guess

Monday, May 09, 2011
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WHAT IF?
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What if I am wrong? That is always a possibility. On the day I assert infallibility, then I will be not just wrong, but catastrophically wrong!
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If you like to speculate, here is another “what if” question that is much more serious and universal: What if the comforts organized religions and faith provide are exposed as empty illusions?
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After centuries of oppression and authoritarian rule millions of Arabs in the Middle East and North Africa have suddenly discovered the benefits of democracy: Would anyone dare to ask “What if they are wrong?” Because in the final analysis that’s all I have been asking for my fellow countrymen: democracy, free speech, and respect for human rights.
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Here is another “What if”: What if the incompetence and dishonesty of our own leadership have done as much harm to the integrity of the nation as the criminal conduct of our former alien masters?
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About free speech: it can be abused, yes, certainly. So can censorship, the manipulation of the media and the educational system.
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Wednesday, May 11, 2011
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GUESSES
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Some questions don’t have answers, only guesses.
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Even when writers realize they can change nothing, they continue to write. Why?
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If a pebble can start an avalanche, why can’t the right word at the right time and place start a revolution?
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If they can lie for no good reason at all, why can’t I speak the truth for a good reason?
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Why did God create the world? To break the monotony of silence, boredom, and nothingness?
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If they know what must be done, why don’t they do it
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Do they hate to admit they have been wrong out of fear they may not be forgiven?
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Unlike Raskolnikov, not all murderers go down on their knees and confess – this is especially true of career criminals and
If they can get away with it – and so far they have – they will continue to lie, abuse, mislead, and deceive.
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Tuesday, May 10, 2011
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FASCISTS
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Authoritarian rulers – fascists for short –
view free speech as a crime against humanity
and state-sanctioned murder of defenseless civilians
as law and order.
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Fascism may also be defined
as a declaration of war by a regime
against its own people.
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In a fascist environment
intellectuals are like canaries in a mine.
Where there is a scarcity of canaries
there will be an abundance of chickens, toads, and rats.
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Turks are the favorite subject of our editors and academics.
Our leadership is a subject they avoid discussing
perhaps because it is not easy speaking of a bordello madam
as if she were a virgin.
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It is safe to assume that the number of moral victories
in a nation’s history is equal
to the number of military defeats.
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Where criminals are in charge
the law of the jungle will be
the law of the land.
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Message flagged
Sunday, May 8, 2011 11:56:48 AM
Sunday, May 08, 2011
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TRUE OR FALSE?
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Organized religions teach us to believe
there is more life in death.
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A heroic death is infinitely more admirable
than a degraded life.
Remember this next time you brag about survival.
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The world is too preoccupied
with its own welfare and survival
to care much about our own.
I doubt if the death of the last Armenian
will make a single headline anywhere.
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Lenin and Stalin served as role models
to many more Armenians than Tolstoy and Solzhenitsyn.
There is more Sultanism in our leadership
than Armenianism.
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For every Armenian who knows better
there will be at least two who know best
and four who know all there is to know.
In such an environment,
writers will be useless
and literature irrelevant –
except for such trashy lines as
“Forget your mother /
But do not forget your mother tongue.”
(I did not plan to quote this line on Mother’s Day.
Call it pure coincidence.)
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