Lost!

Raped British woman in
Dubai is charged with having
sex outside of marriage.

“Lost” is right! I guess we now know where our priorities are. President Obama’s State of the Union speech has been re-scheduled so as not to compete with the season’s premier of this super-duper combination of soap operas, otherwise known as Lost. Whew, I was really worried there for a moment. I confess to never having seen a complete episode of this program, merely bits and pieces, because my wife and son are addicted to it and I cannot completely avoid it. When it comes on I usually beat a retreat into my study, partly because I do not understand it, and partly because it does seem to me like a series of different soaps all strung together. I’m sure aficionados will not agree to this description, but I am equally certain that whatever it is, it should not be regarded as important enough to influence the timing of the State of the Union speech.

It is this, along with many other things that make me feel that, like Alice, I have fallen into a rabbit hole where everything is terribly mixed up and I am surrounded by characters and events so strange I cannot fathom them. There is the leader, half black, half white, who has tried to convince everyone that war is peace and continuity is change. There is also the mad hatter, the former leader whose speech was often so garbled you had to accept that words meant whatever he said they meant, and to be a great leader meant you had to be at war. As he was not very interested in being the leader he was directed by a sort of evil shadow leader who believed torture was the way to find out things that were not true so he could make people believe they were true. Their warriors were led by a strange fellow who believed that things you didn’t know you didn’t know might be of importance if you knew what they were so you could know them, and perhaps you might learn about them if you could just torture enough. He was sometimes at loggerheads with a black lady who played the piano and liked expensive clothing and boots, did not read her mail, but helped design the tortures in meetings they held for that purpose. Nothing was too far-fetched to be considered, one of their lawyers even thought crushing the testicles of a child in front of his parents would be acceptable. There was also a famous General who reported very important things he did not believe because he felt it behooved him to do so because he was a General. These leaders led a large group who believed that the solution to everything was lowering taxes on wealthy people and using taxes in general to finance endless wars so that people might have something to do to keep them busy. As there was never enough money for these endless wars they just printed and borrowed more as they believed deficits were not a problem. In order to do all this they convinced the citizens that black was white, up was down, east was west, and most importantly, lies were truth. They told so many lies, eventually no one could tell the difference any more between truth and falsehoods. This, of course, led to a situation of such utter confusion they had to pause to select some new leaders who have proven to be just like the old leaders, and so this strange cycle of unreality continues in the same vein. I would like to escape this rabbit hole but all the escape routes have been blocked by officials who want you to remove your shoes, carry no liquids, knitting needles, corkscrews, toenail clippers, or anything that might be considered remotely useful, and are soon apparently going to also inspect your underwear and perhaps even your body cavities. Apart from this, their major concern at the moment has to do with how many times the President should use the term “terrorists.” Everyone seems to agree he should use this term, the problem is how often and how passionately. They also worry about other words, the meaning of which, they have no idea, and no desire to learn. Remember, words mean whatever you choose them to mean, which makes possible a “fascist-communist,” or a “compassionate-conservative,” and so on. I fear I may be trapped in this rabbit hole for a long time, perhaps forever.

The one thing that would help the most to end problems in the Middle East, and terrorism, is apparently never even seriously considered, bringing the rogue state of Israel to heel and forcing them to negotiate in good faith a solution to the Palestinian problem, especially and urgently as it pertains to the situation in Gaza. As long as Israel continues to rule the United States this is not going to happen. The participation of the United States in this slow genocide is shameful beyond belief and absolutely unconscionable.

To-day that seems so long, so strange, so bitter,
Will soon be some forgotten yesterday.
Sarojini Naidu