I was very skeptical when I first heard about this. Arabs are known for saying one thing in Arabic to other Arabs, but giving a very different message in English to the Western world.
Is this a genuine counterpart -- a straight translation of each article that exists on the Arab side of the web site? Or is it a completely different version of Al-Jazeera for non-Arabic reading Western eyes?
It's just that the arrogant asshole that you call "president" is really getting on my nerves.
Americans call him president. Iraqis call him savior.
"You just arrived. You're late. What took you so long? God help you become victorious. I want to say hello to Bush, to shake his hand. We came out of the grave."
A group of American anti-war demonstrators who came to Iraq with Japanese human shield volunteers made it across the border today with 14 hours of uncensored video, all shot without Iraqi government minders present. Kenneth Joseph, a young American pastor with the Assyrian Church of the East, told UPI the trip "had shocked me back to reality." Some of the Iraqis he interviewed on camera "told me they would commit suicide if American bombing didn't start. They were willing to see their homes demolished to gain their freedom from Saddam's bloody tyranny. They convinced me that Saddam was a monster the likes of which the world had not seen since Stalin and Hitler. He and his sons are sick sadists. Their tales of slow torture and killing made me ill, such as people put in a huge shredder for plastic products, feet first so they could hear their screams as bodies got chewed up from foot to head."
It's really telling that you direct that statement (I quoted at the very top) toward Americans and President Bush and not Iraqis and "President" Hussein. (Of course, most Iraqis do not actually call Saddam "President"... well, okay, not willingly.)
The actions of shocking genitals, medical experimentation, crucifixions, and using bees and scorpions to sting naked children in front of their parents merely qualifies Saddam Hussein as "not an angel." Meanwhile, the actions of leading the charge to use force to STOP those atrocities does not, in your mind, outweigh whatever other comparatively petty objections you have against George W. Bush, in qualifying him as an "a*hole." The fact that President Bush is at the forefront of this mission of emancipation and war on terrorism makes him all the more praiseworthy. Don't think I'm a Bushie yes-man. I strenuously disagree with the president on some of his foreign policy, but this war is just and necessary for peace. The cost in human life of this war will be high, but the cost of not going to war has been and would continue to be much higher.
Don't mistake courage and decisiveness for arrogance. However, even if Bush were arrogant, that does nothing to diminish the reasons for the war: national and world security, prevent terrorism, Iraqi liberation, stop oppression.
President Bush is not defying the United Nations. You see, the United States is essentially the executive branch of the U.N. It is the only entity in the world truly capable of fulfilling this position. The U.N. has no armed forces, and therefore, no way to enforce its resolutions when countries want to defy its will. Even if there were a U.N. military, the U.N. would be too cowardly to use it. Using aggressive force goes against the tragically flawed, international elitist philosophy that diplomacy can solve every possible conflict in the world. As a result, the U.N. is useless. Its words have no impact because it will not back them up.
The U.S. is not defying the U.N.; it's doing the exact opposite. The U.S. is enabling the U.N. to fulfill its goals. Bush is trying to put a backbone in the U.N., but the U.N. is hell-bent on being irrelevant. The U.N. said that Iraq needed to be disarmed, and if disarmament could not be achieved through diplomacy, then "serious consequences" would be necessary. After seventeen resolutions against the Iraqi regime and twelve years of diplomacy, the situation is worse than when we first began. The U.S. is fulfilling the U.N.'s wishes by volunteering to disarm Iraq by force.
"It doesn't matter what the rest of the world thinks, because we are more powerful than they are and we can do whatever we want."
It doesn't matter what the rest of the world thinks, because we are more right than they are ("Bush is Hitler," "No war for Texaco"). Because we alone have the ability to do whatever we want, combined with accurate knowledge and passion for goodness, we have the moral obligation to do what we know is right.
A group of American anti-war demonstrators who came to Iraq with Japanese human shield volunteers made it across the border today with 14 hours of uncensored video, all shot without Iraqi government minders present. Kenneth Joseph, a young American pastor with the Assyrian Church of the East, told UPI the trip "had shocked me back to
reality." (superyooser: Expounded, "My experience in the real world forced me to abandon my fantasies about Bush's greedy, imperialist intentions and taught me that his administration's position is right and based on reality.") Some of the Iraqis he interviewed on camera "told me they would commit suicide if American bombing didn't start. They were willing to see their homes demolished to gain their freedom from Saddam's bloody tyranny. They convinced me that Saddam was a monster the likes of which the world had not seen since Stalin and Hitler. He and his sons are sick sadists. Their tales of slow torture and killing made me ill, such as people put in a huge shredder for plastic products, feet first so they could hear their screams as bodies got chewed up from foot to head."
If he is a bad programmer he probably is not a good manager either.
I have to disagree with this assumption.
When I was in high school marching band, there was this trumpet player with terrible morale. He was always frowning, he slouched when he marched, played badly, and complained a lot. He was bringing down the whole trumpet section. You might say he was a "loser" or bad apple. It got so bad, he got into vulgar shouting matches on the field with the director and was kicked out of some practices.
The next year, he did a total 180 degree change in attitude. It turns out that he just needed a change in position.
He auditioned to be a drum major (field director) and got the position. I was stunned! I half expected him to drop out of the band. Now he was directing it. You would think that someone not responsible enough to march and play wouldn't be responsible enough to lead the band, a much more involved job, but he did, and did it well. He had actually been to some camp during the summer to train for it. I was amazed at this new-found commitment.
His whole demeanor had been transformed, like Clark Kent into Superman. He was serious, like a drill sergeant. He worked hard and was committed to making himself and the whole band succeed. This guy helped to lead the band in winning several awards in marching band competitions, something that had been rare in recent years.
Sometimes people just have to be matched with the jobs that drive them. People have to find where they function best in an organizational body. A lousy programmer could be a fantastic manager, and an incompetent manager could be a clever programmer.
But only for our Christian soldiers, right? The rest are on their own?
C'mon, you know that's not true. We pray for ALL the coalition troops. That includes the thousands of Muslims in the U.S. military. I pray also for Iraq's downtrodden, ragtag troops, who are forced to fight for Saddam.
Hope we missed as many civilian targets as possible.
I hope we didn't miss any! We drop bombs on military targets, but food and supplies on civilian targets.
When slaves are freed or prisoners rescued, they regard "assimilation" with the rest of the free world as the best thing that could happen to them.
This "assimilation" has been requested and begged for by the Iraqis. They've been literally counting the days and the hours until the time of their liberation. The allied troops are being greeted with smiles and handshakes.
I appreciate that! and I know that many other Americans do too. I saw the owner of TBN (a worldwide Christian TV network) last night praising Tony Blair and requesting the viewers pray for him.
The last I heard, there have been more British casualties (8) than American (6).
I'm sure Bush would love to drive oil prices back down
If the acquisition of oil is the motive, why doesn't Bush just take over the oil fields in Kuwait? That wouldn't require a war. Our troops are already there. Just stake a flag in the ground and declare victory. We would own the oil.
When you watch CNN or FOX News, you're getting one camera angle in a country the size of California. You're seeing a tiny slice of the grand war campaign. Most of the explosions and fire fights are not in any media camera's view.
Point 1: Population-wise, you're probably right. Thanks for the correction.
Point 2: While I'll admit that most local TV stations and newspapers are just affiliates of national networks, they do produce original local content and some original national content. I'll also agree that the big news conglomerates probably do impose some homogeneity on what is reported through all its outlets.
But, those defects happening there do not by any means imply that U.S. news sources have necessarily reached the pinnacle of journalistic standards for factual, unbiased and independent reporting.
I never claimed that they were. I was just talking about numbers. I do believe that many of them are among the best that exist. However, I don't think objectively "factual, unbiased and independent" news really exists.
Some Texans actually think that Texas = world. Please, don't feed their inflated egos.:-) (just kidding, I have friends from there)
Gov. Bush had no obligation to please the French or the Finnish or whoever was bellyaching around the world.
Open Rant to Anti-Bush Protesters
Saddam Hussein tortures and executes thousands of people without trial every year. Why do you people never complain about him? We've heard your tirades for years on end about the death penalty in Texas, but we've heard nary peep against the Butcher of Baghdad. And you display nothing short of joyous zeal over the 40 million babies that have been exterminated in America since Roe v. Wade. Your ilk protests with all your might against the Bush-led rescue mission to depose the Hitler of the 21st century, put an end to genocide and persecution, break up a terrorist-supporting regime, liberate an entire country of suffering victims, destroy huge amounts of weapons of mass murder, and bring increased stability to the Middle East and the world.
Oh, but some convicted criminals in Texas weren't quite deserving of the death penalty. Maybe so -- it's a legitimate debate, but DO NOT PRETEND to be enraged over civil rights violations and angry at Bush because "he executed" those people.
And what about China? Libya? Egypt? Somalia? Rwanda? Ramallah? Venezuela? Syria? Central America? Unspeakable torture and mass executions with kangaroo courts or no trials at all go on all over the world. Your silence is deafening, and your hypocrisy is towering. Why is your condemnation reserved for the U.S.A., the preeminent pioneer and stalwart supporter of human rights in the world? If you hate Bush's politics (conservatism) or his faith (Christianity), just be forthright and say so. But please cease and desist with this farce of phony moral outrage. Your partisanship is totally transparent. There's no sense in denying it. I have nothing against partisanship, but come out and say what you're really about.
I believe that President George W. Bush will go down in history as one of the most courageous champions of liberty and human rights of all time. He commanded U.S. troops to defeat the Taliban in Afghanistan. After the American victory, Afghans celebrated in the streets, women threw off their burqas, and schools resumed. Now, democracy and capitalism are flourishing there. I believe that the same kind of thing will happen in Iraq. Iraqis had begun to move toward democracy before Saddam Hussein's reign of terror derailed the progress that the country was making. Bush will get them back on track to growing into the kind of country they have been wanting to be.
But to you, Bush is the bad guy; he's the dictator and terrorist. You've turned reality on its head. Anyway, it's not Bush's job to make the world happy. He was elected to represent the views of Americans, especially those who voted for him, and abide by his oath of office. He's doing his job exceedingly well.
There's a logical explanation for that. The U.S. is the largest democratic country in the world. There are more media outlets in America than any other country. Every city and state has its own self-contained media industry in addition to the national newspapers, TV news, and news radio networks, and every single channel, frequency, and rag has its own web site. Not to mention the dozens of news magazines with their web sites. Most other democracies are U.S. allies and have similarly burgeoning, free-wheeling media industries.
Non-allies tend to have governments that are Socialist, Communist, militant Islamic, and/or dictatorial, or no real government at all. (Hmmm, that might somehow have something to do with why they're not allies!) As a result, their societies are not conducive to independent media enterprises. Yes, enterprises are necessary here. If, say, Djibouti has a newspaper but doesn't have a decent, consistently-updated website too, Google won't link to it. It takes capital to fund these things. The media outlet(s) in most of these second/third world countries are limited and either highly regulated (censored) or completely state-run. How many news sources are based in Syria? North Korea? Libya? Hint: you don't need all your fingers to count them. Compared to the UK? Too many to track them all down. Heck, compared to the city of Orlando? The non-ally nation news sources are probably outnumbered 1 to 500.
And size does count. The Syria Times, for example, is quite pitiful. The Syria Daily looks pretty snazzy, but notice that over half the headlines actually link to news sites in - surprise - America or American ally countries. These examples don't constitute worthy competitors of, say, the Casper (Wyoming) Star-Tribune, much less the NY Times.
Having said that, I think Google does a fantastic job of consistently pulling news from every part of the globe. I've frequently seen news from Pakistan, "pan-Arab" regions, and many small countries you hardly ever hear anything about.
What is the point of having a skill? If a tree falls in the forest and nobody is around to hear it, does it make a sound? If a person has a talent and nobody around is allowed to benefit from it, does the talent have any usefulness? And if you use your talent only for personal gain, what special virtue is that?
Being the only "computer person" in your family puts you in a fantastic position to show love to your family and others who need your help. Love means giving up -- yielding your preferences, comfort, goals, security, money, energy, or time for the benefit of someone else. In practice, that may be hard work, but know this: How you treat other people, not your wealth or accomplishments, is the most enduring impact you can leave on earth. If you've truly done your best (competently, without complaining) to help someone with something they can't do for themselves, you know that you've done what is right. Don't lose sight of that fact in spite of possible negative reactions or misguided backlash. Realize that the gratitude of God counterbalances and far outweighs the ingratitude of the people you've helped.
All the cases you listed involve people responding irrationally or with undue hostility (assuming that you were actually competent to do the job). To adapt a phrase of author Rick Warren, those are "EGR situations" - extra grace required. Do your best to be gracious in those situations, because you yourself create EGR situations for other people. Everybody does.
You are a peacemaker when you overlook an insult or offense, especially when it is unwarranted. Recognize and respond to the fault behind the offensive attack (e.g., differing expectations, misunderstanding, argumentative personality, pre-existing anger, other worries, fears, or insecurities) rather than to the offense itself. Concentrating on the offense will kindle anger and hatred within yourself against the other person; but responding to the underlying fault will awaken compassion. Consider that their complaints against you may not be really against you, but have to so with some other source of dissatisfaction in their lives. Of course, first honestly consider that part of the blame really does belong to you.
To talk about "demonizing" mafia activity and other organized crime is preposterous.
Piracy on the high seas (arrgh, matey), which sometimes really was terrorism, is still going on today.
"The dual threats of terrorism and war may be able to achieve what the antiglobalization forces have not -- a significant slowdown, even decline, in global trade and investment."
...
The Straits of Malacca have always been prone to piracy. Last year, about 40% of the 370 attacks on ships at sea world-wide took place in the straits or in other Indonesian or Malaysian waters. Typical incidents involved pirates wielding knives or clubs boarding a ship carrying a valuable commodity such as oil and sailing the ship to a destination where they could quietly sell off its contents.
What's new, says Mr. Chung, is the rising incidence of hijacks of tugboats and barges. Instead of knives and clubs, some of the pirates hijacking tugs and barges have carried assault rifles. Instead of ships carrying valuable cargo, some of their recent targets were empty. ...
Tugboats pulling barges are a common sight in the straits, as they maneuver among the bigger ships to load or unload cargo. That would make them ideal cover for terrorist acts.
It's no coincidence that terrorists struck the World Trade Center in New York City, the financial capital of the U.S.. Piracy rings that target the companies of specific nations are committing terrorism. They have the potential to damage the economy just as much as a physical attack.
In fairness, it's possible that the pirates don't have any terrorist objectives in mind. They might just be greedy thieves. I think the only sure distinction between simple theft and terrorism is motive. The "terrorism" label shouldn't make much difference as to how we respond to the individual illegal actions. To me, it's like the difference between a "hate crime" murder and an ordinary murder. It's a crime either way and should be punished.
The creed of extremists is: The ends justify the means.
Stated another way: By any means necessary.
The thinking goes: Even if our methods violate our principles, the righteousness of the results of our goals outweighs the evil we have to commit to attain them.
That's why we saw a "pro-life" extremist kill an abortionist to prevent the abortionist from killing babies.
That's why we see "civil rights" extremists support temporary (we hope) discrimination against whites (supposedly, it is due them because they are enjoying the legacy fruits of past slavery) to support the greater good of producing racial equality.
Or another theory is: They're hypocrites.
Shocking, I know. Religious people are never hypocritical.;-)
I agree with your points about being accountable to an omniscient God, and also, other people being helpful to deal with a genuine addiction.
On a tangent: Why do you write "J-sus" as you do "G-d"? To a Christian, it looks like you're giving equal reverence to Jesus and God, and thus, implying belief in the Tri-Unity of God. I assume it has to do with the command not to speak the names of other people's gods.
I appreciate your efforts to bring Jews and Chr-stians together
I'm just trying to do my part to undo 1,700 years of Greek and Vatican confusion, ignorance, and hostility that has separated us. We were meant to be one in the Olive Tree.
though your use of Hebrew terminology for J-sus is disturbing
To me, the church's use of Greek terminology for Yeshua is disturbing. Alas, the dominance of Jesus and the relative obscurity of Yeshua in the Gentile world obligates me to usually use the former term.
Like it or not, Jesus of Natzeret was Hebrew. He was a Jew of the Galil and taught Torah as a s'mikeh rabbi. His Jewish mother surely didn't give Him a pagan name! Jesus comes from the Greek Iêsous, which was a poor attempt by 4th century Greeks at pronouncing Yeshua'.
"She (Miryam) will bear a Son; and you (Yosef) shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins." - Mattityahu/Matthew 1:21 (New American Standard Bible)
Why in the world would HaShem give specific instructions to Miryam to call the Mashiach "Jesus"?! Saving people from sins is no more reason for calling someone Iêsous (Jesus) than Jimmy or Miguel. Since "salvation is from the Jews" (Yochanan/John 4:22), HaShem forbid that Israel's Mashiach should be given a Greek goyish name!
The truth is: He was not named Jesus. The Savior was named Yeshua' (Y'shua'), or Y'hoshua', which is a contraction of YHVH and yoshia ("he will save"), resulting in the meaning "YHVH saves." Only now, using Jesus' authentic Hebraic name, does Matt. 1:21 make sense. The purpose of the Messiah was to save us from our sins, and that's exactly what He did. Yeshua is also the masculine form of yeshu'ah, which means "salvation."
Now I'll explain the interchangeable use of Christ and Messiah, in case you were disturbed by that, too. Christ comes from the Greek christos, which has exactly the same literal meaning as mashiach. Mashiach was transliterated into Greek as messias and came into English as messiah. All these terms mean the same thing. Some will argue that "Christ" has an anti-Semitic connotation, but that's in the eye of the beholder and is a matter I'll leave for a later discussion.
since he practices a faith that allows you to commit any sin you want
(assuming you are Orthodox Jewish from your use of "G-d")
When you say "a faith," do you mean Christianity as a whole, or just a personal, home-brewed (corrupted) Christian faith? You would be correct in saying that some people have a kind of "faith in Jesus" that allows them to commit any sin they want. But that is not in keeping with the calling of Messiah or the New Testament scripture.
Christianity doesn't allow sin any more than Judaism does. Both have to make allowances for sin, because the evil inclination is in the Adamic nature of every person. If Judaism didn't "allow" sin, you'd be up the creek without a paddle. Of course, that's not the case. See what David prayed in Tehillim/Psalms 86:5.
Admittedly, there has been a major imbalance in much of Christendom regarding the amount of teaching devoted to proclaiming grace compared to that imploring obedience. It is terrible that many supposed followers of Messiah do abuse His grace by making no effort to repent of sin.
Your comment should not have been moderated flamebait. Your post should be an alarm bell to Christians that we should continually examine our actions, attitudes, relationships, and every aspect of our lives in light of how Christ taught us to live. As an outsider of the church, you can only comment on what you see, and what you see is a lot of unrighteous living and phony religion.
I think that the emphasis on grace and forgiveness is more prevalent in Christianity, because Messiah Yeshua personally commissioned His talmidim to reach out to the goyim/gentiles who, unlike Jews, had (or still have) no tradition of thinking of themselves as part of HaShem's family. It is necessary to keep harping on the fact that one's sin and former disassociation with God will not prevent that person from being loved by Him or from having His Holy Spirit live within him/her.
I speak for myself and many Americans by saying that support for Israel is a matter of obedience to God.
In Genesis 12:1-3, God told Abram (later renamed Abraham):
"Go to the land I will show you.
I will make you into a great nation (Israel) and I will bless you;
I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse;
and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you."
Many of us have the heart of the apostle Paul when he wrote in Romans 10:1: "Brothers, my heart's deepest desire and my prayer to God for Israel is for their salvation."
Slashdot Mirror
Is this a genuine counterpart -- a straight translation of each article that exists on the Arab side of the web site? Or is it a completely different version of Al-Jazeera for non-Arabic reading Western eyes?
Americans call him president. Iraqis call him savior.
"You just arrived. You're late. What took you so long? God help you become victorious. I want to say hello to Bush, to shake his hand. We came out of the grave."
A group of American anti-war demonstrators who came to Iraq with Japanese human shield volunteers made it across the border today with 14 hours of uncensored video, all shot without Iraqi government minders present. Kenneth Joseph, a young American pastor with the Assyrian Church of the East, told UPI the trip "had shocked me back to reality." Some of the Iraqis he interviewed on camera "told me they would commit suicide if American bombing didn't start. They were willing to see their homes demolished to gain their freedom from Saddam's bloody tyranny. They convinced me that Saddam was a monster the likes of which the world had not seen since Stalin and Hitler. He and his sons are sick sadists. Their tales of slow torture and killing made me ill, such as people put in a huge shredder for plastic products, feet first so they could hear their screams as bodies got chewed up from foot to head."
It's really telling that you direct that statement (I quoted at the very top) toward Americans and President Bush and not Iraqis and "President" Hussein. (Of course, most Iraqis do not actually call Saddam "President" ... well, okay, not willingly.)
The actions of shocking genitals, medical experimentation, crucifixions, and using bees and scorpions to sting naked children in front of their parents merely qualifies Saddam Hussein as "not an angel." Meanwhile, the actions of leading the charge to use force to STOP those atrocities does not, in your mind, outweigh whatever other comparatively petty objections you have against George W. Bush, in qualifying him as an "a*hole." The fact that President Bush is at the forefront of this mission of emancipation and war on terrorism makes him all the more praiseworthy. Don't think I'm a Bushie yes-man. I strenuously disagree with the president on some of his foreign policy, but this war is just and necessary for peace. The cost in human life of this war will be high, but the cost of not going to war has been and would continue to be much higher.
Don't mistake courage and decisiveness for arrogance. However, even if Bush were arrogant, that does nothing to diminish the reasons for the war: national and world security, prevent terrorism, Iraqi liberation, stop oppression.
President Bush is not defying the United Nations. You see, the United States is essentially the executive branch of the U.N. It is the only entity in the world truly capable of fulfilling this position. The U.N. has no armed forces, and therefore, no way to enforce its resolutions when countries want to defy its will. Even if there were a U.N. military, the U.N. would be too cowardly to use it. Using aggressive force goes against the tragically flawed, international elitist philosophy that diplomacy can solve every possible conflict in the world. As a result, the U.N. is useless. Its words have no impact because it will not back them up.
The U.S. is not defying the U.N.; it's doing the exact opposite. The U.S. is enabling the U.N. to fulfill its goals. Bush is trying to put a backbone in the U.N., but the U.N. is hell-bent on being irrelevant. The U.N. said that Iraq needed to be disarmed, and if disarmament could not be achieved through diplomacy, then "serious consequences" would be necessary. After seventeen resolutions against the Iraqi regime and twelve years of diplomacy, the situation is worse than when we first began. The U.S. is fulfilling the U.N.'s wishes by volunteering to disarm Iraq by force.
If any one is
It doesn't matter what the rest of the world thinks, because we are more right than they are ("Bush is Hitler," "No war for Texaco"). Because we alone have the ability to do whatever we want, combined with accurate knowledge and passion for goodness, we have the moral obligation to do what we know is right.
Bush and Blair are right. The protesters are wrong.
I have to disagree with this assumption.
When I was in high school marching band, there was this trumpet player with terrible morale. He was always frowning, he slouched when he marched, played badly, and complained a lot. He was bringing down the whole trumpet section. You might say he was a "loser" or bad apple. It got so bad, he got into vulgar shouting matches on the field with the director and was kicked out of some practices.
The next year, he did a total 180 degree change in attitude. It turns out that he just needed a change in position.
He auditioned to be a drum major (field director) and got the position. I was stunned! I half expected him to drop out of the band. Now he was directing it. You would think that someone not responsible enough to march and play wouldn't be responsible enough to lead the band, a much more involved job, but he did, and did it well. He had actually been to some camp during the summer to train for it. I was amazed at this new-found commitment.
His whole demeanor had been transformed, like Clark Kent into Superman. He was serious, like a drill sergeant. He worked hard and was committed to making himself and the whole band succeed. This guy helped to lead the band in winning several awards in marching band competitions, something that had been rare in recent years.
Sometimes people just have to be matched with the jobs that drive them. People have to find where they function best in an organizational body. A lousy programmer could be a fantastic manager, and an incompetent manager could be a clever programmer.
Some navy guy in a submarine is bored out of his mind. :)
C'mon, you know that's not true. We pray for ALL the coalition troops. That includes the thousands of Muslims in the U.S. military. I pray also for Iraq's downtrodden, ragtag troops, who are forced to fight for Saddam.
Hope we missed as many civilian targets as possible.
I hope we didn't miss any! We drop bombs on military targets, but food and supplies on civilian targets.
This "assimilation" has been requested and begged for by the Iraqis. They've been literally counting the days and the hours until the time of their liberation. The allied troops are being greeted with smiles and handshakes.
His army has attacked American planes hundreds of times in the years since the Gulf War, violating the cease-fire agreement.
The last I heard, there have been more British casualties (8) than American (6).
If the acquisition of oil is the motive, why doesn't Bush just take over the oil fields in Kuwait? That wouldn't require a war. Our troops are already there. Just stake a flag in the ground and declare victory. We would own the oil.
It actually started twelve years ago. Iraq violated the terms of its cease-fire agreement and has been shooting at our planes for years.
When you watch CNN or FOX News, you're getting one camera angle in a country the size of California. You're seeing a tiny slice of the grand war campaign. Most of the explosions and fire fights are not in any media camera's view.
Point 2: While I'll admit that most local TV stations and newspapers are just affiliates of national networks, they do produce original local content and some original national content. I'll also agree that the big news conglomerates probably do impose some homogeneity on what is reported through all its outlets.
But, those defects happening there do not by any means imply that U.S. news sources have necessarily reached the pinnacle of journalistic standards for factual, unbiased and independent reporting.
I never claimed that they were. I was just talking about numbers. I do believe that many of them are among the best that exist. However, I don't think objectively "factual, unbiased and independent" news really exists.
Some Texans actually think that Texas = world. Please, don't feed their inflated egos. :-) (just kidding, I have friends from there)
Gov. Bush had no obligation to please the French or the Finnish or whoever was bellyaching around the world.
Open Rant to Anti-Bush Protesters
Saddam Hussein tortures and executes thousands of people without trial every year. Why do you people never complain about him? We've heard your tirades for years on end about the death penalty in Texas, but we've heard nary peep against the Butcher of Baghdad. And you display nothing short of joyous zeal over the 40 million babies that have been exterminated in America since Roe v. Wade. Your ilk protests with all your might against the Bush-led rescue mission to depose the Hitler of the 21st century, put an end to genocide and persecution, break up a terrorist-supporting regime, liberate an entire country of suffering victims, destroy huge amounts of weapons of mass murder, and bring increased stability to the Middle East and the world.
Oh, but some convicted criminals in Texas weren't quite deserving of the death penalty. Maybe so -- it's a legitimate debate, but DO NOT PRETEND to be enraged over civil rights violations and angry at Bush because "he executed" those people.
And what about China? Libya? Egypt? Somalia? Rwanda? Ramallah? Venezuela? Syria? Central America? Unspeakable torture and mass executions with kangaroo courts or no trials at all go on all over the world. Your silence is deafening, and your hypocrisy is towering. Why is your condemnation reserved for the U.S.A., the preeminent pioneer and stalwart supporter of human rights in the world? If you hate Bush's politics (conservatism) or his faith (Christianity), just be forthright and say so. But please cease and desist with this farce of phony moral outrage. Your partisanship is totally transparent. There's no sense in denying it. I have nothing against partisanship, but come out and say what you're really about.
I believe that President George W. Bush will go down in history as one of the most courageous champions of liberty and human rights of all time. He commanded U.S. troops to defeat the Taliban in Afghanistan. After the American victory, Afghans celebrated in the streets, women threw off their burqas, and schools resumed. Now, democracy and capitalism are flourishing there. I believe that the same kind of thing will happen in Iraq. Iraqis had begun to move toward democracy before Saddam Hussein's reign of terror derailed the progress that the country was making. Bush will get them back on track to growing into the kind of country they have been wanting to be.
But to you, Bush is the bad guy; he's the dictator and terrorist. You've turned reality on its head. Anyway, it's not Bush's job to make the world happy. He was elected to represent the views of Americans, especially those who voted for him, and abide by his oath of office. He's doing his job exceedingly well.
Non-allies tend to have governments that are Socialist, Communist, militant Islamic, and/or dictatorial, or no real government at all. (Hmmm, that might somehow have something to do with why they're not allies!) As a result, their societies are not conducive to independent media enterprises. Yes, enterprises are necessary here. If, say, Djibouti has a newspaper but doesn't have a decent, consistently-updated website too, Google won't link to it. It takes capital to fund these things. The media outlet(s) in most of these second/third world countries are limited and either highly regulated (censored) or completely state-run. How many news sources are based in Syria? North Korea? Libya? Hint: you don't need all your fingers to count them. Compared to the UK? Too many to track them all down. Heck, compared to the city of Orlando? The non-ally nation news sources are probably outnumbered 1 to 500.
And size does count. The Syria Times, for example, is quite pitiful. The Syria Daily looks pretty snazzy, but notice that over half the headlines actually link to news sites in - surprise - America or American ally countries. These examples don't constitute worthy competitors of, say, the Casper (Wyoming) Star-Tribune, much less the NY Times.
Having said that, I think Google does a fantastic job of consistently pulling news from every part of the globe. I've frequently seen news from Pakistan, "pan-Arab" regions, and many small countries you hardly ever hear anything about.
What is the point of having a skill? If a tree falls in the forest and nobody is around to hear it, does it make a sound? If a person has a talent and nobody around is allowed to benefit from it, does the talent have any usefulness? And if you use your talent only for personal gain, what special virtue is that?
Being the only "computer person" in your family puts you in a fantastic position to show love to your family and others who need your help. Love means giving up -- yielding your preferences, comfort, goals, security, money, energy, or time for the benefit of someone else. In practice, that may be hard work, but know this: How you treat other people, not your wealth or accomplishments, is the most enduring impact you can leave on earth. If you've truly done your best (competently, without complaining) to help someone with something they can't do for themselves, you know that you've done what is right. Don't lose sight of that fact in spite of possible negative reactions or misguided backlash. Realize that the gratitude of God counterbalances and far outweighs the ingratitude of the people you've helped.
All the cases you listed involve people responding irrationally or with undue hostility (assuming that you were actually competent to do the job). To adapt a phrase of author Rick Warren, those are "EGR situations" - extra grace required. Do your best to be gracious in those situations, because you yourself create EGR situations for other people. Everybody does.
You are a peacemaker when you overlook an insult or offense, especially when it is unwarranted. Recognize and respond to the fault behind the offensive attack (e.g., differing expectations, misunderstanding, argumentative personality, pre-existing anger, other worries, fears, or insecurities) rather than to the offense itself. Concentrating on the offense will kindle anger and hatred within yourself against the other person; but responding to the underlying fault will awaken compassion. Consider that their complaints against you may not be really against you, but have to so with some other source of dissatisfaction in their lives. Of course, first honestly consider that part of the blame really does belong to you.
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Piracy on the high seas (arrgh, matey), which sometimes really was terrorism, is still going on today.
It's no coincidence that terrorists struck the World Trade Center in New York City, the financial capital of the U.S.. Piracy rings that target the companies of specific nations are committing terrorism. They have the potential to damage the economy just as much as a physical attack.In fairness, it's possible that the pirates don't have any terrorist objectives in mind. They might just be greedy thieves. I think the only sure distinction between simple theft and terrorism is motive. The "terrorism" label shouldn't make much difference as to how we respond to the individual illegal actions. To me, it's like the difference between a "hate crime" murder and an ordinary murder. It's a crime either way and should be punished.
Stated another way: By any means necessary.
The thinking goes: Even if our methods violate our principles, the righteousness of the results of our goals outweighs the evil we have to commit to attain them.
That's why we saw a "pro-life" extremist kill an abortionist to prevent the abortionist from killing babies.
That's why we see "civil rights" extremists support temporary (we hope) discrimination against whites (supposedly, it is due them because they are enjoying the legacy fruits of past slavery) to support the greater good of producing racial equality.
Or another theory is: They're hypocrites.
Shocking, I know. Religious people are never hypocritical. ;-)
You can click the handle to turn the water off! And turn it back on. It's like dynamic XML.
On a tangent: Why do you write "J-sus" as you do "G-d"? To a Christian, it looks like you're giving equal reverence to Jesus and God, and thus, implying belief in the Tri-Unity of God. I assume it has to do with the command not to speak the names of other people's gods.
I appreciate your efforts to bring Jews and Chr-stians together
I'm just trying to do my part to undo 1,700 years of Greek and Vatican confusion, ignorance, and hostility that has separated us. We were meant to be one in the Olive Tree.
though your use of Hebrew terminology for J-sus is disturbing
To me, the church's use of Greek terminology for Yeshua is disturbing. Alas, the dominance of Jesus and the relative obscurity of Yeshua in the Gentile world obligates me to usually use the former term.
Like it or not, Jesus of Natzeret was Hebrew. He was a Jew of the Galil and taught Torah as a s'mikeh rabbi. His Jewish mother surely didn't give Him a pagan name! Jesus comes from the Greek Iêsous, which was a poor attempt by 4th century Greeks at pronouncing Yeshua'.
Why in the world would HaShem give specific instructions to Miryam to call the Mashiach "Jesus"?! Saving people from sins is no more reason for calling someone Iêsous (Jesus) than Jimmy or Miguel. Since "salvation is from the Jews" (Yochanan/John 4:22), HaShem forbid that Israel's Mashiach should be given a Greek goyish name!The truth is: He was not named Jesus. The Savior was named Yeshua' (Y'shua'), or Y'hoshua', which is a contraction of YHVH and yoshia ("he will save"), resulting in the meaning "YHVH saves." Only now, using Jesus' authentic Hebraic name, does Matt. 1:21 make sense. The purpose of the Messiah was to save us from our sins, and that's exactly what He did. Yeshua is also the masculine form of yeshu'ah, which means "salvation."
Now I'll explain the interchangeable use of Christ and Messiah, in case you were disturbed by that, too. Christ comes from the Greek christos, which has exactly the same literal meaning as mashiach. Mashiach was transliterated into Greek as messias and came into English as messiah. All these terms mean the same thing. Some will argue that "Christ" has an anti-Semitic connotation, but that's in the eye of the beholder and is a matter I'll leave for a later discussion.
The Effects of Pornography
Reasons Why Porn is Bad
You're very clever, young man, but it's no use -- it's turtles all the way down.
Both terrorists and pornographers are evildoers. We fight against each evil by methods appropriate to its nature.
(assuming you are Orthodox Jewish from your use of "G-d")
When you say "a faith," do you mean Christianity as a whole, or just a personal, home-brewed (corrupted) Christian faith? You would be correct in saying that some people have a kind of "faith in Jesus" that allows them to commit any sin they want. But that is not in keeping with the calling of Messiah or the New Testament scripture.
Christianity doesn't allow sin any more than Judaism does. Both have to make allowances for sin, because the evil inclination is in the Adamic nature of every person. If Judaism didn't "allow" sin, you'd be up the creek without a paddle. Of course, that's not the case. See what David prayed in Tehillim/Psalms 86:5.
Admittedly, there has been a major imbalance in much of Christendom regarding the amount of teaching devoted to proclaiming grace compared to that imploring obedience. It is terrible that many supposed followers of Messiah do abuse His grace by making no effort to repent of sin.
Your comment should not have been moderated flamebait. Your post should be an alarm bell to Christians that we should continually examine our actions, attitudes, relationships, and every aspect of our lives in light of how Christ taught us to live. As an outsider of the church, you can only comment on what you see, and what you see is a lot of unrighteous living and phony religion.
I think that the emphasis on grace and forgiveness is more prevalent in Christianity, because Messiah Yeshua personally commissioned His talmidim to reach out to the goyim/gentiles who, unlike Jews, had (or still have) no tradition of thinking of themselves as part of HaShem's family. It is necessary to keep harping on the fact that one's sin and former disassociation with God will not prevent that person from being loved by Him or from having His Holy Spirit live within him/her.
This will change your mind.
Why does the US defend Israel so much, anyway?
I speak for myself and many Americans by saying that support for Israel is a matter of obedience to God.
Many of us have the heart of the apostle Paul when he wrote in Romans 10:1: "Brothers, my heart's deepest desire and my prayer to God for Israel is for their salvation."In Genesis 12:1-3, God told Abram (later renamed Abraham):