Hamas allowed Israel to destroy Gaza in order to precipitate a wider war. They failed. From the beginning of the war, Hamas had no chance of defeating Israel. Their only hope was to resist Israel as long as possible. Indeed, their network of tunnels and supply of missiles made it possible to hold out indefinitely, […]
Sure, we all know what integrity is: honesty, sincerity, morally upright, etc. Merriam-Webster defines it as: firm adherence to a code of especially moral or artistic values : incorruptibility. But somehow, I feel there’s more to it than that. This essay is the sort of exercise that Plato engaged in: taking concepts as real things, […]
History Repeats Itself Merv — former capital of the world Few people know anything about Turkmenistan, and far fewer have actually gone there. But its former capital of Merv was once the hub of the universe: a major stop on the Silk Road, a center for science and culture (home of Omar Khayyam), and in […]
I’m reaching that age when one’s body starts to fall apart. It could happen any day — that first stroke, that first cancer diagnosis. I can’t pretend that it’s not going to happen. I’m so blessed that it hasn’t happened yet. As a result, I am savoring every moment of happiness. My family is a […]
For most of the history of mankind, and in many countries today, the leader has usually led a luxurious life of debauchery and corruption, oblivious to the needs of his people. Yes, absolute power corrupts absolutely. But for millennia, the People accepted that system as inevitable, so they accepted the status quo and even loved […]
Jan. 06 rioters. Pathetic Halloween costumes. Trump’s closing argument was made in Madison Square Garden, directed to a mostly male audience. It was vulgar; it was angry; it was politically incorrect. On CNN, David Axelrod claimed that Trump was closing his campaign poorly, that he should be focusing on the economy and solid issues. I […]
Noah’s Ark — the more you think about it, the more you realize how impossible it is. Do religious scriptures have any meaning at all? More and more, I come to see the answer as negative. Let’s start with the Bible, which is chock full of contradictions. Perhaps the most important one is also perhaps the […]
What would JD Vance do if he were President (quite a likely possibility, I’d say, given Trump’s age and recent dementia)? No one knows, because no one knows what he thinks or believes. He is a total chameleon, who says whatever he thinks Trump wants him to say. He has no ideological core — neither […]
The United States boasts one of the strongest economies in the world, with a 2.4% inflation rate and a 4.2% unemployment rate. Yet most Americans think the US economy is doing poorly, and they point to the high price of groceries. What is going on here? I have my own scenario, which I’m not hearing […]
If truth is beauty, does truth lie in the eyes of the beholder? Around 30 years ago, post-modernism was the darling of the intellectual set. I tried to read the main authors — Derrida, Lyotard, Foucault, Habermas — but found them impossibly pompous and dense. The best I could make out was that their message […]