“When you go to the Middle East, you see immediately how people are imprisoned by history.”

4 November 202314 November 2023 patmcgLeave a comment

I keep trying to explain this Israel-Hamas war to my kids, and it’s really so caught up in the past, both near and distant. Repeatedly, one side’s autonomy, safety, and identity is violated by the other. And it’s piled up over time to the current conflict.

The Daily tackles this history in their 1948 episode, describing an “arsenal of memory” that gets “chiseled in stone” to define each side’s grievances.

When you go to the Middle East, you see immediately how people are imprisoned by history, the especially in Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The Daily

It’s understandable but tragically and obviously unhelpful.

Yes, the past is full or pain and terror. Don’t get stuck in it – move past it like any wise person would do.

Right actions for the future are the best apologies for wrong ones in the past.
Tryon Edwards, theologian

And yes, it can be done.

Ireland put a similar conflict behind it: a centuries-old conflict of two intertwined groups of people involving religion, culture, territorial disputes, terror, violence, and injustice.

They ended up with a two-state solution: Ireland and the UK. There is peace and prosperity. People move freely between the countries. There are no checkpoints, walls, vengeance deaths, or bombings.

There are pubs and museums, a peaceful countryside, and a booming film industry.

The past is recognized and understood but no longer used to justify self-destructive, violent behavior. The “Troubles” are gone, but not forgotten.

The world needs to step up and make this happen in the Middle East. Doing so will require setting aside some fear, which is just a mind killer, but a peaceful solution can happen because it has happened elsewhere.

Quotes · The World

“I don’t understand the purpose of war.”

10 October 20236 November 2023 patmcg1 Comment

I talk about the news sometimes with my daughter, who is in middle school.

Today I told her that Israel was attacked, and hundreds are dead. I played the The Daily for her in the car. It described unarmed people being indiscriminately mowed down by gunmen, people being abducted, families being intentionally ripped apart.

And that’s just day one.

It was a hard thing to have to play for my daughter, but I want her to know what people are capable of at their worst.

She listened silently for about 20 minutes. When we stopped the car, you could tell she was moved and deeply saddened. She pretty well boiled it down in a few words.

That’s a sad story. I don’t understand the purpose of war.

Well said, my friend.

She asked why this happened, and I tried to explain it: all the history and terrible conditions and politics and religion and blah blah blah blah blah. Here eyes glazed over.

Because it didn’t make sense to her.

Because, it really just doesn’t make any fucking sense. Nobody wins this thing.

Intentionally killing scores of unarmed people at a music festival is not a military operation and can never be justified no matter how twisted your logic is, Hamas, you idiots. By now most of the people who did killing are dead too, certainly burning in hell if there is such a thing.

Sometimes a war is necessary, but this one seems to have gotten off to a really shitty start even with that framing.

Good luck, everyone in Israel and Gaza.

I really hope there is a Good Friday Agreement somewhere in your future so you can one day make some sweet tunes with your family instead of cutting off the water supply and burying bodies.

Quotes

“Your task is not to foresee the future, but to enable it.”

27 August 202327 August 2023 patmcgLeave a comment

I love the proactive attitude behind this quote from the author of The Little Prince.

Your task is not to foresee the future, but to enable it.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Life imitates art. The Little Prince is narrated by a pilot who crash-lands his airplane. And sadly enough, the author himself crashed – and died – while flying an airplane in France a year after the novel’s publication.

But the author did enable his future, even under Nazi-occupied France. It just took some patience – The Little Prince was published in his home country only after liberation from the Nazis.

The World

“You can’t stay in Afghanistan forever.”

17 August 202118 August 2021 patmcg1 Comment

Leaving Afghanistan sucks, but it’s also the right thing and took courage.

“Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”
Not Einstein

What would you change about the following narrative?

9/11 attack on the US from an Afghanistan-based terrorist group
Invades Afghanistan, topple the government, and occupy with an international security force
Provide security, promote democracy, invest in education and infrastructure
Keep nation building
Keep nation building for another year, more dead
Keep nation building for another year, more dead
Keep nation building for another year, more dead
Keep nation building for another year, more dead
Keep nation building for another year, more dead
Keep nation building for another year, more dead
Keep nation building for another year, more dead
Kill Osama Bin Laden
Keep nation building for another year, more dead
Keep nation building for another year, more dead
Keep nation building for another year, more dead
Keep nation building for another year, more dead
Keep nation building for another year, more dead
Keep nation building for another year, more dead
Keep nation building for another year, more dead
Keep nation building for another year, more dead
Keep nation building for another year, more dead
Keep nation building for another year, more dead

It’s not a great story, is it?

It’s unfortunate and ugly, but it was time to go. Would another year of nation building have helped? Were things getting any better?

I don’t doubt the good intentions of the war, and I don’t doubt the skill and courage of the brave people who fought it. I thank our soldiers for their service and give them my utmost admiration for sticking faithfully to the mission despite it’s impossible challenges. 🇺🇸

I hate that the ugly Taliban is taking back over, but their deeds are between them and their own god now. The US Army is out of that equation.

You can’t stay in Afghanistan forever.
War Machine

Here’s a clip from a pretty relevant movie that came out 4 years ago about a war that had already been going on for 12 years. Despite some serious overacting by Brad Pitt, it’s a pretty damned good movie and dead on. It shows a good and capable man trying to win an impossible war.