comments

June 17, 2010
***************************************************
A SUGGESTION
*********************************************
Juvenal: “No one ever reached the depths of wickedness all at once.”
*
Since so far divisions have been of no discernible use to us, why not give solidarity a chance to fail on its own demerits?
*
Divisions begin as aberrations by overambitious leaders who care more about their own powers and privileges than the welfare of the people. It's never too late to see this and begin a movement in the opposite direction.
*
Divisions are expensive luxuries. By contrast, solidarity is much cheaper. One school, one community center, and one place of worship for every large community, would save enough money to feed and house thousands of families living below the poverty line in the Homeland.
*
It should be mandatory to include the initial “S” (for Solidarity) in the acronyms of all our organizations.
*
WANTED
**********************
Speechifiers who will unleash a verbal torrent thick with insults to dead ancestors; and comedians who will make merciless fun of our dividers.
*
READING
**********************
I have been reading two books on the ephemeral nature of power and wealth, especially when they are illegally, not to say criminally, obtained:
THE MADOFF CHRONICLES by Brian Ross (New York, 2009), and
KHRUSHCHEV REMEMBERS: THE LAST TESTAMENT, Translated and edited by Edward Cranshaw (Boston, 1974).
*
Brian Ross on Bernard and Ruth Madoff's lifestyle: “They sought the 'old money' look, even though their money was freshly stolen.”
*
Khrushchev hated Stalin but loved using the power amassed and concentrated by him.
*
ONE-LINERS
*********************************
Among Armenians, yesterday’s friend may be (and often is) today’s enemy, but today’s enemy will never be tomorrow’s friend.
*
I repeat myself because I am told again and again that the earth is flat.
*
The credo of all ideologues and partisans should begin with the words: “I believe in a false god….”
*
If you are wrong, they may forgive you. But if you are right, they will silence you.
#
June 18, 2010
***************************************************
FROM ZERO TO INFINITY
*********************************************
Not all stories in one's life have a clear or even a discernible beginning and end. “At the beginning was the word” is a sentence conceived and written by men, not by God or Reality. It is more likely that both beginnings and ends in one's life take place when we are asleep, sometimes even long before we were born.
Our genocide began 600 years ago when we surrendered our destiny into the hands of the Sultan, and even long before that, when we welcomed our enemies by failing to present a united front to them.
*
READING KHRUSHCHEV
************************************
In his memoirs Khrushchev speaks of “loafers, charlatans and toadies who overcrowd our institutes, bloating the staffs and gobbling up state funds without giving anything in return.” And I think of our own institutes – schools, churches, centers, political and cultural organizations – and above all newspapers (with their respective publishers, editors, assistant editors, and correspondents) of which we have a good number when one or two will do just as well – assuming their function is to publish news (as opposed to pushing their respective propaganda line) and not to provide employment to loafers, charlatans, and brown-nosers.
*
“SMALL PEOPLE,” AND “LIFE BACK”
***********************************************
It is in thoughtless moments that we reveal our real thoughts – as BP executives may have realized by now.
*
DOSTOEVSKY SPEAKS
***************************************
“Russian thought is preparing a grandiose renovation for the entire world…and this will occur in about a century – that’s my passionate belief.”
There you have it: one of the greatest writers of all time confusing wishful thinking with prophecy -- all in the name of faith and patriotism, of course.
*
AN ARMENIAN PERVERSION
**********************************************
Instead of studying our present complexes and contradictions, our academics prefer to study our graves.
#
June 19, 2010
***************************************************
NOTES AND COMMENTS
*********************************************
In Saramago's obituary I read this morning: “A militant atheist who maintained that human history would have been a lot more peaceful if it weren't for religion, his novels are preoccupied with the question of God.” Which reminds me of the words of a theologian (Karl Barth?) who said: “You may let go of God but God will never let you go.”
*
First you are taught to respect your elders, then you are lied to.
*
Better a useful idiot than a useless genius.
*
If I disappoint some readers it may be because I dare to think for myself as opposed to delivering the same speeches and sermons they were exposed to as children.
*
To those who accuse me of pessimism, I say: To write is to hope, and to hope is a symptom of optimism.
*
Capitalism is morally superior to communism if only because greed for money is better than greed for power.
*
More often than not bias is expressed in the selection of facts rather than in their misinterpretation.
*
Jean Rostand: “There are some persons we could not cut down to size without diminishing ourselves as well.”
*
Anonymous: “Skinheads have more hair than brains.”
*
Anonymous: “A friend in need is history.”
*
Once in a while I am tempted to remind my fellow Armenians that there is more, much more, to being Armenian than Turks and massacres.
#