is building.

Some Americans believe that only a handful of militant fundamentalists are creating a bad image for the rest of a peaceful Moslem peoples. Unfortunately this is not true. The Shiite movement is huge and getting larger everyday. What is disturbing to me is the methodology being employed to organize and strengthen this military machine. And make no mistake; we are watching the development of a major political and military entity.

When Hitler unified the divided political factions of Germany into the unified political and military machine that eventually entangled the world in a great war he went about the process employing a specific set of tactics. I won’t go into a long explanation of the grassroots organization he built or the way he educated the youth of Germany to embrace a philosophy of intolerance, hate and violence. As a current example of what he accomplished, (and how) I offer the Hezbollah organization.

What made me angry and finally brought my voice to life was the Holocaust conference held in Iran. When I watched the president of Iran, surrounded on stage by an assembly of the worst bigots currently known to mankind, shaking the hand of former Klu Klux Klan leader David Duke it made my stomach churn.

A man is known by the company of men he keeps. When I saw the evil with which Mr. Ahmadinejad was willing to lay down in the mud of the sty and wallow around with it was simply too much for me to remain silent about. Have we, the people of the world truly forgotten the horror of the Holocaust? Have we forgotten the Nazi organization that systematically exterminated and silenced the voices of six million Jewish HUMAN BEINGS?

Ellie Wiesel, author of “Night” wrote, ”Those who kept silent yesterday will remain silent tomorrow.” He wrote these words about the Jewish population who believed in the impossibility of what was happening to them until the very moment they were loaded upon the trains and shipped off to the crematoriums.

How many of us today are standing silent and passive as sheep, watching as a great beast rises up in our midst to devour as many of us as possible? Martin Luther King, one of my personal heroes and inspirations said, “Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”

What is happening in the Moslem world matters. It matters to all of us because of the Shiite war machine being built and the Nazi tactics being employed to build it. When you employ tools of evil to build a thing you can not possibly build anything that is not evil. How can we sit idly by and watch the panorama of hatred and intolerance unfold before us and dismiss it as small and insignificant?

Shiite Moslems are converting huge numbers to their fundamentalist perspective and those who do not submit are being dragged from their homes and tortured to death. We sit in silence as moderate voices are stilled and radical voices scream in unbridled bloodlust.

To my fellow countrymen I say, do not raise your voice up to me and cry, “America has committed sins too! What of America’s sins of the past?” My foolish countrymen, it is purest folly to attempt justification of one entity's sins by comparing it to the sins of another.

Each of us stands before the almighty as an individual in the Day of Judgment. We do not stand before the almighty in comparison to one another and achieve righteousness based upon the deeds of each other. Therefore, it is important that you stop justifying the terrible iniquities of the Shiite war machine in the present moment with a list of America’s iniquities against the American Indian in the past.

I have witnessed an event that clearly defines the Shiite identity and I can not remain silent about it any longer. Iran’s Holocaust conference was an abomination and it was televised throughout the entire Moslem community. So far, not one single voice has been raised in either rejection or condemnation of its message. Millions of Moslem voices have remained quiet, either in silent agreement of what they saw or in fear of Shiite recriminations if they dissent. Both prospects are equally scary to me.

I will not allow my voice to be silenced by fear of offending the few. If my words sting your heart I offer my apologies. I truly do embrace all individuals whose daily lives are guided by love, tolerance and service of their fellow man regardless of color, nationality and faith.

It is just that silence is an option we can ill afford in the world today. By remaining silent we give credence to an evil developing in our midst. Will we continue to hide our heads in the sand as others have done before us in the past believing the lie, “Surely it can not happen to us! Not in this moment”?

I am done. This is the last I will speak of this as we enter the Christmas Season. I believe you all know what I will be celebrating and why.

I will be praying for peace on earth and goodwill towards all men. But I will also remain as watchful as a guard at the city gates.

I will sound the alarm when our city is in peril.

The times they are a changing...
Bob Dylan

“The most heinous and the most cruel crimes of which history has record have been committed under the cover of religion or equally noble motives”
Gandhi

"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter."
Martin Luther King

"Those who remain silent today will be those who remain buried in silence tomorrow."
(Paraphrase) Dirk Bauman

Blackbird singing in the dead of night...

The ankle blog connected to the leg blog...

A little story today from the wonderful world of nature...

One of the most amazing things I’ve ever witnessed occurred when I spent some time out west living in a commune up on top of a mesa. Close enough to our hippie refuge to be seen clearly with a good pair of binoculars a mother eagle built her nest.

For days she gathered the nastiest bits of prickly thorns and sticks. Then she wove them together until she’d built what appeared t be a primitive basket. Once the basket was complete she began pulling tufts of down from her breast and started lining it with the soft material.

After a short time the prickly basket was only visible from underneath the nest. The top of the structure was a beautiful and warm world of downy softness. This is when the mother eagle laid her eggs.

Once the eggs hatched the little eaglets were so cute. They loved their little nest and felt so safe and secure in the warm downy home where they lived. The little ones ate slept and played and life was so good. Then one day came where it was time to grow up...

As the eaglets grew towards adolescence the mother eagle began pulling bits of the downy comforter out of the nest. The young eaglets began feeling the thorny supports of the nest and were not so happy any more. Soon they were hanging out on the fringes of the nest and looking for more comfortable digs. That’s when the mother eagle began teaching her young how to fly.

Each day the mother would spend time with her eaglets preparing them for flight. The process is amazing if you’ve never seen it. She will pick up a chick and place it on her back. She then leaps off the nest and soars high into the afternoon sky. She will then circle and roll over so that the baby eaglet plummets towards the earth below.

The little eaglet flaps its wings and screeches like a doomed infant. That’s when the mother swoops down to catch her baby and returns it to the nest. It is truly a thing to behold. She will continue doing this until the eaglets have strong wings and should be able to fly on their own.

One day she picks up an eaglet and soars up into the skies above. This time when she drops it, if it does not fly upon its own she does not catch it and it crashes into the ground below and dies. Life is tough I the world of eagles...

Why am I telling you this story? Because our mother Blogger has decided that it is time for its little bloglets to leave the old nest and soar into the new world of Blogger Beta. Yes, I know the old nest was comfortable and familiar. I know you don’t want to leave the warm confines of a place you know and trust.

Is it getting harder to comment on your friends blogs? Are old tricks not working so well anymore? Maybe it is time to risk the move and fly on over to Beta. Don’t worry, I’m waiting for you. Trust me, you’ll be just fine. Besides, you don’t want momma blogger to drop you and let you crash. You don’t want to die do you?

C’mon, flap those wings and get on over here...

I won’t post anonymous comments any longer. I mean it!

Jump little bloglets or die.

It is for your own good.

Come to papa!

And have yourself a merry little Christmas time...

"Merry Christmas Everybody!"

There, I’ve said it. Now, are there any disgruntled Moslems who want to complain about it? How about the Islamic community, any complaints about false idols and worshiping something other than the one true God? Should I tear down my lawn decorations because my Moslem neighbors might take offense?

Yes, this is going to be an angry post this evening. Folks, I’m sick and tired of the war on Christmas. Hell, I’m sick and tired of the war on my right to enjoy myself as I see fit during any of the holidays in the country I’ve lived in for my entire life. Fifty-two years I’ve been living in America and I’ve celebrated Christmas each and every year. All of a sudden Christmas is not politically correct? Happy Holidays?

I am all for people migrating to America so they can have a better life and enjoy the same freedoms that I do. Please, make yourself at home and help yourself to a large slice of fresh baked American pie. I’m not kidding! I love diversity. It rocks and I love learning new things about people and the world in which we live. I find no problem in being tolerant.

Therein rests my dilemma. If you come to America to enjoy freedom, why are you so hell-bent on ruining it for me? Is that all Middle Eastern immigrants have to contribute to cultural diversity is religious intolerance? Don’t these people get enough of this hatred in their own countries?

I’m sick of listening to the cultural intolerance of our Middle Eastern friends. Get off our backs about the way we celebrate our traditions and our religious heritage within the confines of our own borders. Would it make you happier if we launched some holiday missiles from neighborhood to neighborhood? Maybe if we dawned our terrorist apparel? How about if we deck our halls with the tortured bowels of our neighbor, Holly?

Why ruin our holidays because you have ruined yours? Every time I see a Moslem holiday, it is a cause for increased violence. This past Ramadan all I heard was cries to kill as many Americans as possible and death to the Israelis. No wonder you hate our drab yuletide carols when you have such festive slogans to warm the human spirit.

Earlier this week a democratic gentleman was harangued because he did not know the difference between a Sunni and a Shiite. Allow me to help you discern the difference. One tortures his next door neighbor with a drill and the other tortures his next door neighbor with a power saw.

That is why I will never bow my knee to Allah! Any religion that condones the torture of next door neighbors and the killing of women because they learn how to read is unacceptable to me as an individual of compassion. As long as imams teach philosophies of death from Mosques that serve as staging grounds for ambushes I will not accept Allah as a viable spiritual guide. As long as Islamic leaders continue to deny the lessons of the holocaust, I will henceforth deny any of their claims to spiritual enlightenment.

As a being of compassion, love and tolerance I must denounce the intolerant Islamic faith as nothing more than a dry riverbed of death and deception. No matter what stalk one follows from the root of Islam it always ends in the flower of death. Always, study the history and not the theology for yourself. Examine the leaders of the Islamic countries, are they shepherds’ of their flocks or priests who sacrifice their lambs to a Moloch of death?

This year I am going to celebrate Christmas. I am going to celebrate the birth of Christ; the One who is the truth, the light and the way. The One who teaches that true religious fervor is in service to your fellow man and not their murder. I will celebrate the One who teaches love as the greatest example of faith. I will worship the God who does not ask me to be a suicide bomber or to torture my neighbor. I will celebrate the one true God and I will do so without fear of the Moslem horde. Yea, though I walk through their valley of death I will fear no evil, for the Lord is my shepherd.

They burn our flag, they hang our leaders in effigy, and they call our leaders devils in the United Nations. They deny the holocaust. They explode bombs in countries all over the world. This very day they threatened to wipe Israel from the face of the earth. Yet, they tolerate no criticism whatsoever. A simple cartoon gives them permission to drag individuals from buildings and beat them to death. Enough is enough.

Tonight I am taking a stand against the Islamic jihad with the only super weapon I need.

Merry Christmas everyone!

The face of Mohammed.
"Brought to you by the nation of Islam."

Film at eleven...

Yes, but did anyone click on the test pattern to see if maybe one last program was showing?

Now what do you have to say for yourselves?

Over the ramparts we watched...

Z-Z-Z-Z-Z-Z...

All the world astounds me and I think I understand...

What is wrong with this picture?

The problem with walls is just how quickly that which was built to protect us first encircles and then imprisons us. Right now there are a lot of walls in our country, imprisoning, separating and isolating us one from another. There are so many of us living alone within the walled confines of our homes huddled around our families and living in fear. All according to the great plan...

You see, we live in a society whose economic engine is driven by fear. Most people believe that the fuel that runs our economy is greed or gluttony. Nothing could be further from the truth. The corporate masters who currently rule our country have learned the value of fear in the mind of the consumer.

That’s right, if we the American consumer are in a state of fearfulness, we shop and we shop in bulk. Think about the advertisements you watch; is your family protected, is your pantry stocked, getting enough vitamins, are you sleeping too little or too much? We are kept in a false sense of anxiety so that we consume. That is why we are an obese society. I may not have time later so I’d better consume something now.

Fear is the new motivator. Sure, sex still sells luxury automobiles, women’s products and beer but fear sells everything else. What do we do when we are nervous? That’s right, we consume. If we aren’t consuming then we’re hoarding against an uncertain future. When was the last time you felt really anxiety free? Sadly, this is the new American way.

The new American way is to live in constant state of fear. We fear the aliens from outer space. We fear the government conspiracy. We fear differing nationalities and those of different colors. We fear our neighbors and their religions. And increasingly, we fear even ourselves. As a result we are a society of walls sharing only one thing in common; consuming as a way of holding our fear at bay. And it is all in the name of profit.

We are being programmed to feel afraid. You don’t have to believe me. Watch your television, listen to your radio or read your newspapers and periodicals and count how many stories are about threats or surviving deadly peril. You’ll be surprised at the amount of anxiety inducing programming you’ll encounter. You’ll probably find yourself walking into the kitchen for something to consume.

My belief is that the real world is not so scary. I believe that if God truly created the world he created it as a way of sustaining life and not as a way of destroying it. I believe the corporate masters have perverted our view of the natural world. The natural world is a good place and not the never ending series of horrors it is being made out to be. In fact, I believe if you simply headed out into the world with nothing more than you could carry on an motorcoach you’d learn just how wonderful a place the planet truly is.

And thus we arrive at the destination point of today’s post; Pepper's blog. According to this woman she managed to break free from her corporate cubicle and headed off into the world armed only with her good friend and copilot, her mother. What? Oh yes, I can hear you now, “Danger Will Robinson, Danger! What are these women thinking?"

Well, I certainly can’t tell you what these two pioneering spirits are thinking, but thanks to Pepper’s blog I can tell you what they are experiencing. They are seeing the miracles of the world around them. They are viewing natural wonders and they are meeting kind strangers and turning them into good friends. This is why Pepper has become one of my new found heroes; she has broken free of her shackles and is living outside of the walls of fear. She is living a life filled with adventure and joy.

Pepper’s posts are always filled with good humor and a sense of expectation. I’ve never read a single word of fear in her writings. There are anecdotes, funny stories, tales of campgrounds and people, but never once have I read a tale of horror. She proves the truth of what I believe each and every day. The world is a marvelous and wonderful place.

Pepper’s blog is a montage of life. It is a place of faith, love and the unabashed expectation of adventure around every turn. She is living proof that the further you journey from fear the closer you come to the experience of excitement and wonder that the creator intended us to live in from the very first moment He created us.

Thank you, Pepper. You are the freest person I know; God’s speed on your journey. Please keep your posts coming; they are a wonderful example of the difference between walking in faith with God and burying one’s head in the sand of manmade fear.

Happy Birthday, Meander!

"Warmest wishes from all of us."

Dear Meander:

Good morning and Happy Birthday. I’ve been thinking about what present to give you for the past few days. It was a bit difficult because you have already been blessed with so many gifts. You have been given beauty, a kind and gentle spirit, both creativity and intellect. Truly you have been graced with a bounty of God’s goodness.

With these gifts you have also been given an important responsibility. God has asked you to look after a very special child of his. This child has a vision that sometimes you cannot understand. That is okay, because it is to God that he speaks. And God understands clearly and loves him with all his heart. Just as you do.

God takes care of his children. You’ve got to believe this...

Your son will always be in the very best of hands, just as you are too.

So, my gift to you on this very special day is a message from He who watches over you. It was originally delivered by a kind and gentle soul named, Kahlil Gibran.

May it bring you peace and wash away any fears you may have of the future.

And a woman who held a baby against her

bosom said, Speak to us of children.

And he said:

Your children are not your children.

They are the sons and daughters of life’s

longing for itself.

They come through you but not from you,

And though they are with you, yet they be-

long not to you.

You may give them your love but not your

thoughts.

For they have their own thoughts.

You may house their bodies but not their

souls,

For their souls dwell in the house of tomor-

row, which you cannot visit, not even in your

dreams.

You may strive to be like them, but seek not

to make them like you.

For life goes not backward nor tarries with

yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children

as living arrows are sent forth.

The archer sees the mark upon the path of

the infinite, and He bends you with His might

that his arrows may go swift and far.

Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for

gladness;

For even as he loves the arrow that flies, so

He loves also the bow that is stable.

Happy Birthday from all of your new friends. We love you!