Richard,
I always read your emails with a Texas accent; dunno how, but there it is...
As usual, what you say has great depth, and most of all, an aura of truth
unfettered by ideology.
By the way, Mark Twain also commented, in his own inimitable way, on what
the land was like around the end of the 19th century. It was just as you
described it below: no basketball-sized grapefruits.
P.
At 09:34 PM 8/14/2006 -0500, you wrote:
Howdy Vorts,
Been an interesting series of comments but I see no consensus.
At the fundamental base of humanity, very few have an inherent evil
within. I have met very few that were evil to the core without any
redemptive value.
There seems to be an age , possibly around 6-9 years, where certain
patterns of behavior emerge and a set of values begin to form that
influence behavior into adulthood. It is mostly impossible to change a
persons mind or behavior once set.since only God can change the heart.
Different religious cultural practice and parental teaching and discipline
seems to identify with various cultures. Muslim culture clashes with
Judeo-Christian culture and has for some 1400 years. Isreal understands
there can be no peaceful resolution so their method of survival is eye for
an eye. The Christian method is dependence upon God. We could be seeing
the same situation that occurred in the time of the kings of Isreal where
2 Chronicles chapter 20 identifies battles that belong to God.
The USA is not only a paradox, it is going through another phase of
melding of cultures of which the outcome we cannot predict.
Dynamic changes underway have unintended consequences where individual
freedoms are further reduced both by the well intended and the schemes of men.
Human nature is influenced by jealousy, vanity, lust and greed which leads
to no end of mischief with never ending variations producing one of the
most profitable and intriguing industries on the US scene... lawyering.
and the military industrial complex so profitable to the Carylile and
Blackstone group.
I recall reading something written by DesCartes after his visit to the
holy lands regarding his unbelief that the phophecy of the eventual
restoration of Isreal couldn't happen because no one lived in the desert
region between the western sea and the Persian gulf except a few thousand
nomadic herdsmen. Yet the Zionist movement sent settlers to form Kibbutz
along the Gaza area in the 1880's They secured authorization from the
Turkish Sultan and purchased ( emphasis on bought , not took) the land
from the tribesmen on which they drilled water wells and created irrigated
farming co-ops ( communes) to sell produce to Europe. After thses farms
were established, their next step was to form the Hebrew University to
begin the training of a civil service cadre for governing. This long range
planning resulted in what Isaiah predicted and a nation was created in
"one day" in 1948. There has not been one day of peace since that day.
There has not been a day since 1948 that Isreal has not been mentioned in
the world news. Phophecy states that every nation that comes against
Isreal will injure themselves. A view of the pics of the damage wrought
against Lebanon seems to confirm that prophecy.
Maybe the Mexicans had it right in the old days.. when two people couldn't
agree, they tied their hands together with rawhide , handed each a sharp
machete and advised them to settle the matter between themselves.
Oh! were the disputes of the world that easy to resolve. But .come to
think of it.. trouble usually starts with just two. If the two could be
culled out before they were able to hire somebody else to fight their
battles. everyone else would be left in peace to chase women, drink
whiskey and raise hell.
Richard
