Here we go again with Middle East news

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Isn't there total redundancy with the news reports coming out of the Middle East? As I heard someone say at DeToy's a few days ago: "These people have always been fighting and they will keep fighting." 

Does the U.S. just pour gasoline on the fire by sending more "aid" over there? Is it assumed that Israel is always "the good guys?" Is this a rational judgment or based more on superstition that comes from the Holy Bible? And is this fulfillment of Biblical prophecy? 

Up until Trump, there was an understood dictum that our top political leaders would not present their arguments in Biblical terms. Trump broke all sorts of norms. At first we're shocked by so much of this, then time passes and we realize we cannot change the situation. So, minus any options we just start commenting on the new norm. One of these is that an outgoing president can unleash a mob in a violent action against the U.S. capitol. The "small fish" might get in trouble but the top guy not only escapes, he's now the frontrunner, probably the prohibitive front-runner, for the GOP nomination. 

He'll have experience for when he gets back into the presidency, and this experience he can mine to make sure he has absolute toadies in many top positions around him. Just watch the justice department. 

And with the top guy motivated by raw, unyielding retribution, just watch what kind of acts get carried out. This abomination will follow the expected pattern, where at first there is shock and disbelief. "Oh this can't be real." It is real, the reason being that we the American people put this person named Trump into power. Of course he did not win the popular vote in 2016. But we rationalize that our system of the electoral college is practicable. There is more debate to be had on that. But it apparently is not going away. 

The assault on the capitol happened way back in January of 2021. Maybe by the standards of our white collar justice system, that's not so much time to have elapsed. According to my own seat-of-the-pants judgment, it is. My influence might be compared to a grain of sand on a vast beach. 

One might argue that in the old days of the big TV news networks, the "gatekeeper" media people would have pushed Americans to a quick reckoning about what we saw on TV at the capitol. I would like to argue as much. The "Big 3" of the days of Cronkite would seem to have been more dispassionate, sensible etc. 

On the surface, yes, but the argument completely falls apart when you realize how the major media let the years of the Vietnam war just roll on. Big media eventually had to conclude that it had been played by the U.S. government. I might clarify that to "the military industrial complex." But whatever, if you think the white collar legal process is so slow with Trump now, look back to when the Vietnam war persisted for years as a virtual morass. Television should have been an asset for clearing that up, making us realize the sheer folly. 

 

"Zippo Lighter"

Oh TV did try, as with Morley Safer's famous "Zippo Lighter" story. Safer reacted with mock amazement - "Isn't this something?" - at how the simple little Zippo Lighter could burn an entire Vietnamese village down. 

Just think how the poor U.S. servicemen could have been advancing their lives in the healthy normal fashion back here. Back home. Lives were extinguished, lives were ruined and lives were scarred. The suffering continues today, all while the U.S. has a favorable relationship with the same people we were fighting. "Ah Bartleby, ah humanity." Or something like that. "We are so human an animal." That one's mine really, because I don't think I'm even using it right. Has the right ring to it. 

"So human an animal" is handy as we consume another batch of absolutely predictable dispatches from the Middle East. Is the media helping us sort that out? Is the media helping us draw conclusions that would at least serve our interests domestically? Shouldn't our primary aim be to take care of our own country, our own welfare? So why do we always make Israel's concerns into our concerns? 

We should realize that Israel is not even homogeneous when it comes to political matters. There are Israelis who actually feel for the Palestinians. There are Israelis who would be content giving some ground in the conflict if the trade-off would mean less conflict, more peace. 

My own judgment is that the U.S. should have grave reservations about partnering so closely, to the extent of military aid, with a religious nation-state. Well of course that's Israel. 

The hardcore conservatives lead the way in waving the flag for Israel, even if many of them actually harbor anti-Semitism. The Jews reject Jesus Christ as the savior and reject the New Testament. Headlines remind us of anti-Semitism all the time. And I'm sure it is not the political liberals of America most guilty. Ironically the political liberals are most inclined to feel sympathy for the Palestinians. But liberals are gentle and inclusive people. We'd actually like a lot of the religious barriers to come down. 

 

Wisdom from music?

We see religion as an impediment in so many areas. Isn't this the crux of what boils over in the Middle East so often? So John Lennon wrote "imagine there is no religion." But is that such a genius comment? Couldn't this cross the lips of any sentient person? Aha, songwriters can be overrated, I say with irony because I try to be one of them. 

John Lennon with Tom Snyder

A pop song that supposedly "says a lot" can really have such elementary words and phrases. Composed on their own and without music, we'd think nothing of such phrases. Songwriters know they have the power to take such simple thoughts and weave them into a product that might be timeless! Pretty clever. Look at Lennon's song "Imagine." 

IMHO the surviving Beatles are committing sacrilege by taking an old rough tape of Lennon's and "mining" it into something new. Anything with the Beatles' name attached, accompanied by the marketing machine, will be a boffo success. The guys have done this before with "Free as a Bird" and "Real Love." They continue to pick away at Lennon's carcass. 

One of the best books about the Beatles, called "Shout," was by a guy who thought Lennon was 3/4 of the talent of the Beatles. And when I talk about "the surviving Beatles," shall I assume it's just two? McCartney and Starr? Well I'm inclined to think of Pete Best too, seriously. He was the Beatles' drummer for two years, a long time by the standards of that business. I have felt very sorry for him through the years. 

The standards for drummers are very high in commercial recorded music. There is a strong theory out there that even Ringo did not perform on all the Beatles' recordings. Remember the "Wrecking Crew?" Glen Campbell? Ever hear the term "session drummer?" 

I think Pete Best fit in fine when the group was doing straight-ahead rock 'n roll in Hamburg. But a group's style can change. Best could not have cut it on "Rubber Soul." But he seems like a fine gentleman and he speaks with the same Liverpool accent as the other three did. Their voices rise at the end of a sentence. Charming. 

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Will the "new" Beatles song make a big splash? It's called "Now and Then." 

I remember how ABBA's "comeback" was supposed to be a really big deal. It ended in a whimper. 

Big as the Beatles once were, I really think they are relegated to yesterday's news now. Just watch: the youngest generation just does not get swept away by the old stuff. Pop music is the domain of the young. No stopping it.

 

- Brian Williams - morris mn minnesota - bwilly73@yahoo.com