www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall Purple badge of courage: Iraqi elections

Of course there are more problems that just the Islamic terrorists. What if we were to leave the world scene, then how many nations would end up with a nuclear bomb.

Also China is becoming quite powerful. Now you know what we are, and we're pretty good and fair minded. Actually, I don't believe any nation in the world will ever be as decent as we have been towards others.

If China does become more powerful than us, (as it will some day), will they be as equally fair? How will they perceive us? But maybe it won't be China. Maybe in the end, it will be an Islamic nation?

Zenovia

Zenovia wrote: Today America is the world's policeman because the British Empire doesn't exist. We are the only super power left, and someone has to do the dirty work. Just look at the U.N. It's absolutely useless.



Slava Bogu, the British aren't in charge of the world anymore! They are responsible for so many of the world's problems today, e.g. the Middle East. And if it weren't for the British, Hagia Sophia might today be a functioning Christian church.


Now I know very well what our problem is. It is our support for Israel. But what is the alternative? If we allow the Palestinians to retake the land of Israel, then who will be next? They took Kosovo, and Macedonia is having it's problems.



I agree about Israel. It is a racist state responsible for unspeakable crimes against the land's previous inhabitants. And Americans can hardly afford to give Israel those billions of dollars of aid every year. I am disgusted by the support given Israel by American fundamentalists, who could care less about Middle East's Christians. Yet I don't have any solutions. I believe there's a divine plan at work there that I haven't quite figured out. And I believe that the Biblical promises made to the Jews are still binding today.

I'm not sure what you mean when you say "they" took Kosovo. Muslims, Albanians, Clinton & Albright? Albanian expansion has been a slow steady process helped by one fact: Albanians have the highest birthrate in Europe. As I said before, demographics is the key to future power. Only those willing to bear & raise children will survive in the future as a culture. I'm very curious what America will look like in 200 years. Will the southwest be part of a Hispanic state, or will Spanish-speaking Americans continue to assimilate?

Stojgniev

two ways of looking at this. Those segments of Protestantism that support Israel seem to conveniently overlook the fact that there are Christians in the Middle East. Perhaps their skin is darker than would be acceptable, perhaps they are not Christian enough. at the same time, Israel has a checkered history in race relations even amongst Jews, as darker skinned ones are kind of put out of sight. again, at the same time, in the future, the land will be given to the Jews, but it seems that everyone forgets that it will be Messiah who does so, and the state that exists now is the result of certain people storming the gates of Heaven, so to say, thus the result is so much suffering, violence, and injustice in that part of the world. nevertheless, pray for the peace of Jerusalem.
Much Love,
Jonn

The idea of the United States serving as policeman for the world while closely monitoring the internal affairs of foreign nations would have been a profoundly horrifying concept to the Founding Fathers of our country. I quote from George Washington's Farewell Address of 1796

Observe good faith and justice towards all nations; cultivate peace and harmony with all. Religion and morality enjoin this conduct; and can it be, that good policy does not equally enjoin it 7 It will be worthy of a free, enlightened, and at no distant period, a great nation, to give to mankind the magnanimous and too novel example of a people always guided by an exalted justice and benevolence. Who can doubt that, in the course of time and things, the fruits of such a plan would richly repay any temporary advantages which might be lost by a steady adherence to it ? Can it be that Providence has not connected the permanent felicity of a nation with its virtue ? The experiment, at least, is recommended by every sentiment which ennobles human nature. Alas! is it rendered impossible by its vices?

In the execution of such a plan, nothing is more essential than that permanent, inveterate antipathies against particular nations, and passionate attachments for others, should be excluded; and that, in place of them, just and amicable feelings towards all should be cultivated. The nation which indulges towards another a habitual hatred or a habitual fondness is in some degree a slave. It is a slave to its animosity or to its affection, either of which is sufficient to lead it astray from its duty and its interest. Antipathy in one nation against another disposes each more readily to offer insult and injury, to lay hold of slight causes of umbrage, and to be haughty and intractable, when accidental or trifling occasions of dispute occur. Hence, frequent collisions, obstinate, envenomed, and bloody contests. The nation, prompted by ill-will and resentment, sometimes impels to war the government, contrary to the best calculations of policy. The government sometimes participates in the national propensity, and adopts through passion what reason would reject; at other times it makes the animosity of the nation subservient to projects of hostility instigated by pride, ambition, and other sinister and pernicious motives. The peace often, sometimes perhaps the liberty, of nations, has been the victim.

So likewise, a passionate attachment of one nation for another produces a variety of evils. Sympathy for the favorite nation, facilitating the illusion of an imaginary common interest in cases where no real common interest exists, and infusing into one the enmities of the other, betrays the former into a participation in the quarrels and wars of the latter without adequate inducement or justification. It leads also to concessions to the favorite nation of privileges denied to others which is apt doubly to injure the nation making the concessions; by unnecessarily parting with what ought to have been retained, and by exciting jealousy, ill-will, and a disposition to retaliate, in the parties from whom equal privileges are withheld. And it gives to ambitious, corrupted, or deluded citizens (who devote themselves to the favorite nation), facility to betray or sacrifice the interests of their own country, without odium, sometimes even with popularity; gilding, with the appearances of a virtuous sense of obligation, a commendable deference for public opinion, or a laudable zeal for public good, the base or foolish compliances of ambition, corruption, or infatuation.

As avenues to foreign influence in innumerable ways, such attachments are particularly alarming to the truly enlightened and independent patriot. How many opportunities do they afford to tamper with domestic factions, to practice the arts of seduction, to mislead public opinion, to influence or awe the public councils 7 Such an attachment of a small or weak towards a great and powerful nation dooms the former to be the satellite of the latter.

Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence (I conjure you to believe me, fellow-citizens) the jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly awake, since history and experience prove that foreign influence is one of the most baneful foes of republican government. But that jealousy to be useful must be impartial; else it becomes the instrument of the very influence to be avoided, instead of a defense against it. Excessive partiality for one foreign nation and excessive dislike of another cause those whom they actuate to see danger only on one side, and serve to veil and even second the arts of influence on the other. Real patriots who may resist the intrigues of the favorite are liable to become suspected and odious, while its tools and dupes usurp the applause and confidence of the people, to surrender their interests.

The great rule of conduct for us in regard to foreign nations is in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connection as possible. So far as we have already formed engagements, let them be fulfilled with perfect good faith. Here let us stop. Europe has a set of primary interests which to us have none; or a very remote relation. Hence she must be engaged in frequent controversies, the causes of which are essentially foreign to our concerns. Hence, therefore, it must be unwise in us to implicate ourselves by artificial ties in the ordinary vicissitudes of her politics, or the ordinary combinations and collisions of her friendships or enmities.

Our detached and distant situation invites and enables us to pursue a different course. If we remain one people under an efficient government. the period is not far off when we may defy material injury from external annoyance; when we may take such an attitude as will cause the neutrality we may at any time resolve upon to be scrupulously respected; when belligerent nations, under the impossibility of making acquisitions upon us, will not lightly hazard the giving us provocation; when we may choose peace or war, as our interest, guided by justice, shall counsel.

Why forego the advantages of so peculiar a situation? Why quit our own to stand upon foreign ground? Why, by interweaving our destiny with that of any part of Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the toils of European ambition, rivalship, interest, humor or caprice?

It is our true policy to steer clear of permanent alliances with any portion of the foreign world; so far, I mean, as we are now at liberty to do it; for let me not be understood as capable of patronizing infidelity to existing engagements. I hold the maxim no less applicable to public than to private affairs, that honesty is always the best policy. I repeat it, therefore, let those engagements be observed in their genuine sense. But, in my opinion, it is unnecessary and would be unwise to extend them.

Taking care always to keep ourselves by suitable establishments on a respectable defensive posture, we may safely trust to temporary alliances for extraordinary emergencies.

Harmony, liberal intercourse with all nations, are recommended by policy, humanity, and interest. But even our commercial policy should hold an equal and impartial hand; neither seeking nor granting exclusive favors or preferences; consulting the natural course of things; diffusing and diversifying by gentle means the streams of commerce, but forcing nothing; establishing (with powers so disposed, in order to give trade a stable course, to define the rights of our merchants, and to enable the government to support them) conventional rules of intercourse, the best that present circumstances and mutual opinion will permit, but temporary, and liable to be from time to time abandoned or varied, as experience and circumstances shall dictate; constantly keeping in view that it is folly in one nation to look for disinterested favors from another; that it must pay with a portion of its independence for whatever it may accept under that character; that, by such acceptance, it may place itself in the condition of having given equivalents for nominal favors, and yet of being reproached with ingratitude for not giving more. There can be no greater error than to expect or calculate upon real favors from nation to nation. It is an illusion, which experience must cure, which a just pride ought to discard.

In offering to you, my countrymen, these counsels of an old and affectionate friend, I dare not hope they will make the strong and lasting impression I could wish; that they will control the usual current of the passions, or prevent our nation from running the course which has hitherto marked the destiny of nations. But, if I may even flatter myself that they may be productive of some partial benefit, some occasional good; that they may now and then recur to moderate the fury of party spirit, to warn against the mischiefs of foreign intrigue, to guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism; this hope will be a full recompense for the solicitude for your welfare, by which they have been dictated.

How far in the discharge of my official duties I have been guided by the principles which have been delineated, the public records and other evidences of my conduct must witness to you and to the world. To myself, the assurance of my own conscience is, that I have at least believed myself to be guided by them.

In relation to the still subsisting war in Europe, my proclamation of the twenty-second of April, I793, is the index of my plan. Sanctioned by your approving voice, and by that of your representatives in both houses of Congress, the spirit of that measure has continually governed me, uninfluenced by any attempts to deter or divert me from it.

After deliberate examination, with the aid of the best lights I could obtain, I was well satisfied that our country, under all the circumstances of the case, had a right to take, and was bound in duty and interest to take, a neutral position. Having taken it, I determined, as far as should depend upon me, to maintain it, with moderation, perseverance, and firmness.

The considerations which respect the right to hold this con duct, it is not necessary on this occasion to detail. I will only observe that, according to my understanding of the matter, that right, so far from being denied by any of the belligerent powers, has been virtually admitted by all.

The duty of holding a neutral conduct may be inferred, without anything more, from the obligation which justice and humanity impose on every nation, in cases in which it is free to act, to maintain inviolate the relations of peace and amity towards other nations.

The inducements of interest for observing that conduct will best be referred to your own reflections and experience. With me a predominant motive has been to endeavor to gain time to our country to settle and mature its yet recent institutions, and to progress without interruption to that degree of strength and consistency which is necessary to give it, humanly speaking, the command of its own fortunes.

Though, in reviewing the incidents of my administration, I am unconscious of intentional error, I am nevertheless too sensible of my defects not to think it probable that I may have committed many errors. Whatever they may be, I fervently beseech the Almighty to avert or mitigate the evils to which they may tend. I shall also carry with me the hope that my country will never cease to view them with indulgence; and that, after forty five years of my life dedicated to its service with an upright zeal, the faults of incompetent abilities will be consigned to oblivion, as myself must soon be to the mansions of rest.

Relying on its kindness in this as in other things, and actuated by that fervent love towards it, which is so natural to a man who views in it the native soil of himself and his progenitors for several generations, I anticipate with pleasing expectation that retreat in which I promise myself to realize, without alloy, the sweet enjoyment of partaking, in the midst of my fellow-citizens, the benign influence of good laws under a free government, the ever-favorite object of my heart, and the happy reward, as I trust, of our mutual cares, labors, and dangers.

Geo. Washington.


I'm sure some will claim it is no longer applicable in our globalist society, but I'll take it over the New Deal socialism of the so called Greatest Generation any day.

Stojgniev,

Calling Israel "racist" is something that is simply your view, but is an uncharitable remark on this site.

There are those who regard Poland as having been the same prior to World War II.

As someone of partly Jewish ancestry, I take offense and call on you to withdraw your remark and apologise.

Your choice of language . . .

Alex

Operation "Wisla" is still in the minds of many of our Lemko faithful who were expelled from Poland after World War II.

Diak,
I am aware of that atrocity against the Lemkos, and of the atrocities against the Masurians, the Kashubians, the ethnic Germans, and even the Jews (pogrom of 4 July 1946) who had suffered too much. not going to make a political statement, but just to let you know that this American is aware of what happened after WW ll. My maternal Grandmother was a full Prussian German, and learned that some of her people were expelled from what is now Poland, she also learned that a cousin of hers, married to a German nobleman implicated in 20 July 1944, was beaten to death by the Gestapo at Ravensbruck, this, and what Hitler did to the Jewish people really set her off. she loved her family, and she loved the Jewish people who she grew up with in Harlem. when will the world ever learn.
Much Love,
Jonn

Alex wrote: Calling Israel "racist" is something that is simply your view, but is an uncharitable remark on this site.

Alex, I meant no personal offence.

I simply stated my view of Israel's policy towards non-Jews.

Stojgniev

Very true, Jonn. Many of those pro-Zionist Protestants are the same groups specifically targeting "evanglelizing" Catholics and Orthodox in such places as South America, Eastern Europe, and in the Holy Land. Indeed any Christians of "Apostolic Succession" are apparently not Christians at all in their book.

Diak,

Last year, in the OCA, there was a commemoration of Lemko Orthodox who were persecuted by the Austro-Hungarian authorities during WWI for supposedly being "pro-Russian". Do you know any more details of this part of history??? I always appreciate your sense of history!!!

Dear Alex,

We have to admit that in order for Israel to exist as a Jewish state, it must be racist, (in the broad sense of the word of course). If Israel was to allow the Moslem Palestinians to re-enter, with its high birth rate, that would be the end of Israel as a Jewish nation. It has to be racist.

Please do not be offended, for it is not intended as an offense. I am merely facing reality as it exists today in that part of the world.

We all know that the Moslems have a high birth rate. Now that is not accident, it is encouraged in order to territorially expand the religious/political state of Islam. Israel cannot afford to allow the right of return.

We are now seeing the 'liberal' states in Europe, such as the Netherlands, also becoming 'racist'. They have to in order to continue as the cultural entity they always were.

Please forgive me, for I care dearly for you, and certainly have no intention of offending you. Israel though, is given special priorities by our government because of it's precarious situation.

Zenovia

Dear Zenovia,

That there is struggle between various national/cultural/religious groups all over the world - that is a fact.

But how this makes each group "racist" is beyond me, and I have a little bit of training in sociology.

And the Muslim Arabs - are they not racist too? The fact that North Americans in or out of military uniform are worthy targets of Muslim terrorists?

What I'm protesting (and I'm asking the Administrator for a call on this) is that Israel is condemned as racist.

Then we would have to condemn the U.S. as racist for siding with Israel as it does, do you not agree?

Stoyjniev, being from Poland, has said not one word about the actions of Poland against non-Poles and non-RC's in history (and I'm part Polish too).

The point is that we can keep our personal views in our own pockets, but that such terminology is both wrong, as it is a generality that is unproven, and it is highly offensive.

I call on the Administrator/Moderator for a judgement call on this one.

Alex

Zenovia wrote:

We are now seeing the 'liberal' states in Europe, such as the Netherlands, also becoming 'racist'. They have to in order to continue as the cultural entity they always were.

This issue, again, is about demographics and using demographics to achieve political power. You have to balance issues, such as in the Netherlands, the rights of the Dutch to preserve their traditional culture & language vs. the rights of immigrants with children who have real needs. I suspect that those cultures which are unwilling to raise families will see their rights erode over time as their numbers dwindle. I'm curious if there will be a Germany in 200 years.

Alex wrote:

And the Muslim Arabs - are they not racist too? The fact that North Americans in or out of military uniform are worthy targets of Muslim terrorists?

Turkey is the closest I've come to the Middle East & the only Arabs I know are Christian, but it is my impression that the Muslim world is really quite free of racial prejudice (not to say they don't have their other shortcomings). But you see the pilgrimages to Mecca on TV & can't help but notice the variety of races & cultures.

What I'm protesting (and I'm asking the Administrator for a call on this) is that Israel is condemned as racist.

Then we would have to condemn the U.S. as racist for siding with Israel as it does, do you not agree?

One thing I don't understand - why are defenders of Israel alway so quick to try to take away freedom of speech from those who don't share their views? Not the first time I've seen it.

And yes, the U.S. shares responsibility for what has happened in Palestine. Where does Israel get the money for those bullets & the tanks?

Stoyjniev, being from Poland, has said not one word about the actions of Poland against non-Poles and non-RC's in history (and I'm part Polish too).

Alex, I was born in the US, though I'm proud to call myself an ex-American. I am no spokesman for Poland & believe me, there's not a bigger critic of the present left-leaning Polish govt. than me. So you've got it all wrong if you think I'm some nationalist Pole with a Polish agenda. My own ethnic background isn't important here. I'm just trying to analyze various cultural & moral issues, which is why I believe the way I do about Israel.

Furthermore, when are we going to stop digging up these dead bodies from the 20th century, counting them & parading them around? There's not a group in Europe I know of that doesn't have its martyrology. Unfortunately, that's been a tool for gaining political power for the past half century - parading your victimhood. It's something Slavs in the US - to their credit - haven't done much of (haven't heard Slavs call for reparations from the US).

Yes, it was a tragedy what happened to the Lemkos & other East Slavs in Poland, but then the Poles have their tales from Volyn', it just goes on and on.

It's something quite different to talk about a situation where the course of history can still be changed. And for me it is just unbelievable what has happened in Palestine the past half-century.

Stojgniev

This is not so. The State of Israel was designated as a Jewish State to be a haven for the Jewish people after the horrors of the Holocaust. This does not make it a racist state (see the debates in the UN over the "Zionism as racism" declaration. A haven for a decimated people does not make a state "racist". Though this does not mean that some Israelis are racist in regard to the Palestinians. But the origin of the State is not unless one is ideologically against Israel's existance to begin with.

I will repeat what I said earlier in this thread: (in the final analysis) the land will be given to the Jews by the Messiah when He returns. I dare say that the Palestinians will have a surprisingly better deal than they are getting now, and justice will be for both Jew and Arab.Many ultra Orthodox Jews do not see the present state of Israel as being within the Will of God, but like me, look to the coming of Messiah (I look for the second coming of Messiah, Jesus Christ, the Jews are still searching)for the final word on this issue.
Much Love,
Jonn