Quote of the day

"People with courage and character always seem sinister to the rest."
- Hermann Hesse

Quote of the day!

"The strength of the Constitution lies entirely in the determination of each citizen to defend it. Only if every single citizen feels duty bound to do his share in this defense are the constitutional rights secure."
Albert Einstein

Quran Quote of the day

We Are All That Stands Between The Monsters And The Weak

We Are All That Stands Between The Monsters And The Weak

The sun beat like a hammer, not a cloud was in the sky.
The mid-day air ran thick with dust, my throat was parched and dry.
With microphone clutched tight in hand and cameraman in tow,
I ducked beneath a fallen roof, surprised to hear, "Stay low."

My eyes blinked several times before in shadow I could see,
The figure stretched across the rubble, steps away from me.
He wore a cloak of burlap strips, all shades of grey and brown,
That hung in tatters till he seemed to melt into the ground.

He never turned his head or took his eye from off the scope,
But pointed through the broken wall and down the rocky slope.
"About eight hundred yards," he said, his whispered words concise,
"Beneath the baggy jacket he is wearing a device."

A chill ran up my spine despite the swelter of the heat,
"You think he's gonna set it off along the crowded street?"
The sniper gave a weary sigh and said, "I wouldn't doubt it,"
"Unless there's something this old gun and I can do about it."

A thunderclap, a tongue of flame, the still abruptly shattered;
While citizens that walked the street were just as quickly scattered.
Till only one remained, a body crumpled on the ground,
The threat to oh, so many ended by a single round.

And yet the sniper had no cheer, no hint of any gloat,
Instead he pulled a logbook out and quietly he wrote.
"Hey, I could put you on TV, that shot was quite a story!"
But he surprised me once again -- "I got no wish for glory."

"Are you for real?" I asked in awe, "You don't want fame or credit?"
He looked at me with saddened eyes and said, "You just don't get it.
You see that shot-up length of wall, the one without a door?
Before a mortar hit, it used to be a grocery store.

"But don't go thinking that to bomb a store is all that cruel,
The rubble just across the street -- it used to be a school.
The little kids played soccer in the field out by the road."
His head hung low, "They never thought a car would just explode.

"As bad as all this is though, it could be a whole lot worse."
He swallowed hard, the words came from his mouth just like a curse.
"Today the fight's on foreign land, on streets that aren't my own,"
"I'm here today 'cause if I fail, the next fight's back at home."

"And I won't let my Safeway burn, my neighbors dead inside,
Don't wanna get a call from school that says my daughter died;
I pray that not a one of them will know the things I see,
Nor have the work of terrorists etched in their memory."

"So you can keep your trophies and your fleeting bit of fame,
I don't care if I make the news, or if they speak my name."
He glanced toward the camera and his brow began to knot,
"If you're looking for a story, why not give this one a shot."

"Just tell the truth of what you see, without the slant or spin;
That most of us are OK and we're coming home again.
And why not tell our folks back home about the good we've done,
How when they see Americans, the kids come at a run."

"You tell 'em what it means to folks here just to speak their mind,
Without the fear that tyranny is just a step behind;
Describe the desert miles they walk in their first chance to vote,
Or ask a soldier if he's proud, I'm sure you'll get a quote."

He turned and slid the rifle in a drag bag thickly padded,
Then looked again with eyes of steel as quietly he added;
"And maybe just remind the few, if ill of us they speak,
That we are all that stands between the monsters and the weak."

Michael Marks
Somewhere in Iraq
January 25, 2006

 

They're pushing their luck!

We wake up this morning to see video on CNN showing rampaging
Muslims around the world.  In Europe, the Middle East, the Pacific Rim ... 
Muslim Mobs spreading mayhem.  It seems that these mighty mad Muslims are
rioting and firing their ever-present AK-47s into the air because of cartoons. 
Yup ... this latest epidemic of Muslim outrage comes to us because some
newspapers in Norway and Denmark published some cartoons depicting Mohammed.

Muslim outrage huh.  OK ... let's do a little historical review.  Just some
lowlights:

 

• Muslims fly commercial airliners into buildings in New York City.  No Muslim
  outrage.
• Muslim officials block the exit where school girls are trying to escape a
  burning building because their faces were exposed.  No Muslim outrage.
• Muslims cut off the heads of three teenaged girls on their way to school in
  Indonesia.  A Christian school.  No Muslim outrage.
• Muslims murder teachers trying to teach Muslim children in Iraq.  No Muslim
  outrage.
• Muslims murder over 80 tourists with car bombs outside cafes and hotels in
  Egypt.  No Muslim outrage.
• A Muslim attacks a missionary children's school in India.  Kills six.  No
  Muslim outrage.
• Muslims slaughter hundreds of children and teachers in Beslan, Russia. 
  Muslims shoot children in the back.  No Muslim outrage.
• Let's go way back.  Muslims kidnap and kill athletes at the Munich Summer
  Olympics.  No Muslim outrage.
• Muslims fire rocket-propelled grenades into schools full of children in
  Israel.  No Muslim outrage.
• Muslims murder more than 50 commuters in attacks on London subways and
  busses.  Over 700 are injured.  No Muslim outrage.
• Muslims massacre dozens of innocents at a Passover Seder.  No Muslim
  outrage.
• Muslims murder innocent vacationers in Bali.  No Muslim outrage.
• Muslim newspapers publish anti-Semitic cartoons.  No Muslim outrage
• Muslims are involved, on one side or the other, in almost every one of the
  125+ shooting wars around the world.  No Muslim outrage.
• Muslims beat the charred bodies of Western civilians with their shoes, then
  hang them from a bridge.  No Muslim outrage.
• Newspapers in Denmark and Norway publish cartoons depicting Mohammed. 
  Muslims are outraged.

 

Dead children.  Dead tourists.  Dead teachers.  Dead doctors and nurses. 
Death, destruction and mayhem around the world at the hands of Muslims .. no
Muslim outrage ... but publish a cartoon depicting Mohammed with a bomb in his
turban and all hell breaks loose.

 

Come on, is this really about cartoons?  They're rampaging and burning
flags.  They're looking for Europeans to kidnap.  They're  threatening
innkeepers and generally raising holy Muslim hell not because of any outrage
over a cartoon.  They're outraged because it is part of the Islamic jihadist
culture to be outraged.  You don't really need a reason.  You just need an
excuse.  Wandering around, destroying property, murdering children, firing guns
into the air and feigning outrage over the slightest perceived insult is to a
jihadist what tailgating is to a Steeler's fan.

 

I know and understand that these bloodthirsty murderers do not represent the
majority of the world's Muslims.  When, though, do they become outraged?  When
do they take to the streets to express their outrage at the radicals who are
making their religion the object of worldwide hatred and ridicule?  Islamic
writer Salman Rushdie wrote of these silent Muslims  in a New York Times article
three years ago.  "As their ancient, deeply civilized culture of love, art and
philosophical reflection is hijacked by paranoiacs, racists, liars, male
supremacists, tyrants, fanatics and violence junkies, why are they not
screaming?"  

 

Indeed.  Why not?