Hello again, during this off season.

Plenty to write about, for much has changed. I'd like to bring up a topic that I've been covering in my separate pseudo-publication, "Political dialogues", which is a tiny newspaper I've printed off a couple times as a more editorial piece. (By the way, that's the point of this blog, hence the term "rant".)
How could you have guessed, Lebanon!

Can there be a number placed on the number of lives one life is worth? The president's life, in any country, is worth more than the life of one of his or her guards, that's why the secret service and the Swiss guards exist. The life of a mother is worth less, in her eyes, than the life of her children. On the Titanic, women and children were worth more than the lives of men, so at the end they were the ones put onto the lifeboats. In a darker example, those same two groups were worth less than strong healthy men in Nazi death camps. And what about war? Whose life is worth more then-the soldiers or the civilians/possible terrorists? Israel seems to have decided that the death of civilians is a minor issue, compared to the greater good of attacking Hezbollah. The move that provoked this most recent spate of bloodletting was the capture of 2 soldiers held hostage. So two Israeli soldiers are worth more than peace itself. Now, I realize that there has been little peace in the mideast, but there was a vestige of it emerging. Hamas' political wing was growing more powerful, leading to the wild chance that they might act through peace, not war. Regardless of personal opinion on the matter, the war in Iraq has taken out a violent man determined to attack other countries or those outsiders in his own. So there was a moment, not so very long ago, perhaps a few weeks, when the middle east could've had the slightest opening at tranquility. Lebanon's infrastructure was returning with greater splendor than before. Now the only way out is on Greek cruise ships. Maybe Israel needed to prove its strength in a dangerous corner of the Earth, but really, did it have to buy that at such a devastating price?


Lobolius