Jewish Divide Over Trump Very Telling

 

Here’s a news flash that the media thus far has refused to mention, there are many Jews who support President Donald Trump. The media has been quite vocal of those Jews who are vehemently protesting the Trump Presidency. Probably the most telling example has been the Senate hearings to approve his Ambassador to Israel, David M. Friedman. We will gladly grant the media that President Trump’s choice for Ambassador to Israel of David M. Friedman is a novel appointment when compared to previous appointments made by all the previous Presidents throughout Israeli history. There have been Ambassadors, Middle East Special Councils, Palestinian Israeli Peace Ambassadors and all sorts of other appointments made concerning Israel and her Arab neighbors plus the fact that American Ambassadors to the United Nations often have to interdict in matters concerning Israel, especially in United Nations sanctions against Israel often brought by Arab and European nations at the behest of the PLO or Palestinian Authority (PA) which have more often than not been vetoed by the United States Ambassador.

 

All of these past officials have more often than not been career Foreign Service Officers (FSOs) with the remainder have been political appointees. There have been more than a few of the most recent Israeli Ambassadors and Special Appointees who have been Jewish and thus touted as being most obviously as pro-Israeli. Unfortunately, this has not been the case. Some in particular, Thomas R. Pickering, Martin Indyk and Denis Ross have been some of the most antagonistic to the Israeli cause. Both Martin Indyk and Denis Ross were said to be very much favorable to Israel because of their being Jewish which is like claiming that someone had to be favorable to illegal immigration across the southern border because they were Hispanic, an insult and very likely false. Indyk and Ross attempted to force Israel to make concessions in exchange for empty promises which had been given by the PA before and never acted upon or immediately broken often with an in-your-face attitude. David M. Friedman is a different Jew, he is also a Zionist. This is a first for an Ambassador to Israel and many Israelis are expecting great things if only our leaders can be bold, even brash for a change. Some here in Israel have placed David M. Friedman as being to the right and more Zionist than Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu or most of the other Ministers of the Knesset. Additionally, Israelis have begun to believe that President Trump will be good for Israel providing Israel acts good for Israel.

 

Additionally, Orthodox Jews mostly voted for President Trump over Hillary Clinton while Democrat Jews voted almost universally for Hillary Clinton and are extremely upset by her loss and screaming mad over President Trump. During the hearings for Ambassador David M. Friedman there were Jews disrupting the hearings blowing Shofars. Traditionally the sounding of the Shofar other than as part of religious observance has been used as a warning sign often used as an alarm that enemies were advancing or other calamity. Sounding the Shofar at the hearings for the new Israeli Ambassador they were meaning that a calamity was occurring threatening Jewish lives. Their actions were over the top as no lives were being endangered and no emergency was coming for Jews and if anything this appointment was going to be good for Israel, a new page in appointments of advisors to Israel.

 

This brings us to what for us is one of the saddest things we will ever discuss, Israel and the American Jewish left. Often at demonstrations denouncing Israel some of the most virulent demonstrators will come from leftist, liberal Jews. These Jews are more attached to their leftist principles than they are to Torah and Israel. These are Jews who will never consider making Aliyah and were the members of our Synagogue who when we made Aliyah asked us why in the world we would want to go live in Israel of all places. They were stunned that somebody they knew would do something which was such an anathema to them. These were the same members of the Synagogue who had to get past the horror that we might actually be Republicans as we had admitted. Many initially thought we were joking and trying to be funny and some when they realized we actually were Republicans never spoke with us again. Israel has actually become a divisive issue in the American Jewish community.

 

For Jewish Democrats it is a serious problem. There are still a goodly number of friends to Israel remaining in the Democrat Party but their numbers are diminishing and some have actually needed to go underground in their support. Pro-Israel Jews in Reform Synagogues have to act like the Marranos during the Inquisition where they practice their Judaism silently and with little visible evidence at home and were good Catholics in public even to going to church daily and every action including rosaries and confession to avoid the Inquisition and the tortures and death sentences which would be their punishment if their being a Jew was ever rooted out. These new Marranos support Israel but must do so while in conversations in Synagogue or at Temple functions, as most Reform Synagogues refer to themselves as Temples; something less Jewish in its identity, these Jews either remain silent on issues Israel or denounce those sensitive issues such as Bibi Netanyahu, the greatest force of evil in the Middle East.

 

 

For far too many American Liberal Leftist Jews, Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu has been the reason why President Obama was unable to make peace between the Palestinians and the Israelis and had Netanyahu simply followed the instruction, the orders from on high at the Oval Office, then Israel would have peace. There are no arguments which they would ever accept and they honestly believe that the Arabs would be happy if only Israel would surrender everything to the Green Line and half of Jerusalem and all the terrorism and demands would end. Never mind that Mahmoud Abbas refuses to even say, let alone guarantee, that the terror and violence would end with such an agreement, he has instead stated that any agreement would be but the initial step to the removal of the Zionist entity and that all resistance, that would be terrorism, would continue until the Zionist entity has been eradicated and the Jews defeated completely. Never mind that in Gaza there is Hamas which has promised to murder every Jew on Earth which includes these American Leftist Jews who happily claim that Hamas can be reasoned with. One would think with the history of the Jewish People, especially their recent history, specifically since the last century, that when some group of extremists claim they have designs for the complete annihilation of the Jewish People they would take things like that very seriously.

 

That Israel, and even additionally President Trump to the point of violence and lost friendships, have become the two most divisive issues in the Jewish community is the saddest commentary one could imagine. Israel, the hope and the prayers of Jews for thousands of years now a matter for derision and splitting the community is beyond sadness. Israel and Jerusalem, the final desire of every Seder is, “Next year in Jerusalem” and Psalms 137, Song of Babylon, which demands that as a member of the Jewish People, Jerusalem must be our first love and, allow me to quote, “If I forget you, O Jerusalem, may my right hand forget its skill (strength). (And) May my tongue cling to my palate, if I do not remember you, if I do not bring up Jerusalem at the beginning of my (chief and most important) joy.” Yet somehow Israel, and even the surrender of the Old City of Jerusalem and the surrendering of the Temple Mount and the Mount of Olives Cemetery, has become a sticking point, an issue for debate and for too many simply something too trivial to be bothered with when supporting those for whom Israel is a bother is the real issue. How can Jews unfriend other Jews or shun them in the Synagogue because they support Israel. They demand, ‘how can one support Israel’ which is simply just for those other Jews, those religious Jews, those Jews who are just too Jewish and the ones the anti-Semites hate. They believe that because they support the right causes and they rub elbows with the right people that should the anti-Semites ever get their dream again and Jews are hunted down that they will be granted exceptions because they are those good Jews. They do not realize that to an anti-Semite the only good Jew is a dead Jew. But these Jews would gladly sacrifice those Zionist crazies if it would advance their standing at the club, or even sadly their Synagogue. We hold some truths to be very troubling and beyond our ability to accept. How can there be an ingathering when so many Jews refuse to even accept the concept of a Jewish State, a Jewish People or of Hashem and instead view their Synagogue as just another social club. This makes one remember that a minority of slaves left Egypt with Moses and a similarly percentage returned after they were liberated from Babylonia by Cyrus the Great and the majority either remained in Babylon or migrated to the major cities of Persia.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Freedom of the Media was and is an Illusion

 

Freedom of the Media, the Press, was intended to mean that the media was allowed to take position opposing those in power. With President-elect Trump we have a complete rebirth of freedom in Media as the leftist media has been permitted total freedom in denouncing, condemning, delegitimizing and casting overt dispersion in such rapidity that the Maxim machine gun is jealous of their repetition rate against all items Trump. The only threat the American, and its twin of the European media and much of the western and developed world’s media, is facing is that largely, with few notable exception, is pure leftist progressive slant where anything which is not in line with their politically correct, censored, straight-jacket narrow view of the world is denounced as demonic, evil, Nazi-esque and potentially leading to censorship closing down all opposing views of the right wing. The media and their vociferous echo chamber of NGO’s, political advocates, full array of supportive leftist and progressive alternative media, and various leftist lobbyists all standing together making as much racket as the world might stand. That is one of the precious secrets of the Progressive leftists, they are all for one and one for all even more so than the Three Musketeers. This becomes evident in the one area where the left progressives have mastered something that the other end of the political spectrum has yet to even consider, let alone adopt.

 

Watch any demonstration for any leftist Progressive cause and you will soon understand how they get hundreds or more at every demonstration, universal representation. Go to an ecology rally against perhaps coal powered electricity plant in your city and there will be all sorts of ecology demonstrators including anti-nuclear power, pro-wind power, save the whales, clean our rivers, save the oceans, clean air and any other ecology cause imaginable. But that is not all. There will likely be others there who support other causes and are not particularly worked up about the ecology of the Earth and more concerned with the pro-choice, anti-death penalty, anti-racism, and even pro-Palestinian or BDS or other anti-Zionist, anti-Israel movements all there for one reason, the leftist you scratch my cause I’ll scratch your cause. Often at a demonstration for some cause there will be protest signs for other causes within the demonstration because if you protest one leftist Progressive cause, you are there representing all leftist progressive causes. And the mainstream will give favorable coverage with inflated numbers of protesters and enthusiasm and will take their pictures selectively attempting to only get the right standards despite others also on prominent display. Many will accuse me and ask how it is I know this. Well, once upon a time many years ago I was one of those liberals back when being a liberal meant keep the government out of my life, respect for all people, equality for all, live and let live, and, believe it or not, gun rights was not an automatic exclusion from the club. To be honest, the one cause which had tepid support was gun rights, but at least in those days it was not a cause which caused one to be disassociate and shunned.

 

Back then one went to every protest just as is the means today. There were people who would pay people to attend protests which were considered vital. These were often the protests against particular politicians or counter rallies to out shadow any right wing causes by having greater numbers at the counter rally thus making the coverage all about the liberal progressive cause which opposed the scheduled protest. Often the counter protest did not have any license or permit and actually be technically illegal but they were seldom forced to disperse and were given much freedom. The exception were the anti-war demonstrations which the government took a dim view and would use violent force to break up such demonstrations. This was back in the late 1960s and into the 1970s and with the times the position of the establishment changed as the left took command during the Administration and Presidency of Jimmy Carter. That was a turning point as from that point on the left progressive tours de force began a simple tactic, the just ignore everything between progressive majorities and just pick up right where the last front left off. This made for a force which became all but an inevitability which could never be opposed by anything the conservatives could establish.

 

This became evident when President Jimmy Carter simply picked up where President Lyndon Baines Johnson left off with the Great Society, affirmative action, wealth redistribution, ecology restrictions on industry through emissions and every other leftist progressive cause. Then there was a break for a dozen years of the Reagan and George H. W. Bush Presidencies. Then came President William Jefferson Clinton who continued expanding the progressive cause and then came another Republican, President George W. Bush, who was not so much a counter to the progressive causes than a slightly different approach in establishing big government programs which the “No Child Left Behind” program. This brought on the yet another rendition of ‘new math,’ ‘full word recognition’ and stressing minority contributions from the past replacing history with little mention of any contributions from white males and especially Judeo-Christian ethics and instead an anti-ethical education which removed any standard history of the United States and other Western histories which when mentioned it received condemnations of how it was exclusive not as meaning something exemplary but rather as racist, prejudiced and intolerant. Any traditional history was belittled and condemned by using modern day morality and equal rights viewpoints making everything from the past appear hateful and vengeful being racist, prejudiced and xenophobic. Making normative history where Christian, white male formed history such as the Founding Fathers were cast as hateful slave owners and thus not ethical or acceptable because such was unacceptable in these modern times and the European greats such as Da Vinci, Michael Angelo, Isaac Newton, Galileo and others were also intolerant, supremacist, racist, sexist and likely homophobic or full of other forms of hateful white supremacist views which would be condemned in today’s world. This version of history left much of traditional history untaught or presented as something to be rejected and spurned as horrible examples of a hateful past.

 

 

Some of such views are being presented in the media where past events are presented under a modern viewpoint and leftist microscope where anything which was acceptable back in history becomes unacceptable and regrettable as it fails to measure up to the modern ethos and leftist yardstick which was unheard of and did not exist when the history occurred. This method was designed and makes children ashamed of their past history and thus leaves them unattached to their past and because of their being separated and unanchored their views can be molded in such a manner as to overturn their ethics and allows them to be made to accept anything as one who has no past can be given any defined future. This is an actual method for disconnecting children from their parents, their history, their religious affiliations and anything which might define them as a continuation of their actual society and are instead given an entire redefined ethos which has nothing connected to their history and disconnecting them from parents and everything which would allow for a continuation of history and a continuation of the historic societal models. This is reinforced by the mainstream media which works using the identical redefined ethical framework leaving a youth which when they take the reins of power, they will start a society completely detached from past realities and all of history. The casting of all former history as evil and ruinous and without any worth was beautifully exemplified by President Obama when he returned the bust of Sir Winston Churchill as he refused to retain the visage of a colonialist, racist, evil, hateful individual and not the man who saved the world from Nazi Germany’s world conquest. This is indicative of the new morality that the mainstream media and education which are both completely under the thumb of the progressive, leftist rewriters of all history and religious anchors in order to create a brave new world where for all intents and purposes they could teach children that 2 + 2 = 5 as truth and the children would have no anchoring to know it was a lie. Thus is the prospect for the future in Europe, the United States and the remainder of western society, culture and the developed world should it remain under the sway of the progressive leftists whose remaking of society has actually been in progress under even the ‘conservative’ politicians since Theodore Roosevelt and shifted into high gear by Woodrow Wilson and accelerated by Franklin Delano Roosevelt (yes, a relative of Theodore) and moved along even faster by Lyndon Banes Johnson and the line held by Jimmy Carter and slight advancement by William Jefferson Clinton and George W. Bush and then taken airborne and breaking virtually every barrier by Barack Hussein Obama with the future remaining to be seen. The main reason for the apoplectic fits and near convulsive contortions by progressive leftists over the election of Donald Trump is they fear those who hold their religion as holy, their ethics as cemented in a tradition worth preservation, their history as ethical and who desire moderation in progress where changes are evaluated over time, instead of great leaps being taken blindly without looking back and burning all the bridges and even the castles and fields behind them assuring there is no chance of retrieving any morsel from our collective past as they are ashamed of their Judeo-Christian history despite it having been the basis for many positive developments.

 

They refuse to credit the Judeo-Christian ethics with the end of slavery instead blaming it for slavery, bringing about the Renaissance instead dwelling instead on earlier Church anti-science standings ignoring the truth that things changed and the fact that many of those precious progressive ideas they hold as sacred have their roots in the Judeo-Christian ethos that people are all equal in the eyes of Hashem and instead teach that religion was all about exalting white, male Christian superiority and all the evils which can be appropriated to such a viewpoint. The fact that history has been a progression of events and evolutions caused often by the very past which originally opposed change but with time softened and became champions of the progressive changes in society. The reason for the new view demonizing the past of the youths’ parents and ancestors and pressing that all their views which are actually the logical result of the Judeo-Christian ethics, they want to disposes the past and make the youth divorce their history and thus be pliable and moldable into whatever the latest untested theories for society the progressives can invent. Where this will lead is to an entire unanchored generation which will fall before any anchored group which has a strong history and religious anchoring who are willing to fight for their beliefs. These types will rule the day simply because, as the old adage goes by G.K. Chesterton (we realize that anything old, especially adages, is unacceptable and makes any argument unacceptable but tough), “When men choose not to believe in God, they do not thereafter believe in nothing, they then become capable of believing in anything.” This probably states why the progressives work so hard to disconnect the youth from their past.

 

Beyond the Cusp 

 

Republican Disarray After Trump, Only if They Blow It

 

There have been numerous articles attempting to discern exactly what the Republican Party will be like after its foray with the Donald. They try to figure what effects he is going to have on the candidates for the House of Representatives and the Senate as well as State races for legislatures and governorships. There are all different levels of panic to excitement. Some are excited thinking that the increased voters may mean a stronger voter turnout which will raise all candidates as these voters are most likely to vote for the party ticket rather than only voting for Donald Trump as that is the easiest path and these are lower information voters who are more likely to just pull the single lever for the Trump party rather than voting for each office individually, an occurrence the Democrat Party is more familiar with than are the Republicans. This is a new and untested ground for the Republican Party and more so than most will ever know. Has anybody actually bothered to ask the Donald if he is really willing to surrender control of all his companies and real estate interests for four or possibly eight years placing them in a trust where he will not be managing his holdings? I mean seriously now folks, can anybody see Donald Trump walking away from his wheeling dealing which is really what he lives for. Does he in the end really want to be President, or are we watching the dog caught the car by the rear wheel and now is stuck driving the car? He will be the center of attention between now and the end of his term should he actually prevail, something looking more certain as the clock ticks down to Tuesday. There is where the drama will peak and Trump will do the unthinkable and still hold the future of the Republican Party in his hands and he will play it for maximum exposure of the Donald before he makes the final fateful step which will astound most of the pundits, the media and the entirety of the Republican Party, win the day carrying the House of Representatives comfortably and give the Republicans a minimum of fifty-seven and possibly as high as 62 in the Senate. Yes, Donald Trump could be sitting in the catbird seat with a filibuster-proof Congress if the Republicans can find their way to work with him. Not to worry, they won’t.

 

Of course all this is pure conjecture but in one manner it would be wonderful to see a true and total Republican Congress with the same theoretical license to do whatever they can agree upon just as was the case for the Democrats for the initial two years under President Obama. Thankfully the wheels came off of that cart fairly quickly and before the world ended and the destructiveness was mostly repairable with Obamacare needing the largest repair, removal and replaced with a completely open system countrywide for all insurers with take and carry benefit for all plans. There could be options for tax breaks for companies paying percentages of employee chosen plans giving everybody total control. Returning to major medical plans with a basic plan required for any insurance that would cover Emergency Room, Trauma Center and major surgeries with rate of coverage set by a board of major hospital directors chosen every five years by the top five-hundred hospitals by some pre-set formula which would include their accepting Medicare and Medicaid pricing as set by the board and approved by Health and Human Services and the Senate also voting as if this were an actual treaty requiring a super-majority. This would guarantee bipartisan agreement. This base pricing could be used for a national defined plan which all insurers could use as their guideline for a general basic coverage plan.

 

The one part of such unilateral Republican control is there would no longer be the excuse by the Republican leadership of, we did not have the complete control of the House, the Senate, power to end filibusters or, their favorite, we did not have the White House. No more excuses and just let the Congress show the world what plan the Republicans really got! Turn them loose and let the legislation fly. Not to worry folks, they will hit a log jam within weeks, more likely days and even within hours or minutes. They would, in a word, choke. The main problem the Republicans suffer is the one thing Trump offers to teach them, bravado. The Republicans are afraid to lead, timid and only comfortable pointing out what is broken in their opinion and then lamenting their inability to do anything about the problems. Given total control they would continue to shuffle their feet, looking at the ground, mumbling senselessly, wandering around lost in the wilderness of their own making. They have no dynamic leadership. They did once under Newt Gingrich and the Contract with America, a plan. Imagine that, an actual plan laid out, defined and actually almost followed. Eventually the Republicans did what they do best and shot down their leader because the media picked him apart while they watched on playing the helpless damsel in distress sobbing over her miseries as their presumed White Knight was pounded into the mud by professional muckrakers. What leadership has the Republican leadership or the rank and file shown with their control of Congress as they have handed President Obama victory after victory with budgets including every item with every dollar as requested? One would have at the very least thought they might have, at the very least, demanded more money spent investing in improved care through privatization of the Veterans’ Administration’s healthcare system changing it to an insurance plan open to any and all insurers with guaranteed rates equal to Medicare system rates. This would have freed the veterans to receive care locally, virtually anywhere other than living in a log cabin in Nowhere, Montana. They might have fought to end the downward spiral in defense spending when compared with all the increases in Welfare, Food Stamps and Unemployment costs or demanded that $15.00/hr. minimum wage for military personnel and their pay scale to be based on a forty hour week plus ten hours overtime pay (trust this infantry veteran, most soldiers, especially the privates, work at least an average of well over fifty hour weeks with extra duties such as guard duty, going to the field, weapon training plus yearly qualifying, physical training plus annual testing and a myriad other additional often busy work). These would have been easy initiatives and would have placed a spotlight on some actual problem situations and not on men who claim to be women using any bathroom that fits their life-choices.

 

A complete Republican victory with Donald Trump as President would not necessarily be the disaster the media has painted. Remember, this is a media which has gone step-for-step with every single idea the Democrats have suggested and even initially carried the water for Obamacare and are now backing the Democrat plan of government run healthcare exactly the same that the following countries found to be impossible to afford; Britain, France, Canada, Germany, Russia and any other where the tax rate is under 80% of income with allowances for food, housing, clothing and transportation. When the government allows refunds for food, housing, clothing and transportation; they are dictating how you live and all but defining what you are permitted to spend on food, housing, clothing and transportation. Does such a system sound good to any regular-work-hard American? That is the European Plan that President Obama and a President Hillary Clinton are targeting for America and with a European level military unable to afford ammunition to train with. When we read articles reporting that NATO national military personnel are required to run around in training exercises yelling, “Bang, I shot you, you’re dead,” and that passes for training, we worry what is wrong with these countries. What is wrong is they are not responsible for their defense, the United States is responsible because as NATO defines itself it goes something like this; from each nation as they can provide, from the United States whatever is required to complete the task any NATO nation leaves hanging in the wind. Force the United States to train yelling, “bang bang, you’re dead,” will leave the Western World vulnerable to conquest using swords as swords are a superior weapon to a rifle without bullets, and any invader will have real rifles with real bullets and will not react by claiming, “you got me,” after a NATO soldier screams, “bang bang, you’re dead.” Trust us on this one, really.

 

The choice comes Tuesday, the counting will take the rest of the week unless the victory is definitive, the lawsuits another month or two and the appeals even longer. There is a possibility that the inauguration just might take place on the perfect Saturday, April 1, 2017, April Fool’s Day, and it will be the biggest joke, bet nobody will be laughing, they will be too darned sick and tired. Sick and tired of the wasted time, money and credibility. Sick and tired as the American Representative Constitutional Republic will have been assassinated and lying next to death’s door in desperate need of some serious reckoning. So sick and tired that it is doubtful she will receive the necessary attentions and restoration of faith in the system, the leaders, the nation any time soon. That is the saddest thing about this fiasco disguised as an election. The disgust may be made more palpable by the apparent lack of decency, competence, qualifications and general revulsion one or both candidates elicit from each member of the electorate, but they are not the source of the revulsion, just one more product of the end of America.

 

This was not the original target for the end of this piece, but we rarely end where we started. The disarray coming after this election will encompass both parties. They have each been laid bare for all to see the rotted core filled with the diseases of hatred for the other, distrust of all, the required demand for the lowest expectations, the lowest denominator as the norm and the lack of desire, nay, even ability to repair that which has been left to fall into disrepair. People will ask how things got here and the answer is an easy one. Just open your eyes and look around you and for all that is holy take off the rose colored glasses, the beer goggles, the fractured lensed party glasses and put down the weed, booze, drugs, sexting, or whatever consumes you that is in that little box you so feverishly share everything that amounts to the nothing that is your current life. Too many of us are lost and are too busy becoming even further lost to notice. We started down this road when our materialism surpassed our reason and replaced our faith, well, became our religion. Hashem, The Big Guy who made all of it, or so we used to believe, was put aside for just a short while as we worked harder for that new car. After the car we moved for a bigger house, then that little vacation cottage, those new computers, stood all night in the rain for that next must have gadget, the newest i-Phone, and on and on endlessly until we forgot completely about Hashem.

 

I was right there with many and got lost in living for the now and for the me. Sure, we all peeked up every so often, glanced around, did the traditionally right thing and then dove back in. We lost religion because we had science and a new religion, human rights, animal rights, right to anything and everything while forbidding others from deviating from our chosen things because we, our group knew better than any other group. We pressed for laws which made our cause the right, moral and now legally enforceable right. There were a few hiccups as differing views clashed. The big issues were such as but not limited to abortion, guns, marijuana, free healthcare, free college, minimum wage, military size, military weapons systems, war and peace. The eventuality due to high demand lives and higher taxes both parents worked and in some families one parent worked two jobs, had to keep up the old image, you know. Flat screen television, fifty-two inch display, 3-D, 7.1 surround sound, build on a theater room for the next party, it was never going to end and then we wondered why we had a coronary.

 

Meanwhile, who had time to assist with homework, providing we ever made time for having a family? Time and interest in the children’s schooling also fell by the wayside and the PTA became the teacher’s union more so than a shared parent-teacher relationship. The schools gave us what we wanted, good grades though often so inflated as to be meaningless. They left real schooling somewhere back a ways and replaced it with social programming of our youth who now knew of the evils of capitalism but were unable to define it, global climate change, racial inequality, gender inequality, LGBT life choices, and the new relativity, not Einstein’s but moral, gender and ethnic amongst others. Multiculturalism became the watchword where no single culture was preferable to any other and that included the tribes of cannibals and headhunters, communists and socialists, anything but that one dreadful, awful, despicable culture, Judeo-Christian culture, the old ways that built Western Civilization. No, we had to move beyond our little corner and our petty ways and go and try those other cultures which were all equal while all were preferable to the old way, that demanded far too much civility and culture need not be civil in order to have a civilization.

 

The Narrow Path

 

The new multicultural civilization would embrace everything different than our past, that civilization was built on faith and decency, or so it claimed. Faith was long dead; humiliated from the town square and who was it that got to define decency. Assuredly we could each define decency for ourselves, provided it was not defined in the morality based on that old book we had presumably discarded long ago. The children were prepared to forge that new world whose foundation was firmly planted in shifting sands which were so undefined and meaningless that everything was near collapse. We were approaching the cusp and beyond the cusp was a great and bottomless void. The edge had watched many a great civilization fall beyond the cusp to fall into the darkness never to return. This was how greatness of civilizations died, not from withering attacks but from withering within. They first hollowed out the principles upon which they were built and then with the inner structure destroyed, they simply collapsed from their own weight. They all died from their internal injuries, one after the other marching straight into the abyss awaiting their eventual arrival as they passed beyond the cusp. They all had lost their way and strayed from the narrow path turning right or left, it matters not as the cliffs of ruin line both sides and one can pass beyond the cusp going either way, right with dictatorial systems controlled by a single lunatic or left where a horde of self-proclaimed wise men act just as need of an asylum as the single loon and who rush beyond the cusp into the void with equal abandon. The path is as pictured above, narrow and perilous for any who lose their compass and stray from the good path, the narrow way.

 

Beyond the Cusp