[Arktwo] Welcome home Brits

[Bruce Beach]

Wonderful that the British were released.
Pawns in a propaganda war.
Dress up dolls for the cause.
Head cover on -
head cover off.
Civvies for departure -
change in flight to uniform.
Not permitted to speak
with embassy or Red Cross in Iran.
Stood at attention
and then whisked away for debriefing -
before interview with the press in Britain.

And the winner is?
Iran!
GREAT PR!
Released at the time of
Muhammad's birthday
and the Christian most holy season.
All done under an Iranian sign in English -
using the term God rather than Allah.

Smiling faces -
gifts and treats.
Certainly different
than the pictures of prisoner treatment
by Americans
that one sees coming out of the
Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo prisons.

I think Iran's freeing the Brits -
is GREAT -
whether there is anything
hypocritical about it or not.
Such attitudes / actions / expressions -
may eventually lead to more
peace and understanding.

I wish that the same expressions
extended to my religion in Iran.

Received the following yesterday:

04 April 2007 (CBNS) -- An increasing number of attacks on Iranian Bahá'í
schoolchildren has been reported recently, along with news of the expulsion
of 94 Bahá'ís from Iranian universities. The pattern of harassment points to
organized efforts to escalate the persecution of Iran's largest religious
minority.

In January and February of this year, some 150 incidents of attacks on
schoolchildren were reported from ten Iranian cities. The children and youth
were insulted by teachers in front of their classmates, degraded, threatened
with expulsion, sometimes summarily dismissed from school, pressured to
convert to Islam, slandered by their teachers, and taught "Iranian history"
that denigrated and falsified their religious heritage.

---------
My sincerest desire -
is that the whole Iran issue be resolved peacefully -
because Iran contains some of the world's most
concentrated Baha'i communities.
Bombing Iran - bombs Bahá'ís
although it would be a wrongful Bahá'í attitude -
to not be equally concerned
about the millions of others
regardless of their religion.

The reality is -
however,
that resolution does not seem likely -
although this current PR
is certainly a propaganda setback
for Bush and Blair.

Some may feel
that the current event may delay
the greater situation from coming to a head.
But -
other factors are setting a timeline.

Arab proposals that Israel
give up its most holy site and city -
that the Palestinians return to Israel
and eventually become a majority -
that Israel give up its nuclear defense
when it is outnumbered more than a hundred to one -
are all non-starters.

The increased pressure to accept such proposals -
just increases the pressure
for Israel to act now -
as does the rapidly increasing armament of
Syria, Hezbollah, Hamas, and Iran.

On the other hand -
the window of opportunity for action
becomes more and more narrow for Bush -
as he runs out of troops to send to Iraq -
and has to return more and more of the same ones -
with shortened rotational leaves -
of less than the promised year.
He has now gone past
the bottom of the barrel.

The showdown with the new US Congress
is going against him on the budget issues -
which would seem to establish
a time limitation -
although he did win on two key points -
attached to recent Congressional bills:

a. The authorization that he had
to go into Iraq
includes going into Iran.

b. He does not have to get
any new authorization
to go into Iran.

His incentive is therefore great
to act now
before these conditions can be reversed.

Probably the greatest motivating factor
to act now -
is the present military surge.
There have been two previous practice surges -
first, when all the ships put to sea last summer
to prove that capability -
and secondly,
the feint when both the Enterprise and Eisenhower
were on location earlier in the year.

Surges require time for recovery and reset -
so it would probably be a considerable time
before another could take place -
if this current one is not used.

While surges develop
skill / training / capability -
and are useful in time of build-up -
the US forces now appear to have peaked
and further surges are using up resources -
while at the same time
permitting opposing forces that are building
to better their positions.

I think that the neocons undoubtedly see it
in the manner which I have described -
and while there are opposing forces and voices
in the
Pentagon,
Congress,
US Public,
UN,
International Opinion,
and other Nations -
still they may be able to carry through.
If so -
it appears that it will have to be sooner -
rather than later.

-------------
I prefer the approach that:

Proverbs 15:1
A soft answer turneth away wrath:
but grievous words stir up anger.

But this is an answer -
from one correspondent yesterday:

-------->
My compliments on your sophistry.  You are a loquacious representative of
modern academia.  Like you I spent a lot of time in the halls of higher
learning.  Fortunately I had the presence of mind to leave the university
behind for the real world.

Because you are a race traitor with admitted contributions to the pollution
of the White gene pool I no further to add nor any interest in your
response.

I wish you and your Mischling offspring peace and tranquility in the fervent
hope that none of you will make further contribution to the corruption of
European blood stock.

---------

This was one of several such responses
yesterday.
I always try to reply
to all readers of this newsletter.

One had sent me
a lengthy justification
of the American use of torture
at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo  -
and the other a disparaging article
on the qualities of American black airmen.
I sought to refute both.

My latter attempt
was somewhat widely circulated
among what are apparently neo-nazis,
and the above was a reply
to my following subsequent attempt
to speak with a somewhat conciliatory voice:

--------->

Hitler had many beneficial ideas
from the autobahn to the Volkswagen.
Germany was the pinnacle of science
and a light unto the world in that regard.

He arose to power
because he was responsive
to many of the severe problems
the German people faced at that time.

All of us have mixtures of ideas
that contain both some good
and some erroneous concepts.
His view of the
Heartland,
Rhineland,
Bridgeland,
and the role that Germany was to play
in the world
was of course culturally determined
by where he lived.

Rev. Moon (if you know who that is)
currently holds the same view about Korea.
Such is one stage in maturing human thought.

There have been philosophical thinkers
about numbers of different economic systems.
Fascism was the system espoused by
Hitler,
Mussolini,
George Bush,
and the neocons.
Today it goes more by the name of
International Corporatism.
The advantages or disadvantages
of various economic systems such as
communism,
capitalism,
corporatism,
is a philosophical discussion
about which it is not appropriate
to discuss in this reply -
but none are anything to 'satanize' an advocate about.

The Nazis had ideas
of 'race purification'
which they sought to implement
vis-ŕ-vis the Jews, Gypsies, and others.
They were intolerant of many others -
just as many others -
in humanity's past and present
have been and are intolerant of others.

This is equally true -
no matter where one goes.
In general,
Chinese, Japanese and Koreans
are mutually intolerant of each other
and jointly of Caucasians -
generally much more so -
than Caucasians are of them.

It is not surprising that we find this same deficiency
among some Jews also -
but surprisingly not that many -
because even more surprisingly
the majority - even in Israel -
indeed specifically in Israel -
proclaim that they are not religious.

I am not quite sure what that means -
although admittedly -
numerous major advocates of atheism
have been Jewish.
Still, when many Jews say they are not religious -
I often wonder if it simply means
that they are not 'observant' or 'orthodox',
rather than that they are atheistic.

In any case -
the spirit of anti-religion is rampant
in Israel as elsewhere.
The true spirit of religion -
that of love, tolerance and compassion -
is lacking also
even among those who are fundamentalist
in their religions -
and this applies equally to
Hindus,
Jews,
Christians,
and Muslims.

We see this lack of true spirituality
throughout the world -
and there is no need to single out
any one group as its perpetuator.
To do so,
is simply to manifest that spiritual disease -
one's self.

Many groups -
American Christian neocons,
Chinese Communists,
Muslim fundamentalists,
and many others -
have hopes for extending
their philosophies world-wide.

There is no "one" conspiracy
to take over the world -
but instead there are many such aspirations -
and yes,
among some Jews also.

I deal with this subject on a number
of the over 600 web pages that I maintain -
and I might refer you to one:

	http://tinyurl.com/3by6vx

and particularly to:

	http://tinyurl.com/2h293j

Hitler's ideas were a part
of this same thread of thought.
As I said before -
there were both good and bad aspects
to many of his ideas.

The victors write history -
and so consequently today -
Hitler is demonized -
which is not to say unjustly -
but it surprises many Americans
as to whom many people in the world
now think is the Great Satan.

It is a travesty
that current Political Correctness
does not permit more open discussion
regarding humanity's relatively recent history
in the events surrounding WW2.

The lack of insight -
as to what caused WW1,
and the response that caused WW2,
is again repeating itself
as we plunge towards WW3.

But -
the insight necessary
is not regarding any particular group -
Masons,
Catholics,
Jews,
Muslims,
or any other specific group -
but rather regarding the nature of humanity itself.

<----------
So much,
for trying to reply to many people
objectively and in a conciliatory manner.
Unfortunately,
that is the situation on BOTH sides -
or I should say -
for ALL sides -
on the present international scene.

It went well for the Brits
in the short-term -
but I have no such long-term optimism.

Peace and love,
Bruce
DawnSayer@webpal.org