On Music Appreciation

A serendipitous sway shows the magic in the music we listen to today

What all started this whole train of musical appreciation thought was my 25+ year relationship with the fine folks at Hart Shaffner Marx’s designer suit division, the one that markets such suit labels as Kenneth Cole, Perry Ellis and Pierre Cardin.

A couple of years ago I was their guest for a Celine Dion concert at Caesar’s Las Vegas during the huge MAGIC menswear show.[1] Her incredible show began with the song Nature Boy, which I had vaguely remembered hearing sung by somebody, some long time back in my youth. My host told me the incomparable Nat King Cole first recorded this song, so when I returned home I bought the album, which I fished out and loaded in the sultry heat of my car while motoring around town today.

Now there are MANY musical masterpieces (and subjectively if any one person finds magic any music—yes, even, gangsta rap—then that music is for that person a masterpiece), but listening to the fluidly melodious voice of Nat King Cole, his accompanying orchestra and the arrangement on songs that defy the ages with familiarity made that word, “MASTERPIECE” bubble through my consciousness.

From “The Very Thought of You”, to “It’s Only a Paper Moon,” then “Route 66,” “Unforgettable,” and by “Mona Lisa” my spirits were soaring with appreciation for Mr. Cole, and for the power and magic of all and any music that can move our soul at any particular moment, mostly when we least expect it.

L is for the way you look at me O is for the only one I see V is very, very extraordinary E is even more than anyone that you adore can

You know, there are more than just the lyrics, the words and the voice that delivers them that creates the euphoric sensations we sometimes experience while listening to a song that strikes our soul. It is a micro-cosm of life, of all things working together in harmony that enables our enjoyment of, well, EVERYTHING.

Literally, everything, from the smallest toothpick to the most elaborate skyscraper--and even a little lily—is a culmination of hundreds, thousands of processes. Products come by an incredible series of human activity sharpened through centuries of building upon each prior generation’s progress and encompassing a worldwide network of people working together AS A TEAM. From the cultivators of raw materials, to the shippers, the designers, engineers, manufacturers, marketers, deliverers, maintainers and users it’s all one big harmonious interplay.

Just like the next song…”Don’t Get Around Much Anymore,”
♪ Missed the Saturday dance…Heard they crowded the floor…Couldn't bear it without you Don't get around much anymore…

And the next one… “Straighten up & Fly Right,”

The buzzard took the monkey for a ride in the air
The monkey thought that everything was on the square
The buzzard tried to throw the monkey off his back
The monkey grabbed his neck and said now listen, jack
Straighten up and fly right, Straighten up and fly right,Straighten up and fly right
Cool down, papa, don't you blow your top. (I love that line!)

And then my favorite, “Nature Boy,”[2] the haunting melody with the message of all that really matters:

There was a boyA very strange enchanted boy
They say he wandered very far, very farOver land and sea
A little shy and sad of eye But very wise was he
And then one dayA magic day he passed my way
And while we spoke of many things Fools and kingsThis he said to me
"The greatest thing you'll ever learn Is just to love and be loved in return"
"The greatest thing you'll ever learnIs just to love and be loved in return"

Again, the interplay of voice, of instrumentation, cadence and tempo create the finished product. And most important to our listening enjoyment are the sound engineers, the producers and the technology that allows me to motor around with music at my beck and call, recreating a 1948 performance as if they were performing for me alone. Incredible!

And “Unforgettable.” So “Smile.”


[1] The theatre, the lights, the setting and physical changes for each of her songs was 25th century spectacular, as was her whole concert…simply Unforgettably unbelievably great!

[2] Nature Boy was written by eden ahbez (he refused capitalization as he thought it reserved for the divine only), an unlikely source for one of the greatest songs of all time.

From the Wikipedia: eden ahbez, born Alexander Aberle (April 15, 1908 – March 4, 1995), and adopted by a Kansas family and raised under the name George McGrew, was one of the few genuinely unique characters of pre-rock American popular music.
Ahbez composed the song "Nature Boy" about friend and fellow freegan "Tribesman" Robert Gypsy Boots Bootzin, who was leading a lifestyle which strived to be all natural and Spartan.
Eden lived a bucolic life. He refused to use capital letters to spell his name. He travelled in sandals, camped out below the first L in the Hollywood sign above Los Angeles, studied Oriental mysticism, and cultivated a Christ-like appearance with his shoulder-length hair and beard. He claimed to live on three dollars a week, sleeping outdoors with his family, eating vegetables, fruits, and nuts.
In the mid-'50s, he did some recording with jazz musician Herb Jeffries; he also did some occasional composing and singing, sometimes for rock & roll novelty records. His most comprehensive statement as a recording artist, however, was the 1960 LP Eden's Island, a bizarre record which mixed exotica album and beatnik poetry. Many consider it as one of the weirdest exotica records ever created.
Ahbez was also photographed with Brian Wilson in the studio in 1966, lending further credence to the theory that the head Beach Boy was influenced by exotica during the Pet Sounds and Smile sessions. He died in 1995 after being hit by a car.

For even more about this incredible story and how he got his song to Mr. Cole you MUST read this: http://www.spaceagepop.com/ahbez.htm

Islam Falsely Accused

Before I eat another bite or take another breath I must correct a mis-characterization that if left to stand would sew ever more fear and hatred in our already compromised world. President Bush said in reference to the foiled London bomb conspiracy: “… this nation is at war with Islamic fascists who will use any means to destroy those of us who love freedom, to hurt our nation.”

He surely did not intend to disparage the Islamic faith or its adherents. Yet the effect of parroting a phrase so mindlessly repeated by many in the media is to unfairly condemn the Muslim world and in the process brand an entire religion as something that it most certainly is not

The truth is that yes, there are some people who want to commit heinous crimes against other people. In this case the alleged attackers were Pakistani British residents who were targeting passengers destined for America. Of course, those passengers would have included Muslim as well as Christian, and possibly Pakistani as well as American citizens.

Nevertheless, the high-profile nature of their crimes obscures the fact that they are but a tiny sub-sect of Islam. They in no way represent the mainstream body of faithful Muslims. Nor are they part of an alleged conspiracy for world domination for there simply is none.

This alleged plan is part of a self-fulfilling prophecy long enshrined in the concept of the “Clash of Civilizations,” first espoused by Samuel Huntington in 1993. While it is true that the effect of conflicts between the West and the Middle East are in that sense conflicts between two differing cultures, that is not the reason for such disputes per se.

The reason is as old as humanity itself: the quest for resources. The root cause of what they call “Islamic fascism” is not religious or cultural. Rather it is the incursions into the lands of those peoples, that to their sensibilities are dis-respectful, immoral and certainly done in a way that we would never tolerate in our own lands, thus violating the very heart of Christian ethics—do not unto others as you would not want done to yourself.

Islam is one of the three Abrahamic religions along with Judaism and Christianity. It has always been tolerant of these other religions, as the Koran teaches. Jewish citizens flourished under Muslim rule in Spain during the nearly 8 centuries of Moorish rule from 711 to 1492.
And you will find no greater praise for Jesus than in the Koran. In fact it esteems Jesus as the Messiah, the Word of God, God’s most enlightened and sinless prophet. For example:

· in Oud Emrom 5-45, Jesus is referred to as, "the greatest above all in this world and the world to come."

· S-5-46: "And, in their footsteps, we sent Isa (Jesus), the son of Marium (Mary), confirming the law that had come before him. We sent him the gospel. Therein was guidance and light, and confirmation of the law that had come before him. A guidance and an admonition to those who fear Allah (God)."


· 3.45: When the angels said: O Marium, surely Allah gives you good news with a Word from Him (of one) whose name is the '. Messiah, Isa son of Marium, worthy of regard in this world and the hereafter and of those who are made near (to Allah).

There is no conflict with Islam and those of other faiths. The heinous acts of those who see themselves as victims or fighting for victims do so in response to perceived injustices against them. As they perceive that more justice is shown to them—for instance, the ending of wars and dominations of their lands and the beginning of statehood for the Palestinians—the less mayhem they will attempt.

Remove the thorn to calm the lion.

Richard F. Dawahare 8/12/06

Is-raelity TV (TonyVision)

I’m tired. I’m just ready to give in. It’s been a week of high anxiety and low blows. It started with the shocking finality of a brother’s death—in reality a blessed release to eternal comfort for Tony, yet a gut wrenchingly sad void for us. Beyond this personal tumult rages the object of my non-professional political pointer—the war in Lebanon, of which I’d previously written from opposing viewpoints.

There is a string of meaning in Tony’s life, death and the events in the Middle East that exposes a higher truth. First, in Tony’s eulogy I stated the two themes of my life with him that jumped out. One, that love is truly a choice…and one we MUST make if we desire the happiest most fulfilled life for all. See, Tony had some innate characteristics that defied convention. Through these traits I learned to forego judgment, empathize more and love no matter what. This also enabled me to FEEL outside of the box, and thus, feel outside of my own perspective and comfort zone, which is the pre-requisite for empathy.

The second theme is the importance of humor no matter how dark the circumstances. The pre-requisite for enabling this humor to enter our lives is humility, the same ingredient that allows us to see our selves and our situation objectively. It allows us to literally laugh at ourselves when that scenario is called for.

His funeral brought together many people from a variety of backgrounds. There were Jewish, Christian, Muslim and I’m sure agnostic and atheist all present—and all united in the shared spirit of love and compassion. By sheer coincidence I had learned from my Jewish friend about a mother-in-law whose parents were killed during the Holocaust in Nazi concentration camps. She was a teen and escaped only by her cunning and suffering of various humilities.

He proved—graphically and emphatically—that the holocaust is NOT a distant memory. It is recent and real. He also proffered another slant on Israel’s invasion of Lebanon. First, he truly believes the Arabs, through Hamas and Hezbollah, really DO want to wipe out Israel. He also pointed to news reports and analysis that say this whole thing is really a power play for Iran to try and take control of the region, that there is struggle between Shiite (Iran, Syria) and Sunni Islam (Saudi, Egypt, Jordan), and by having Hezbollah successfully withstand Israel, leave them (Shiite) able to brag that they are the real protector and voice of Islam. Beyond that, such fundamentalists want to impose their religion by force on the rest of the world.

Apparently there is AGAIN virulent anti-Semitism in France, which is indication of a similar sentiment throughout Europe. This makes the recent memory of the Holocaust a very relevant reminder of the absolute necessity of a JEWISH homeland. Thus, the right of return for Palestinians admittedly done wrong by their expulsion in 1947-48, is not acceptable, for eventually they would outnumber the Jewish citizens and possibly vote to deny any more Jewish people in. WHERE WOULD THE NEWLY PERSECUTED JEWISH EVACUEES BE THEN?! It is a legitimate concern, friends, a legitimate concern.

At our mercy meal I spoke to a Palestinian immigrant friend, who was one of those thrown off their land. He came in 1951; his father was killed over there. The method of eviction was similar to the Lebanese situation now, except there were more men on the ground with weapons ruthlessly used against the defenseless native population with the certain intent to kill or create fear enough to make them flee. The ironic thing is that he said the vast majority back then were Christian Palestinians, most of whom have left leaving it predominantly Muslim.

Back to my Jewish friend who perceptively noted that the Palestinians are the new Jews. He then asks, “Why are they living in tents with all the surrounding Arab territory that could easily accommodate them?” He answers: because the Arab nations WANT IT THAT WAY! They want that festering sore in order to help bring about their real goal of destroying Israel. He truly, truly admits that there were injustices done early on, and even now, the killing of innocents is atrocious. But their very survival depends on rooting out the Hezbollah who hide amongst those innocents.

Even he admits that the deaths are too much and too damaging for Israel to continue and that they must have a ground invasion to truly control the Hezbollah, or negotiate some ending. He sees the bombing as I do: inappropriate and counter-productive.

Whew. I’m back to the beginning. The lessons of Tony Vision clear the path to peace. ONE, should all concerned choose to Love, practice EMPATHY, they would see that everybody is right in this conflict. TWO, using humor or in this case, HUMILITY, would have them conclude that the blood won’t dry until each of them says, “we’re sorry, we’re wrong.”



Richard F. Dawahare 7/30/06

A View from an Israeli’s Shoe

I can’t sleep. So I feel called to take a second look, really the 102nd look, at this Israeli/Palestinian situation this time by putting myself in the skin of a Jewish person. Not the superhuman “above-the-fray” person that exists mostly in the realm of spiritual idealism, but the human one, the feeling one, the one that’s about like me.

Okay, so now I am of a race, a culture that only 60 years ago was subject to the worst atrocity imaginable. Solely because of a trait over which I have no control—my blood, my ancestry—I was sought out for extermination. I was helpless, powerless, feebly and futilely consumed by the hate-filled bestiality of perverted humanity.

For centuries prior at different times and places, my forbears were similarly despised, falsely blamed, chased, burned at the stake or otherwise degraded on account of this same ethnicity.

But the holocaust made manifest the millennia of abuse known only through the history books. There are survivors, there are pictures and there are indescribable shudders of horror that anything like this could ever possibly happen again. God forbid we, me, my people—or any other strain of humanity—be so defenseless, so vulnerable to this treatment. By GOD’S will, by all that is true and just this should not, WILL NOT, happen again.

I begin to see that strength and self-reliance are crucial to preventing even the possibility of this occurring again. A safe land is the first step, a bastion of freedom for all—yes, especially of my race—who wish to come, or if the situation ever demanded—must come. And to insure protection against this past suffering I, we, will do anything. Hopefully, we can do it all with consistent justice and in accord to our highest nature, but when necessary we will do anything—ANYTHING—to insure our safety.

Yes, my people may have committed some acts against our highest nature that in other eras we would have decried, and yes, we may be doing them now. But the sin of these actions PALE in comparison to the sin done to us and to what we will prevent from ever occurring again. If we ever go down again it will never be from being weak, unprepared or unguarded. And who could blame us.

So in Israel, with help from others sure, but by OUR hands, by OUR will, have we forged this new land, this new security. Others in the region still seek our destruction; try as we might to get along. Why can’t they see, why can’t they feel, why can’t they empathize? Regardless, if they can’t and won’t refrain from harming us, we must stand ready to insure our safety. For this we have armed, we have trained, we have girded ourselves--boys, girls, men, women. Ourselves alone, for who stood up for us before, and on whom can we depend again? No one but ourselves, alone.
------------------------------

When I step back into my own skin I see it and understand it, and by damn, before I let anything like what happened before I’ll commit--or allow others in my behalf to commit--about ANY lesser atrocities.

And that is part of the tragedy, for if I can’t see more perspective—in this case that I/we are not endangered as we were for centuries before--then our actions that we think so essential to our preservation will on the contrary build resentment to our people and possibly, ironically, lead to a renewal of contempt against us—based only on blood and ancestry, yet again.

As I’ve long said—the situation is one where everybody is right. But the blood won’t dry till we (both sides) say we’re wrong.


Respectfully, Rfd 7/25/06

Beyond Israeli Propaganda: Jewish leaders cry ‘Emet’ (Truth)

“Rich, your family is from Lebanon originally, isn’t it? This must be killing you,” a friend asked in church this morning. “Yes, all my grandparents are from there[1]. And yes, it is difficult.”

Israel’s invasion is very problematic for me, and not nearly because Lebanon/Syria is the land of my forebears and where relatives still live. In fact, just as I was sitting down to write this my paternal cousin called, and then she initiated a three-way call with her daughter who is now in Beirut. I just spoke to her and her fiancé, who by coincidence is a distant cousin on my mother’s side.

But Israel’s terrorism on the Lebanese is troubling regardless of any personal connection I may have, for injustice is injustice no matter on whom it is visited. And while the perception may be that one with such ties can never be objective I should not let the potential charge “oh he’s just a homer” prevent my search for the highest truth and my standing upon that lofty perch.

On the contrary, I shudder to speak contrarily about Israel. I have longed believed in the necessity of some kind of Jewish homeland, especially in view of the Holocaust. Yet the roots of today’s conflict were sewn in the very creation of Israel by the eviction of nearly 1,000,000 Palestinians from lands they called home for over 2000 years.

Indeed, a review of today’s headlines show that Israel is using nearly identical methods to those in 1947-48 by attacking defenseless Lebanon, where Israel has driven 500,000 from their homes. 500,000. FIVE HUNDRED THOUSAND. And why? Because, Israel says, Hezbollah captured 2 Israeli officers.

Is Israel really serious that their reason for killing innocent Lebanese children and destroying its infrastructure—bridges, airports, water, power, communications systems-- is that Hezbollah arrested a couple of their soldiers, when Israel has arrested many hundred times more in a tit-for-tat exercise that has been going on for years?

Not a chance. Israel has long planned this invasion, and typical of “might makes right” military machines, they have used lies, and politically appealing cover to justify this outrage.

What’s at play is much more sinister. Naseer Aruri, Professor Emeritus of Political Science at the University of Massuchusetts, Dartmouth and author of Dishonest Broker, America’s Role in Israel and Palestine, said that by its invasion Israel seeks “…to forestall a diplomatic solution based on two states, for which Hamas has been more than ready.”

Professor Aruri cited Hamas’ Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh’s recent peace initiative that appeared in a Washington Post op-ed piece. “And it seems whenever Israel is threatened with a ceasefire or a peace offensive, it bombs its way out of a diplomatic settlement.”

And this is the nut. For all their stated desire for a Palestinian state Israel has sabotaged its creation by building settlements, conducting terror raids, building walls, depriving Palestinians of power, water and economic livelihood and laying down such a thick carpet of anti-Palestinian propaganda that American’s continue to support the billions we give Israel each and every year.

Of course Israel has the right to exist. Palestinians readily accept this, yet they insist on the same for them. As Haniyeh said, “We want what Americans enjoy—democratic rights, economic sovereignty and justice.” And until now, and ever since 1948 this has been denied to them by Israel’s defiance of not only International law but Judaism’s historic moral code.

The world does not need my protestations of Israeli intransigence. It can get all it would ever need from Jewish leaders themselves, who see in Israel a state acting ostensibly on their behalf, yet behaving so contrarily to their ancient moral code:

1) “How tragic that in our own time the very state established by Jews in the aftermath of this evil (the Nazi Holocaust) has become a place where racialism, religious discrimination, militarism and injustice prevail; and that Israel itself has become a pariah state within the world community. Events taking place today are all too reminiscent of the pogroms from which our own forefathers fled two and three generations ago -- but this time those in authority are Jews and the victims are Moslems and Christian Palestinians.”[2] [18 prominent Jews endorsed this ad in The Nation, calling for American Jews to “dissociate from Israel.” They expressed concern that "the close identification in the public mind between Israel and Jews -- an equation vigorously fostered by both the Zionist movement and the American Jewish lobby, which has come under its control -- threatens to stigmatize Jews everywhere."

2) Rabbi Reuben Slonim: “Today we Jews are losing [the] humanism and universalism of Judaism, all for the sake of Jewish statehood. We love Israel, and so we should, but we are so blinded by that love that we are willing to pay a prohibitive price for it. We condone acts we would declare unconscionable anywhere else in the world: nuclear weapons are wrong but necessary for Israel; apartheid is wrong, but for the sake of Israel's survival we will tolerate it; human rights are critical, but not for the Palestinians; we have a right to a state but Palestinians do not. Our racism towards Arabs would be regarded as anti-Semitism if others spoke of us in the same light. In all things we need to remember that the Jewish people and the Jewish state are but instruments, not ends in themselves; that what is good for the world is good for the Jews, not what is good for the Jews is good for the world; that the ultimate goal of the Jew, if he be truly Jewish, is to serve humanity.”[3]


3) Reb Binyomin, a prominent writer, strongly criticized actions that occurred during the creation of the Jewish state. In 1953 he wrote: "After the State of Israel was established, I began receiving news about the terrible things perpetrated both during and after the Israeli-Arab war. I did not recognize my own people for the changes which had occurred in their spirit. The acts of brutality were not the worst because those might have been explained somehow . . . Far more terrible was the benevolent attitude towards these acts on the part of public opinion. I had never imagined that such could be the spiritual and moral countenance of Israel. . .”[4]

4) Nathan Chofshi A Jewish settler who witnessed the birth of the Jewish state and did not like what he saw. In a 1959 reply to a rabbi who "parroted" the official version of the Palestinian exodus from Israel, he bore witness to the campaign to expel the Palestinian population: "We came and turned the Arabs into tragic refugees. And still we dare slander and malign them, to besmirch their name; instead of being deeply ashamed of what we did, and trying to undo some of the evil we committed, we justify our terrible acts and even attempt to glorify them.”[5]


5) One of the leading Israeli anti-Zionists today is concentration-camp survivor Israel Shahak, who currently heads the Israeli League for Civil and Human Rights. Shahak believes that "the State of Israel is a racist state: “In this state people are discriminated against, in the most permanent and legal way and in the most important areas of life, only because of their origin.”[6]

6) Israel Shahak again: “I would say the only human response to Holocaust is to try not to be like Nazis, in word or in deed. What brought the Holocaust was the racist attitude towards Jews, the division of German society into Jews and non-Jews on grounds of race. This is exactly the same thing that is happening in Israel.”[7]

7) Albert Einstein, Hannah Arendt and other Jewish leaders in a letter to the NY Times: “The public avowals of Begin’s party are no guide whatever to its actual character. Today they speak of freedom, democracy and anti-imperialism, whereas until recently they openly preached the doctrine of the Fascist state. It is in its actions that the terrorist party betrays its real character; from its past actions we can judge what it may be expected to do in the future.”[8]

8) “A shocking example was their behavior in the Arab village of Deir Yassin. This village, off the main roads and surrounded by Jewish lands, had taken no part in the war, and had even fought off Arab bands who wanted to use the village as their base. On April 9 (The New York Times), terrorist bands attacked this peaceful village, which was not a military objective in the fighting, killed most of its inhabitants—240 men, women, and children—and kept a few of them alive to parade as captives through the streets of Jerusalem.Most of the Jewish community was horrified at the deed, and the Jewish Agency sent a telegram of apology to King Abdullah of Trans-Jordan. But the terrorists, far from being ashamed of their act, were proud of this massacre, publicized it widely, and invited all the foreign correspondents present in the country to view the heaped corpses and the general havoc at Deir Yassin.The Deir Yassin incident exemplifies the character and actions of the Freedom Party. Within the Jewish community they have preached an admixture of ultranationalism, religious mysticism, and racial superiority. Like other Fascist parties they have been used to break strikes, and have themselves pressed for the destruction of free trade unions. In their stead they have proposed corporate unions on the Italian Fascist model. During the last years of sporadic anti-British violence, the IZL and Stern groups inaugurated a reign of terror in the Palestine Jewish community. Teachers were beaten up for speaking against them, adults were shot for not letting their children join them. By gangster methods, beatings, window-smashing, and wide-spread robberies, the terrorists intimidated the population and exacted a heavy tribute.”[9]

We should not be surprised at a reality that is so different from that which our government and media present to us. Every reference by Israel, by our government and our media to the Palestinians calls them “terrorists.”

Lost in our media’s constant referral to Palestinians as “terrorists” lays the true nature of Israel, long buried in the dead sea of propaganda. This nature was first described by none other than Albert Einstein, Hannah Arendt and other Jewish leaders in a December 4, 1948 letter to the New York Times. They condemned the emergence of what was to become the dominant political force in Israeli politics, the “freedom party,” led by Menachem Begin.

They said Begin’s party was “closely akin in its organization, methods, political philosophy and social appeal to the Nazi and Fascist parties. It was formed out of the membership and following of the former Irgun Zvai Leumi, a terrorist, right-wing, chauvinist organization.”

Then, a warning that has tragically been ignored ever since: “Before irreparable damage is done by way of financial contributions, public manifestations in Begin’s behalf, and the creation in Palestine of the impression that a large segment of America supports Fascist elements in Israel, the American public must be informed as to the record and objectives of Mr. Begin and his movement.”

Instead of heeding this advice America has given $160 BILLION over the last 50 years to the Israeli war machine. Every failure of peace is automatically blamed on the Palestinians. All events are sold from the perspective of an Israel built upon the corrupt foundation Dr. Einstein and others so courageously warned about.

The problems in the Middle East are primarily of Israel’s own making. To achieve peace they must:

1) END THE OCCUPATION;

2) Follow UN Resolution 242[10], and the more than 70 others that condemn Israeli behavior, its unlawful land grabs and their oppression of the Palestinian “refugees”;

3) Follow The Commission on Human Rights[11] directive to “desist from all forms of violation of human rights in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem, and other occupied Arab territories; to respect the bases of international law, the principles of international humanitarian law, its international commitments and the agreements it signed with the Palestine Liberation Organization; to withdraw from the Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem as a basic condition for achieving a just, lasting and comprehensive peace in the Middle East.”

Remove the thorn to calm the lion.




Respectfully, Richard F. Dawahare 7/23/06

PS Many of the quotations are from an article by Edward C. Corrigan, Jewish Criticism of Zionism, http://libaware.economads.com/jewcritzion.php

[1] My maternal grandparents were Lebanese (although I remember my grandmother saying she was born in Bethlehem) and my paternal grandparents from Syria. But prior to WWI this was all “Syria” and was controlled by the Turkish Ottoman Empire. My paternal great-grandfather was the Christian mayor of a small Syrian village. The Turks were killing all such non-Muslim leaders and killed him. My great-grandmother hid my grandfather in a well, as the Turks were looking for his oldest son to kill as well. He got out and emigrated to the US as a young teenager, meeting his wife in NY and settling in Jenkins, Ky. My maternal great-grandfather and others were conscripted in the Ottoman army. Many of the next generation came to America to avoid reaching a similar fate.
[2] "Time to Dissociate from Israel," The Nation, February 13, 1988, p. 19.
[3] Reuben Slonim, Grand to be an Orphan (Toronto: Clarke, Irwin & Company, 1983), p. 175.
[4] Hans Kohn, "Zion and the Jewish National Idea," The Menorah Journal, Autumn-Winter 1958, p. 42.
[5] Jewish Newsletter, 9 February 1959, cited in Gilmour, p. 74.
[6] Israel Shahak, "The Racist Nature of Zionism and the Zionistic State of Israel," The Link, Winter 1975-1976, p. 10. For an example of the work of the Israeli League for Human and Civil Rights see Report on the Violation of Human Rights in the Territories during the Uprising, 1988 (Tel Aviv: The Israeli League for Human and Civil Rights, 1988).
[7] Charles Glass, "Jews Against Zionism: Israeli Jewish Anti-Zionism," Journal of Palestine Studies, Autumn 1975/ Winter 1976, p. 77.
[8] Isadore Abramowitz, Albert Einstein et al, “New Palestine Party,” New York Times, Dec. 4, 1948; ProQuest Historical newspapers the New York Times (1851-2003) pg. 12.
[9] Albert Einstein, et al ibid.
[10] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UN_Security_Council_Resolution_242
[11] http://www.hri.ca/fortherecord2001/vol3/israelchr.htm

Who’s a Terrorist in the Middle East?

This site encompasses my personal philosophy of peace, so I reject forceful, violent means such as Hezbollah or Hamas use as well as the thorn inducing their actions, the violent conflict-initiating means Israel used to take land belonging to the Palestinians.

Yet this site also stands for truth, as best as we can define this often nebulous term. So it is fair and just to ask: just who is a terrorist, especially in the Middle East? If one honestly addresses the roots of the conflict in the Middle East one will find “terrorism” all around, starting with Israeli Zionists. In 1948 their terroristic “Freedom Party” (Tnuat Haherut) led by Menachem Begin, massacred the Arab village, Deir Yassin. Such terrorism continues this week with Israel’s horrid invasion in Lebanon, not made any less illegal by calling it a defensive response to Hezbollah.

Albert Einstein, Hannah Arendt et al in a letter to the NY Times (see below) accurately described the terrorist nature of the violent machine that was to control Israel. They said it was “a political party closely akin in its organization, methods, political philosophy and social appeal to the Nazi and Fascist parties.”

Those bands of Zionists massacred many defenseless Palestinian villages, which for hundreds of years had lived under Ottoman rule, and for at least 1500 of years before were home to native Arabs AND Jews (though a much smaller percentage). 750,000 to a million of the Arabs, the Palestinians, fled their homes at the gunpoint of Israeli terrorist guns.

That dislocation, that injustice, that crime against humanity is the root cause for all the problems in the Israeli/Palestinian/Hezbollah/Hamas/Syria conflict today. (With Iran, there is the additional layer of American subversion of internal politics for control of oil).

The further loss of territory in 1967, and later still, the many strategic Palestinian lands taken from them by the Israeli settlers—ALL illegal under numerous UN regulations—further entrench and strengthen those roots of discord.

Remove the thorn and the lion stops roaring. At the least: Israel--remove all illegal settlements, follow all UN resolutions, and there will be no Hamas or Hezbollah.

I personally know Palestinians chased by gunpoint from their homes. Even they—with this emotional experience fresh in their mind—accept the right of Israel to exist. They do not support the violent means, what we call the “terrorism” of those trying to right the wrong. Yet they yearn for justice, for re-compense. Others want their land back taken since 1967 or 1980 or 1990 or 2000.

Without at least this level of justice, forget it. There will be much worse catastrophes there, and because of that, all over the world.

Then it won’t matter whom you call “terrorist.”

PS Now we know why Israel wants nukes and all the military might they have. It’s the same reason Lebanon needs it (to prevent such Israeli monstrosities as occurred this week and in the 1980’s). It’s why Iran and Syria want it. Why should one country have it and not another? Oh, because they are countries that support “terrorists” namely, the unorthodox defenders of a cause that is just—the reclamation of illegally taken lands by Israel with the support of the United States. Might makes right when it’s wearing the right colors, and when there’s so much more of it than on the side that opposes it.

PPS A logical retort from the “other side” to a question in a recent Louisville Courier-Journal editorial Terrorist provocation, “Those who have clucked about a "disproportionate" Israeli response might ask themselves what government anywhere would accept such murderous provocations without delivering a powerful response” would be “what group of people could remain passively submissive to the initiators of murderous provocations?”

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1948 letter of protest against Israeli 'fascists', 'terrorists'

A Letter To The EditorHANNAH ARENDT, ALBERT EINSTEIN, et alThe New York Times, 2 December 1948Among the most disturbing political phenomena of our times is the emergence in the newly created state of Israel of the “Freedom Party” (Tnuat Haherut), a political party closely akin in its organization, methods, political philosophy and social appeal to the Nazi and Fascist parties. It was formed out of the membership and following of the former Irgun Zvai Leumi, a terrorist, right-wing, chauvinist organization in Palestine. The current visit of Menachem Begin, leader of this party, to the United States is obviously calculated to give the impression of American support for his party in the coming Israeli elections, and to cement political ties with conservative Zionist elements in the United States. Several Americans of national repute have lent their names to welcome his visit.It is inconceivable that those who oppose fascism throughout the world, if correctly informed as to Mr. Begin’s political record and perspectives, could add their names and support to the movement he represents. Before irreparable damage is done by way of financial contributions, public manifestations in Begin’s behalf, and the creation in Palestine of the impression that a large segment of America supports Fascist elements in Israel, the American public must be informed as to the record and objectives of Mr. Begin and his movement.The public avowals of Begin’s party are no guide whatever to its actual character. Today they speak of freedom, democracy and anti-imperialism, whereas until recently they openly preached the doctrine of the Fascist state. It is in its actions that the terrorist party betrays its real character; from its past actions we can judge what it may be expected to do in the future.Attack on Arab VillageA shocking example was their behavior in the Arab village of Deir Yassin. This village, off the main roads and surrounded by Jewish lands, had taken no part in the war, and had even fought off Arab bands who wanted to use the village as their base. On April 9 (The New York Times), terrorist bands attacked this peaceful village, which was not a military objective in the fighting, killed most of its inhabitants—240 men, women, and children—and kept a few of them alive to parade as captives through the streets of Jerusalem.Most of the Jewish community was horrified at the deed, and the Jewish Agency sent a telegram of apology to King Abdullah of Trans-Jordan. But the terrorists, far from being ashamed of their act, were proud of this massacre, publicized it widely, and invited all the foreign correspondents present in the country to view the heaped corpses and the general havoc at Deir Yassin.The Deir Yassin incident exemplifies the character and actions of the Freedom Party. Within the Jewish community they have preached an admixture of ultranationalism, religious mysticism, and racial superiority. Like other Fascist parties they have been used to break strikes, and have themselves pressed for the destruction of free trade unions. In their stead they have proposed corporate unions on the Italian Fascist model. During the last years of sporadic anti-British violence, the IZL and Stern groups inaugurated a reign of terror in the Palestine Jewish community. Teachers were beaten up for speaking against them, adults were shot for not letting their children join them. By gangster methods, beatings, window-smashing, and wide-spread robberies, the terrorists intimidated the population and exacted a heavy tribute.The people of the Freedom Party have had no part in the constructive achievements in Palestine. They have reclaimed no land, built no settlements, and only detracted from the Jewish defense activity. Their much-publicized immigration endeavors were minute, and devoted mainly to bringing in Fascist compatriots.Discrepancies SeenThe discrepancies between the bold claims now being made by Begin and his party, and their record of past performance in Palestine bear the imprint of no ordinary political party. This is the unmistakable stamp of a Fascist party for whom terrorism (against Jews, Arabs, and British alike), and misrepresentation are means, and a “Leader State” is the goal.In the light of the foregoing considerations, it is imperative that the truth about Mr. Begin and his movement be made known in this country. It is all the more tragic that the top leadership of American Zionism has refused to campaign against Begin’s efforts, or even to expose to its own constituents the dangers to Israel from support to Begin.The undersigned therefore take this means of publicly presenting a few salient facts concerning Begin and his party; and of urging all concerned not to support this latest manifestation of fascism.[signed]Isidore Abramowitz, Hannah Arendt, Abraham Brick, Rabbi Jessurun Cardozo, Albert Einstein, Herman Eisen, M.D., Hayim Fineman, M. Gallen, M.D., H.H. Harris, Zelig S. Harris, Sidney Hook, Fred Karush, Bruria Kaufman, Irma L. Lindheim, Nachman Maisel, Seymour Melman, Myer D. Mendelson, M.D., Harry M. Oslinsky, Samuel Pitlick, Fritz Rohrlich, Louis P. Rocker, Ruth Sagis, Itzhak Sankowsky, I.J. Shoenberg, Samuel Shuman, M. Singer, Irma Wolfe, Stefan Wolfe.—New York, Dec. 2, 1948

“Heil Schicklgruber!”? Depressingly, No

The big black swastika beckoned, like a satanic siren willing me to it. I’ve had William Shirer’s epic “The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich” for some years, but by happenstance ran across the thick 1000+-page tome as I was leaving to visit an ailing brother in Florida.

I must’ve read and heard about Hitler, the Nazi’s, the Holocaust, WWI, the Versailles Treaty, Mein Kampf, WWII ,etc., etc., 3500 times*. Actually thought I knew most of the origins of how such an evil monstrosity as Hitler could come to power. Yet such is the improbable magnitude of Hitler’s rise, his spell on a nation, and the horrors that followed, that I can almost never get enough of reading about, trying to understand the real truth about, how this came to be.

So I lugged the thick book on the flights to Ft. Lauderdale and delved into it.

Mr. Shirer digs deep, to Hitler’s grandparents, to his upbringing with a domineering civil servant father who pooh poohed Hitler’s interest in art, his bohemian poverty in Vienna as a young teen, his failure to get into the Art Academy, living with the outcasts, reading, and filling his mind with the anti-Semitic lies (as well as books of all kind) that he would take for truth as the cause of the poverty, the division of the Germanic peoples-- his brethren of superior Aryan blood--with divine right to rule, and to rule with the Nietzschian iron fist, then his joining the German Army in WWI, his meritorious service until their surrender, which surrender Hitler, the industrial corporate and military elite ordered then falsely blamed on the “November Criminals,” the combination of the forward thinking political leaders who sought a new democratic German Republic, and who were back-stabbed by the military leaders, who wanted to run the show along with the old monarchy and industrial elite.

He then follows Hitler’s accidental arrival at the German Worker’s Party meeting where about 17 showed up, this the future Nazi party, which a shrewd, calculating and hard working Hitler would, over the next 10 years, forge into the beast it would become. He did it scientifically, learning from past failures, that any new political movement must get the approval of traditional power centers, like the military, the monarchy, the industrial elite, in order to get the masses to buy in. He learned from the failed Beer Hall Putsch, that force would not work, that he must succeed through the Constitutional way—the VOTE. He learned the psychology of controlling the masses, of propaganda, and he was tenacious in sticking with his vision.

While there were many twists and turns that would have prevented Hitler’s ascent, there are two that stick out:

1) His father, Alois, was an illegitimate child who for his first 39 years bore his mother’s name, SCHICKLGRUBER. While the probable father, Johann Hiedler (later changed to Hitler), married the mother 5 years after Alois was born, he never legitimized him. After the mother (Hitler’s grandmother, Anna) died Johann disappeared for 30 years. Then, at 84, he resurfaced to testify before a notary in the presence of three witnesses that he was the father of Alois Schicklgruber, probably to help him get a share of an uncle’s inheritance. The parish priest scratched out Alois Schicklgruber and put in Alois Hitler, the father who 13 years later sired Adolf…Hitler, not Schiklgruber.

We must understand, as Shirer says just how important this last minute name change was to history. “There may not be much or anything in a name, but I have heard Germans speculate whether Hitler could have become the master of Germany had he been known to the world as Schicklgruber. It has a slightly comic sound as it rolls off the tongue of a South German… 'Heil Schicklgruber!’? It is a little difficult to imagine.”

2) The Great Depression. By the late 1920’s the new Democracy in Germany was finally starting to work. Inflation and the Versailles Treaty dictates were both easing, people started working, saving and living well. Then, the Great Depression hit and wiped it all out. Like everywhere else, but probably even worse in Germany because of its debts, the economy tanked. This alone provided the opportunity for Hitler and his Nazis to ply with propaganda upon a susceptible, suffering people their destiny to rule as a superior German race, and blame the current democratic republic, the Jews and internationalism (as opposed to strident German First and ONLY nationalism) as the scapegoats preventing their rise.

And I’m only 100 pages through.

*I actually worked this out: from the time I first heard of him, oh about 12 years old, then studied in earnest at 16-17, I figure I must have thought, read, mused, or analyzed this situation AT LEAST twice a week. I am now 51, 51-17=34, 34 X 52 x 2 = 3536. Is this manic on my part? May be, yet all that transpired is still so hard to believe…even harder that something equivalent could ever occur again—that it more than intrigues me, it re-awakens that old adage: humanity that does not learn from history is doomed to repeat it.

Another Political OUTRAGE!

10 kids die DAILY from GUNS yet 188 Republicans and 42 Democrats killed a trigger lock mandate that would save them. Our lawmakers have once again sold out to the special interests that fund this bribery. That is, they vote the way the interest group wants to the exclusion* of the greater public interest (in this case FOR the gun lobby and AGAINST innocent children) and thereby get money and power in return.

[*This is the key part of the equation that makes such vote-peddling rise to the “bribery” level. There are undoubtedly examples where the public interest position dovetails with the moneyed one, but this is clearly not one of them].

Sure both parties are guilty; but for the past 25 years it’s been pretty much a Republican show, and they have received the lion’s share of the political grease, perhaps 75% to 25% in keeping with the famous Enron donation percentage. But why quibble, this blatant abuse is a key reason that so many Americans: 1) distrust our political system, b) hold those running it in such low esteem and c) refuse to vote in elections that they view as an exercise in futility.

Rep. Marilyn Musgrave, the Colorado Republican who made this proposal, said that locks on weapons don’t prevent the slaughter of children, they only make "personal protection more costly." In a piece of convoluted logic that is totally ignore the facts, she continued, "Many things around the home are dangerous when used without proper instructions or supervision. But it is not the government's job or responsibility to mandate every conceivable protective mechanism imaginable."

So tamper-proof aspirin bottles are well within government’s rightful sphere of consumer protection, but GUNS are not?!

If this wolves-guarding-the-henhouse system of ours is “democracy” then why kill so many Americans and Iraqis to force same upon them?

Rfd 7/10/06

PS This is NOT a gun-banning argument. I would stand by the NRA should a real threat materialize to ban guns. But reasonable restrictions, safety measures, etc. that better protect the public are just and right. They are not the “give ‘em an inch they’ll take a mile” step to gun elimination.

How Horses Schtup

So Phil, what does the “LF” mean by the $60,000?” I asked. “That means you must pay the money when the mare (the female horse) has a foal (a baby horse) and it stands on its legs.” Phil (not his real name) was showing me the horse farm’s brochure, which was top drawer, high-glossed perfection, the kind where you can see you fingerprints. Beautiful Bluegrass sunsets, white fences and…horses. Spectacular!

I began to wonder about this horse breeding business in a way I never really thought of before—the mechanics of how they get the stallions to “perform” so many times. (Phil said the studs went at it practically non-stop).

“Hmm, so do they have to ‘stimulate’ the stallions?”

“No, they’re pretty much ready.”

“Well, is there much of a courtship, I mean, is the female just as ready to, uh, copulate?”

“First we put a ‘teaser’ in there with a mare to see if she’s ready to mate.”
“A teaser?”

“Yeah, we bring another male in the breeding barn and see if the mare is receptive.”

“And then you take the ‘teaser’ horse out and bring the stallion in?”

“Right.”

“Hmmm, sounds cruel to the teaser horse. I mean, you get him all hot and bothered and then just yank him out. Do you get him a…substitute mare, a concubine, some kind of magazine at least?”

“Nah, they just go back to the field. Ernie is my favorite; he’s been at it a long time. He’s real cool, knows what to expect.”

“Okay, when you bring the stallion in to do his thing what’s that like?”

“Well, we have the barn, with padded walls, and put the mare and stallion in there together.”

“So-o-o-o, how long does it take for the parties to, uh, what, make love? Mount? Do it? Is there any foreplay, any romance? Do you have posters, soft music, hay-scented fragrances or anything to help get them in the mood?”

“Nah, it’s pretty much horse-rape, the stud just goes after her. Sometimes she’s easy, sometimes not. It’s over pretty quick.”

And that’s how future Derby winners are made, as well as the thousands more that just eat grass and look good in the fields and farms of our beloved Bluegrass.

Rfd 7/8/06

Devaluing America On the Third of July

It’s a real shame that on the eve of the Fourth of July, wherein we celebrate our nation’s highest ideals, our top political leaders attack them. Yesterday, Senators Mitch McConnell, John McCain and Lindsay Graham attacked the Supreme Court for insisting that our government follow not only its own laws (the Uniform Code of Military Justice), but also those of a binding legal treaty to which we have long been a signatory, the Geneva Accords.

Instead these Senators, along with President Bush, would have us try our military prisoners in secret courts, unilaterally developed by the president, which deny even the smallest amount of due process. It is so bad, so unfair that even the military lawyers object to the rank injustice. The accused have no right to be present for the trial or to see all the evidence against them. It is so bad that not a single case has been tried.

As Justice Stephen G. Breyer said, "Where, as here, no emergency prevents consultation with Congress, judicial insistence upon that consultation does not weaken our Nation's ability to deal with danger. To the contrary, that insistence strengthens the Nation's ability to determine -- through democratic means -- how best to do so.”

McConnell is concerned that American servicemen could potentially be accused of war crimes. But that is what treaties are all about. We therefore do unto others what we want, and through the treaties expect, in return. What McConnell demands violates fundamental fairness as well as national and international law, and as such is truly contrary to the spirit of the American ideals bequeathed by our forefathers.

And if you accept McCain’s argument that the decision “is somewhat of a departure…of people who are stateless terrorists” then you reject the very notion that we are in a war at all, for a state of war demands a concrete declaration against a defined other state. He, and Bush, cannot have it both ways.

Either we are at war, which Bush has declared since 9/11, wherein all prisoners are due the protections of our own law, the UCMJ, and the Geneva Accords, or we are not at war, and those prisoners are treated instead as common criminals in international courts of law.

It is anti-American to denigrate our inherent values and diminish our system of justice. Bush was wrong to have done so all this time. That is what the Supreme Court has said. Yet our leading Senators persist in making America less than America.

This, on the eve of the Fourth.

Rfd 7.4.06

A Response to a letter criticizing Senator Mitch McConnell on his vote against the anti-flag burning amendment.

With all respect I must risk your wrath as I know how you feel, but I must be truthful. This is the ONE, and about the only issue, upon which I agree with Senator McConnell. Think about it: the flag stands for the premise of FREEDOM, even to burn it to express one's displeasure with the government, the state or whatever one associates with the flag.

Is it a contemptible exercise? YES!! Is it dis-respectful? YES!! Does it fulfill ANY of Rotary's Four Way tests? NO!

Yet, that is what the flag stands for--the freedom to express an opinion in such distasteful means. And you know what--there are hardly ANY incidents of flag burning anyway---zilch, none. This issue is repeatedly brought forth by politicians seeking to rile the emotionalism of voters they hope will vote for them. There simply IS no problem of flag burning and even if there were, that would mean there are some serious problems in the country that must be addressed. Better to allow such venting than to squelch free speech, driving it underground to fester and ferment.

Another factor--an especially vital one to those who trumpet the Ten Commandments--is that to seek this kind of protection for a piece of cloth, the FLAG, is to IDOLIZE that object, thus VIOLATING THE SECOND COMMANDMENT..."Make unto thee no graven image..."

Rather than skewer McConnell look at the motives of those pushing this red herring amendment non-issue.

Sincerely, Richard

ps. I can and do criticize McConnell on his many votes against the greater public interest and FOR private/corporate greed. He represents much of what is wrong with our political system and with the ever increasing concentration of power and wealth in the hands of the few, at the expense of the many.

----- Original Message -----

Subway Notes

I take the subway whenever I want to get around NYC, and a Times to read while blending with my fellow riders. These news items infuriated me:

1) Estate Tax Repeal and Refusal to consider Raising the Minimum wage—The Republicans added to the repeal bill yet another tax break, this time to the timber industry, in order to sway 4 Democratic Senators to vote for the whole package. I’ll be clear: THE ESTATE TAX IS AN ESSENTIAL Democracy-protecting vehicle. It does more than raise money—it prevents the ever-accumulating massed wealth in the hands of the few, the aristocracy who controls the political process.


And that is EXACTLY what we’ve been seeing with the politicians in power the last 10 years. The influence peddling, the industry-writing-the laws and policies (Enron et al writing energy policy, the credit industry writing the Bankruptcy “reform” Act e.g.), the no-bid contracts, the bribes and giveaways to the well-connected this is ALL part of the CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH and power to the EXTREME DETRIMENT of our Republic.

America was founded on the ideal of democracy and equality—equality of opportunity, as well as of the protection of rights and laws. And the founders structured our system to prevent the hereditary aristocracy and vast inequalities of wealth of the European kingmakers and king-keepers from which they came. The Estate Tax is a check on that corruptive power, and its dilution is directly contributing to the corruption in Washington today. It is exactly as Franklin Roosevelt said, “Great accumulations of wealth cannot be justified on the basis of personal and family security … Such inherited economic power is as inconsistent with the ideals of this generation as inherited political power was inconsistent with the ideals of the generation which established our government.”

Any so-called free market capitalist should understand that no taxpayer is an island. It is ONLY through an intricate network of all citizens, from the laborer, the burger-flipper, as well as the professionals and the force of law that enable ANYBODY to make whatever fortune they do make

Teddy Roosevelt, the second to last truly great Republican President (Eisenhower was the last, NOT Reagan) said: “The man of great wealth owes a particular obligation to the State because he derives special advantages from the mere existence of government.” Roosevelt recognized that wealthy citizens were aided in their endeavors by government protection of wealth and property rights. And at NO TIME SINCE THE GILDED AGE has that been more true than today!

Yes, the exemption should have been increased—and it has been. An honest discussion can help determine the proper exemption amounts and the rates of taxation above that exemption. But the lies—DAMNED LIES—of the pro-repeal camp is sickening. Let them point to even ONE family farm lost from paying the tax. THEY CAN’T!! The tax only affected 2% of estates to begin with. And with reforms, those unfairly hit—a miniscule number—can be rescued without a wholesale elimination.

Hastert and company followed this gift to the rich by preventing a floor discussion on a much overdue raise in the minimum wage. When their shouts of “CLASS WAR!” begin in the next election cycle remember--THEY started it.



2) Bush Compares Iraq War to Hungary’s Uprising. That is the problem with America in a nutshell: the PRESIDENT, who theoretically represents the top of our society, makes such an UNEDUCATED, horribly flawed analogy betraying a complete lack of understanding of history, OR WORSE, intentionally lies about it to further compound his earlier lies that set about our war of conquest and control of Iraq and its oil fields.

In fact, Hungary’s uprising was only one of many in its thousand-year history against all its occupiers (the Mongols, the Turks, the Nazis) and monarchs (the Hapsburgs). In fact the Soviets “liberated” Hungary from the fascists after WWII. Of course the Hungarians wanted out from under Stalin’s cruel heel, and although their 1956 revolution failed it did compel their puppet leader to institute reforms—living standards raised and it remained in the Soviet sphere until Gorbachev dismantled the system in 1990.

In Iraq, if anything it is we, the USA, that is playing the role that the USSR did in Hungary and the Iraqis want nothing more than to be rid of us and our control. In Hungary a citizenry who for hundreds of years were fighting to rid the yoke of submission once again did so under Stalin. In Iraq, WE started the maelstrom, NOT THE IRAQI CITIZENS!!

But, hey, it’s a great sound bite…and with today’s Foxification of our corporate media that’s ALL that counts.

By time I climbed the stairs out of the subway into the blazing sun, I had definitely seen the light. Thanks to God.

rfd

FORE-gotten: An Ode to the Woods

“You have quick hands, you must be a golfer,” the gentleman told me as my finger hit the ‘door open’ button just as the elevator was closing in on him.

“Nah, don’t play much…but I used to love it!” I then recalled those days of pine and glory. I’d light up an Antonio and Cleopatra and lay it on nature’s scalp before swinging away. (I got a special thrill from this, I guess because the cigar was a pure substance of the ground and this sort of connected me to mother earth as well—I GUESS). Then I’d look at those fairways that just begged for a down-the-middle drive and the tall trees and sand traps that inevitably ended up with it.

Yet the game for me was not about the score as I learned early on that golf was not my destiny. Instead, the game was about the sights, the sounds, the feel, even the smells. Who can’t appreciate GOLF AROMAS: fertilizer, fresh cut grass and clubhouse chips, dogs, nuts and nabs! And I couldn’t wait to prance across those cushy soft greens, which were noticeably harder in seasons of draught.

But the most satisfying of all—even better than sinking a long putt—was the sound of that perfect drive off my Ben Hogan wood. Whoosh…THWAP! and about one drive out of twenty the ball’d be where I always looked (I always thought positive): high, down the middle and respectably long. There was nothing that felt as good as a solid wood-on-ball strike… well, I do exaggerate here, there are LOTS of things that are better than that, but it was sweet, as you who golf know.

As a boy I occasionally went with my dad and his foursome. I loved to look at those duck-headed clubs, the shiny shades of wood kept in colorful covers of all varieties. I knew right then and there that one rite of manhood, other than wearing boxer shorts and pleated pants, would be the day I could take a controlled swing with that NUMBER ONE WOOD. Not the 3 or 4 woods, which were fun to swing because they were still woods, yet so much lighter. Nah, they were just tricycles. The big test was the DRIVER!

So it surprised me to learn that you can’t even FIND a wood today—they’re all big ol’ metal heads now. Space-aged titanium and alloys and grotesquely large heads that give golfers a larger sweet spot. Seems golfers are not traditionalists, they just really want the best chance of having the longest, and most accurate drives.

The woods have gone the way of the bat, replaced by today’s technology that either enhances performance or economy. Free markets apply to golf so there are no laws against this kind of progress, nor should there be. Yet like other areas of life where personal values check behavior and choice a collective desire to cherish tradition could bring back the wood.

I prefer to honor the THWAP! of tradition, so I will the wood. Alas, most will ping away and go for the win.

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*ASTERISK*

Today’s athletic feats, be they home run records, field goals or sprints—impressive as they are—must mostly be asterisked for if it isn’t space-age equipment changes, then it’s one of many evolutionary advantages today’s athletes enjoy vis-à-vis yesterday’s legends. These include vastly higher nutritional opportunities, a greater public placement of value (even national pride), hype and DOLLARS on athleticism, as well as a quantum jump in equipment options and technology.

Pooped and Pooped upon...

I’m tired—pooped (no sleep last night as an old fraternity brother was in for a funeral then a 6 am flight to NY, followed by a sultry pavement pounding day, ending with a Vegan eatery’s candlelit reading of a NY Times editorial, The Call of the Gun Lobby, that prods this output) —but simply MUST use whatever coherence I yet have to share this latest in a long, long line of Republican Congressional travesties (okay Republican friends, I see I’ve already lost you with that, but please read on).

With Bush railing against terrorists, with “national security his constant credo, the Republican-led House is set to make POLICE OFFICERS FELONS for sharing data on ILLICET GUN DEALERS all because of the GUN LOBBY, its influence, its MONEY. Additionally, since Bush has taken office he has hidden vital information about illegal gun trafficking—classifying it as a “state secret”—thus “putting the privacy of unscrupulous gun dealers over the safety of the public.” NY Time editorial http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/19/opinion/19mon1.html?_r=1&oref=slogin.

This echoes the UNBELIEVABLE post 9/11 sell-out that protected the ability of terrorists and other criminals to get guns by forbidding the sharing of gun purchase records between law enforcement agencies, then mandating the destruction of all such purchase. This severely undercuts Bush warnings of terrorism for how serious can that be if the same wolf-cryers are so cavalier about laws that are aimed at catching them……………………………………………………………………………………………………….,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, the terrorists……..slee-e-e-p, s-le-e-ep, YAWN, sl-e-e-e-e-e-e-p-pp…………y…….//,’;;;/..

NO! No, NO SLEEP---THAT IS WHAT I HAVE BEEN DOING-- WE have been doing!! WE ARE ALL ASLEEP. We go about our affairs, kid’s softball games, club golf foursomes, cookouts, business trips, backyard burgers, weddings, reunions, x-boxes, gardening, etc. etc. either unaware of the perverse sell out of our common interests to power and influence, all the illlllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll (that is my fingers laying on the l key as I doz-z-z-e off).

Just think of their brazenness, that if they are so openly on the take by making policemen FELONS FOR DOING THEIR JOB PROTECTING US!!!!!!, how much more are they selling us out on matters much further under the radar screen????

Republican friends—do me a favor—don’t vote Democratic, for you think I am just slamming the GOP. Well…. I AM, and have been slamming TODAY’S utterly corrupt Republican Party which has turned utterly Jekyllian from the honor of Ike, even, GASP, Nixon and the fine Gerry Ford.

NO, NO, NO, Democrats have NOT acted against the greater public interest to anywhere NEAR the same degree or on as many fronts as these Republicans. Some of you say “I agree that these guys are bad, but where is a Democrat I can truly trust to do better?” …………….Oh, the heck with it, good knight…er night. I’ve said ljpijkllll what I wanted t ol and what difference dossss ………..

Where are the Lions?

I recall a youthful Sunday in church when this warning from Jesus totally baffled me: “you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of me.” (MT 24:9, LK 21:17).

Huh?! Everybody was a Christian. In fact, it seemed to me to be just the opposite, if you weren’t a Christian, you were more likely to be scorned. I simply could not conceive of being in a threatened position by being a Christian. [However, years later I DID feel so threatened by being a follower of Jesus, which is NOT necessarily the same as being “Christian.” A subsequent essay will detail this experience].

Ever since, I had often wondered just how that kind of persecution would be and what turn of events would have to occur before we “Christians” would experience what Jesus was talking about. Would the butcher, the baker or burger maker suddenly scowl as a believer walked by? Would the cop on the beat or political powers that be clamp down on us a la Nazi Germany and the Jews?

The early Christians in Rome came to mind. Visions of lions devouring our faithful-unto-death bodies, releasing our souls to eternity, consumed me, even though I supposed the Christian-riddin’ death machine would more probably match the technology of the times. In America, and most of the world, cries of persecution are ludicrously false.

Yet hearing the shouts of many Christians today, one would think Christianity is under a severe state of siege. Cackles from the highest tabernacles cry “persecution!!” Behind every “Happy Holidays,” every Constitutionalist separator of church and state, every proponent of equal treatment for all people under the law lurks the lion of Christian persecution.

These pretensions are a total distortion of Jesus’ teachings and they demean the very real persecutions of the early Christians. In fact they are nothing more than a part of the plan to instill Christianity as the official state religion, wrongly entwining it within our government.

Hmmm, you might ask—“What’s wrong with having God direct our affairs, we even print our money with ‘In God We Trust’?” Here is the disconnect: First, God, as perceived by the deists who founded our country, and the Universal Moralists today, is truly universal in nature, as such God is God as God of all—Hindu, Muslim, Buddhist, Catholic, Jew, Protestant, Zoroastrian, even agnostic and atheist.

Second, the Christian crusade to revolutionize America is totally against the teachings, principles and life of Jesus himself, the namesake and central figure upon which Christianity supposedly exists!

Jesus would never “Lord” himself over anybody. He never sought to create a political order, a government or nation. Indeed Jesus said: “MY KINGDOM IS NOT OF THIS WORLD. If it were, my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jews. But now my kingdom is from another place." John 18:36.

On the contrary, today’s evangelicals have become a political monolith, the surging wind beneath the Republican Party and part of the GOP’s very strategy for dominance. Their leadership uses lies, deceit, raw power and military might, packaging Manifest Destiny and end-times prophecy to energize and enthuse its Evangelical base.

Why do the “Left Behind” Christians fail to see the vast difference between their actions and Jesus’ teachings? Jesus himself said that “…I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me." John 18:37. And that truth is nowhere more clear than in his Sermon on the Mount (MT 5:3-10), the TRUTH that God blesses those who put their faith in God, not man-made weaponry or ideologies, that God blesses the mournful, the gentle and lowly, those hungering for justice and work for peace, those who are merciful and whose hearts are pure, and finally God blesses those persecuted—TRULY persecuted—for righteousness sake. To all these will come God’s Kingdom.

Instead, the current leadership preaches division, fear and hatred. They constantly stoke the fires of the “Clash of Civilizations” between Islam and Christianity—a lie, a damned lie, if there ever was one. They preach fear and hatred of anything that varies with their own version of the truth, be it evolution, stem-cell research, animal rights, or equal human rights.

It is one thing to preach the Gospel (the TRUTH) to all nations as Jesus directed, but quite another to force upon any nation, including our own, a man-made religious doctrine about how to interpret, teach and live by that truth. Otherwise we end up with lies, damned lies, and falsities that discard truth, that throw science in the trash and exalts “biblical inerrancy.”

Subsequent essays will show that much of the Bible is allegorical as well as contextual, but suffice it to say that the mentality that IS NOW CONTROLLING our nation’s government is the same that denounced Galileo for saying that the universe did not revolve around the earth, but that the earth revolved around the sun.

Today, the lion devours truth, and it often wears a Christian mantle.

Rfd 6/18/06

POSTSCRIPT:

Kevin Phillip’s latest book, American Theocracy, foretells the disaster facing America should we fail to check the ruinous confluence of religious fanaticism, unprecedented national debt and the inevitable decline of oil. Phillips, a former REPUBLICAN strategist and Nixon Administration member, is a stickler for the lessons of history, and he compares the nearly exact scenarios that faced—and brought down—both the Dutch and the English in centuries past.

Life, Death, Rats and Bugs that go Splat!

Today began with Life and Death, and ended with it too. Life: a cool-aired morning run, under crystalline azure blue skies, vivid green leaves waving appreciation for their newly-budded life, bird songs of every feather, like that of a South Pacific tropical island. High overhead a circling hawk soared, its stationary wings riding the airwave in easy, wide arcs. Life, freely roaming, freely happening as I filled my lungs with the what’s still free*.

*[Let the corporate, capitalist privatizers find a way to control our air and we’ll REALLY BE IN TROUBLE! We MUST, WE MUST, WE MUST take back our water, and put it in the public domain. NO essential resource should be subject to private profit. Food is plentiful and there is much, much competition, so it is different. Oil and coal…well, now we know why many countries nationalize those industries, for their greater public good.]

The radio drive to work brings death: Iraq, railroad crossings and rats. Yes, rats on the local morning talk show with the local “balanced” talk show. Turns out a condemned property is overrun with that furry mammal, so cute and cuddly as a Beanie Baby, or as one of its cousins, the squirrel, but as a rat, well, they rate as only disgusting vermin.

A PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) spokesperson suggested capture and lethal injection as a much more humane way to dispose of the rats. The hostess was aghast—“But they’re RAT-T-T-S! Disgusting vermin, all we want to do is KIL=L-L them!” The talk show hostess was so, so dismissively condescending and incredulous that the young lady could even suggest a more humane way to handle the problem.

But she did not even stop to consider: a) it costs about the same, 2) it is HEALTHIER for humans, because once the rat is poisoned, it runs off to who knows where before it dies, to then rot, attract germs, maggots, YECH-H-H. Further, that approach and attitude is consistent with her stands, which seem to mirror most of the other “fair and balanced” camp, on everything from immigration to capital punishment: DEATH, death of the body, death of the spirit, and death of hope.

She and they would imprison illegals and, any who aid or abet them, and send them back, period. They believe in the death penalty, period. No deeper thinking, just raw eye for an eye emotionalism. The states with the HIGHEST murder rate are death penalty states, those with the lowest—countries as well—ban capital punishment. Immigration is likewise fraught with policy and fairness issues to make their “rack ‘em up” solution foolhardy as well as hard-hearty.

Well, a long time former employee, Brian Gibbs, passed away and I drove to the most northeastern tip of Kentucky, South Shore, on the Ohio border. Like all drives through rural Kentucky, it was just beautiful. Rolling green hills, trees, forests, and farmlands. One thing about a one-stop light town is that the funeral home is real easy to find. Inside was his family, who were all very appreciative of my visit.

Then, there was Brian. He had suffered a form of cancer and got a bone marrow transplant from his brother a few years ago. It affected his immune system and he started wasting away over the last 6 months. He was literally a ghost of the robust, smiling spirit that I knew—down to 100 pounds. I cried as I saw him lying in the box, with our trademarked bugler logo on the lapel of his suit. I tear up now thinking about that: such a great person, loyal to our company—he worked in FOUR different towns, wherever we needed him to go, and now we will be with him, where he goes.

All there seemed in good spirits, there was laughter and good cheer, as one might expect after a long awaited suffer-releasing death, the initial grief gone. The sense was that HE has graduated and is truly in the best place, blazing a path to welcome us some day. It was hope. It was peace. It was life. It was good.

Said my good byes and hit the road again. It was night now and there is one thing about driving in rural Kentucky on a spring/summer night: BUGS, BUGS, BUGS galore! Bugs of all sort, and with the high beam it looked like snow! But instead of the soft powdery landing of flakes, it was SPLAT! SPLAT! SPLAT on the windshield. Life free flying through the wild Kentucky night one second, SPLAT, life OVER the next.

Do bugs think? Perhaps they were returning from or going to a date. Maybe to eat, or just to sightsee. Like the trillions before them, little did they know they’d end up as window décor. No eulogies, no tears, no lover’s remorse. Just the chipped rubber blade of the next gas stop’s squeegee.

As I thanked my lucky stars that I was the squeeg-er and not the squeeg-ee I stopped at a CVC to get the only sensitive skin pre-electric lotion I know of. A very cute young lady rang me up…and after all that death, I never felt more alive!

Rfd 6/8/06

Guilty!

Guilty! I sit guilty, Lord. Guilty of blocking the light you’ve given me. Guilty of straying from the path you’ve paved for me. Guilty of desiring more the favor of friends and the comforts of culture than pressing forth the principles you’ve implanted within me. Guilty! Guilty! Guilty!

Guilty! Guilty of failing to figure out a way to reconcile Dale Carnegie with Gandhi. Our political leaders persist in gross hypocrisy, hiding behind You while changing money for favors, selling out the least of us and acting with all means of hate, selfishness and greed. Yet my defiance makes the voters of them, the supporters of their party, upset with me, draws a line between us, makes Your love impossible, or at least most difficult. How do I smile with family and friends, how do I keep from offending or afflicting them as I stay true to the mission of justice and truth that is me? How Lord, how?

Guilty! Guilty of shielding my mind to war abroad and poverty at home with the distractions of plenty and pleasure. Guilty of soothing my conscious with trifling donations, exchanges of peace at church, prayers and tsk-tsks at daily headlines—“34 killed in roadside bomb in Baghdad.”

Guilty of deadening my senses, of rationalizing my paradise while murder and mayhem I condone by my friendly-faced silence. Guilty of the chaos and corruption I support with my taxes and “let’s get along and go along” pleasantries instead of round-the-clock Canary in the mineshaft cries of “LOOK WHAT WE’RE DOING, LET’S STOP IT NOW!” But canaries die. Jesus died.

Guilty! Oh woe, don’t want to die, Lord. Just let me lie, lie in peace with my pleasing luxuries and remain, safely, guilty…

...And then the Jesusian refrain: “Whosoever will save his life will lose it, but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake will save it.” And what is “Jesus’ sake” if not the Beatitudes—to live peace, live justice, live charity, live mercy, wish well for friend and enemy alike, turn over the moneychangers’ tables, tear down the walls of hate and intolerance, tear them down!

Not for one minute more should we tolerate theft from within by those in Washington. Not for one minute more should we engage in pre-emptive war sold on lies, continued on more lies. Not for one minute more should we sing “God bless America” while not also wishing that God Bless THE WORLD!

If I offend thee, I am sorry. If thou wouldst silence me, then deaf to ye shall I be. For I shan’t longer tarry with the work given me, so that from now evermore my guilt be set free.

To Kill a Mockingbird Meets Mr. Holland's Opus

A couple of weeks ago Judith asked if I would help out at the church tonight. My task, and one of only two reasons I was looking forward to the occassion, was to pour the wine…my cup included.

The other motivation: Reed Polk, as captivating and motivational a speaker as you could ask for. I have had the pleasure of knowing Reed through Rotary over the last few years. But until tonight I had no idea he grew up with Harper Lee ("Nelle"), author of To Kill a Mockingbird, in Monroeville, Alabama. In answer to a question, Reed says that he saw nothing in Harper that would suggest she would write her masterpiece. She was 10 years his senior and attended his church, where his father was the minister.

Now this is no small coincidence for me as To Kill A Mockingbird is my all-time second favorite movie (North by Northwest is numero uno!). Les and I were studying for law school finals and we heard it was playing at the student center. So we took a break to watch it and WOW! Perhaps it is because I went to law school for idealistic reasons, but seeing this movie was a defining moment in my life.

Turns out that awesome actors aren’t just born—they WORK it. Reed told me that the few weeks prior to shooting Gregory Peck went to Monroeville “undercover” as a homeless man. He had a tattered shirt, torn pants and a fake beard, and showed up at Reed’s church. The deacons were wary, but Reed’s father waved this itinerant—and insistent—hobo in. When alone with Mr. Polk, senior, Peck stood tall, ripped off his beard, extended his hand and said, “I am Gregory Peck and I want you to tell me everything you can about Mr A.C. Lee,” who was Harper’s father and the inspiration for Atticus Finch (Harper was Scout, Atticus’ daughter). He was a lawyer in real life and also taught Reed to play golf.

Harper said of Mr. Peck, "Gregory Peck was a beautiful man. Atticus Finch gave him the opportunity to play himself." Peck had a grandson named Harper, for her.

Truman Capote was Dill, the boy in the novel who spent summers with the Finch’s neighbor and who in real life became best friends with Harper. In fact, Truman encouraged her during her writing of To Kill a Mockingbird, and later, she encouraged his writing of In Cold Blood.

Reed tells of meeting Truman on the golf course back in the late 60’s down in Ole Miss. He told Truman that he was a new minister and used In Cold Blood as an example in his sermon to which the high-pitched effeminate voiced Capote cried “Jesus Chri-i-i-s-t!” Reed explained that just as the two criminals went to that rural Kansan house with mistaken hopes of finding fortune, many come to various churches with promises left unfulfilled. Again Capote cried, “Jesus Chri-i-i-s-t!”

[GO SEE “Capote” if you have not done so. Phillip Seymour Hoffman as Truman Capote is absolutely incredible!]

Afterwards, during the reception, as I am pouring—and drinking—the fruit of the vine, FERMENTED of course, this is an Episcopal church after all—Reverend Sally’s husband, Dick, tells me of his prior career as a high school music teacher. His stories reminded me of Mr. Holland’s Opus, with Richard Dreyfuss, and sure enough, when he retired the school had a huge party with a banner as in the movie. He was in actuality a true-life example of Dreyfuss' portrayal of Mr. Holland, tears and all.

Life does imitate art—wait a minute, that’s reversed. But maybe not. As Reed exhorted us, in order to reach our goals we need only DREAM our painting, then PAINT OUR DREAM!

Rfd 5/18/06

Politics and Personal Relationships

Heart over head or head over heart—how shall I be ruled? I ask this question on election eve where I have 3 very good friends vying for the Lexington mayoral race. One, the incumbent Teresa Isaac, fits squarely within both heart and head. That is, she shares the same liberal philosophy as I and we and our families are lifelong friends.

Jim Newberry I know from our law school days and our tenure on the NCCJ board together. Jim is a conservative Democrat and a friend, so it is somewhat difficult to decline my support for him in favor of T.I. (but not too much so as he opposes city takeover of the water company).

Bill Farmer on the other hand is a real quandary: he is a strong conservative Republican AND a very close friend, my younger brother’s best friend. He even threw my engagement party, so giving precedence to my political head over my personal heart is difficult.

Yet--and this is where the ballot meets the box—Bill’s eager support for his party makes him equally complicit with the lockstep Republicans in Congress in what I view as the destruction of our democracy.

Like most liberals I believe in government: a) that benefits the greater public interest (welfare, health care, social security, housing, education, etc.), b) is honest and transparent and not beholden to special interests, much less outright bribes, c) operates in a multilateral fashion and does not engage in counterproductive, immoral pre-emptive war, d) that respects the separation of church and state. I truly and to the depths of my soul think the Republicans have over the last 25 years acted in near total opposition to ALL these principles and as such against most of what I hold dear.

So even a brother or sister, were he or she to run under the GOP banner, I could not support. Odd, I now understand why brother fought against brother in the Civil War. In essence, this is what I told Bill during our frank conversation.

Yet, I have now come to the realization that it is the HEART that should take priority in ALL circumstances. That is, no matter what my gyrations, no matter what logical and to my mind morally right arguments I may weave to buttress my philosophies, the political wheel will roll on as if I did nothing. Thus, “God give me the serenity to accept that which I can not change” is the tranquilizer that quells my political passions of late.

When Bill called this afternoon to get permission to quote my opposition to Newberry’s proposed sales tax increase, I would certainly have done so, but for the appearance of entangling our business. I DO oppose such an increase, so it would be honest. And I could look my liberal friends in the eye and say, “look, does it REALLY matter, he’s my friend, and in any case I will always stay true to my philosophy. Who knows, it may even rub off on him. As my Uncle Willy always said, you catch more flies with honey than you do with salt!

So I joke and laugh and cry and hug my conservative friends and family—all the while believing that the structure they support is stifling our nation. Yes, it’s important, yet I sense that try as I might, all my huffing and puffing won’t blow that house down.

Still, as my heart overflows my head recalls: “most people stop when they’re tha-a-a-t (thumb and forefinger spaced one inch apart) far away.”

Where the spirit leads, I will follow.


Rfd 5/15/06

Toast

A huge advantage to losing 35 pounds and being dead-on the “ideal” weight for my age and size is that I can eat bread again. Not that avoiding it did any good for as I fastidiously avoided any starchy carb I watched my weight steadily climb from 175 to 200 over a 5-year period. I was running and exercising as well, yet still my girth grew.

And now I know why: Diet Coke, or more precisely ANYTHING with Nutrasweet (Aspartame) or Splenda (Sucralose). You can see a photo of me from that period and note the “aspartame puff” as I call it. I attribute much of my weight loss from this elimination of all diet drinks. These artificial sweeteners make you GAIN weight by slowing your metabolism and reducing your brain’s secretion of seratonin.

PLEASE, for YOUR health, and anyone you care about—QUIT ALL DIET DRINKS AND Aspartame and Sucralose specifically. They also affect your neurology, decrease your energy level, create learning disorders for youth and cause cancer. [Please refer to my blog article for a detailed history of aspartame
http://peacecow.blogspot.com/2005_07_01_peacecow_archive.html].

I went cold turkey on not only aspartame, but also all meats—chicken, beef, pork (I still eat fish, but very sparingly)—and anything with hydrogenated oils, like basic peanut butter, margarine, crackers AND I limited my total calories to under 2000 a day.

I re-discovered whole, natural foods like nuts and grains and veggies and fruits as well as new-fangled choices like soy bologna, vegenaise, tempeh and tofu. And I mustered up all the courage I could to actually buy…BREAD! Wow—I was really living on the edge now—whole loaves of BREAD, on my counter and in my fridge.

Now I don’t get ordinary bread. Whole wheat, or spelt only. And I bought a new toaster, a spiffy Cuisinart 2-slot toaster--$39.99, with a digital dial, I couldn’t wait to have my first toast in many a year.

But it was quite by accident that I discovered the IDEAL toast, which for me is crunchy and nearly black. It was night and I was hungry so I plopped a couple of slices in and set it at level 8. But I fell asleep. So the next morning I saw the toast and instead of throwing it away I wondered what would happen if I re-toasted it at a lower setting, 2. Now I always keep a couple of slices "in the holster" ready for the second go-round.

Wow—that wonderful browned-bread aroma filled the house; only freshly ground Starbucks coffee smells better than that! The toast was perfect. I eat one slice at a time, slathered thickly with vegenaise, mustard and the soy bologna—my newest, bestest buddy!

Crunch, crunch, crunch…ah-h-h-h!