Hillary Clinton said a couple of days ago: I want the Iranians to know that if I’m the president, we will attack Iran. In the next 10 years, during which they might foolishly consider launching an attack on Israel, we would be able to totally OBLITERATE them. This DEMOCRATIC candidate’s willingness to be perceived as the next war-president of the US is both sickening and scary. What exactly is going on?!?!
Okay, so I seem to be whining exclusively about women today. But how can I help it! See I heard Archana Puran Singh on the radio. She is a sassy actress and comedienne who delivers - in her upbeat Hinglish sort of style - Indian celebrity news. And as she does so, she classifies actors and their acts, whether on stage or off, as “HS”, “LS”, or “MS”. If it has you scratching your head, that’s high society, low society, and you got it, middle society.
Believe it or not, her audience laps it up! India has historically been a country of much hierarchy - from the caste system, to the imperialism imbibed from the British, to the recent-haves and always-hads created by the more recent economic boom. Which is precisely why I find Archana’s system of stratifying Bollywood gossip to be irresponsible. I’m very tempted to label her deejaying as deeply LS, but I’ll settle instead for HI. As in, highly ignorant.
Condoleeza Rice at a press conference on Friday: “The United States doesn’t have permanent enemies; we’re too great a country for that.”
No-permanent-enemies is obviously semantic strategy to clarify that North Korea and Iran are indeed enemies until they comply with nuclear demands. It makes little diplomatic sense to refer to enemies - however temporary - as enemies out loud. Okay, so it’s a clumsily put statement, but at least it is honest.
Now the too-great-a-country bit. It brings to mind instantaneously the fact that truly great countries - if there are indeed such things - should have no enemies! Particularly in the unctuous way the US currently does. What were her speechwriters thinking when they churned that out?
Help!
I am addicted to (gulp) TBN.
Today, I watched Bill O’Reilly in earnest conversation with James Robison. The latter is a regular on the evangelical channel I have become so intrigued by. They were discussing O’Reilly’s latest book called ‘Culture Warrior’ where he talks about some stark divide between America’s “Traditionalists” (Ts) and its “Secular-Progressives” (SPs).
I have watched him on ‘The O’Reilly Factor’, and often been impressed by his ability to think rationally and articulate quickly and succinctly his point of view. What he sorely lacks however is the ability to discern the shades of grey of any issue and therein lies his (fortunate) unpopularity with more than just the “SPs”. I saw the same trend play out in this interview, where Robison asked him to tell “people of faith” in the TBN audience about his book.
O’Reilly spoke of how, in polls, 65% of America was found to be of the “T “variety and how, unfortunately, a liberal media represents the 35% “SP” minority. He went on to beckon viewers of TBN to be a “T warrior” and help to preserve the Judeo-Christian foundation on which the nation has prospered so far. He pointed out how there exists a clear distinction between right and wrong, good and evil, and how this line is sadly made blurry by people who think secularly and progressively.
He claimed to be against the removal of Christian prayers from public school, espoused his clearly anti-gay-marriage view, and spoke passionately about how Ts need to fight SPs from causing furthur deterioration of this nation’s values. “Too many Americans,” he told Robison, “are sitting this one out, when in fact, we need them to go out there and be warriors!” What he means by that is “boycott liberal media” and other things in that vein, but the language is incendiary, to say the least.
Needless to say, Robison was lapping all this up. It seems to me that this “T” state of mind is the internal war - which in turn fuels the external wars - that America is embroiled in. And the same issue seems to exist worldwide. That Shilpa Shetty would be given such a tough time in India (wasn’t the Shiv Sena involved?), for a little kiss in public from Richard Gere, reeks of the same misguided and arrogant sort of “traditionalism”.
Well, I’m going to have to avoid getting my daily fix of TBN drivel tomorrow. But I’m afraid that The Bold and The Beautiful will toss me in to the throes of withdrawal.
Listen to Sir Ken Robinson make a marvelous appeal for designing an education system that nurtures creativity. I heard him speak at an Account Planning conference in San Diego recently and he made similar points with respect to organisational innovation. This talk is from TED where some of the world’s most progressive and articulate people share their thoughts. Truly ‘ideas worth spreading’.
