Is It 1933 yet?

First Amendment to the United States Constitution:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Some of the First Amendment is certainly dated and should be changed.  The laws respecting religion were designed to protect Christian sorts like the Protestants, the Catholics and the Anabaptists.  This country was founded by people who found themselves persecuted by Peoples and Governments that disagreed with their type of Christianity (The Pilgrims and Anabaptists come to mind.)  

But the First Amendment is merely words that instruct Congress what to do, or not do.  The First Amendment does not command people on what is good, correct or appropriate.  The People are free to do and think as they wish.

Recently some of the People have used their free speech rights to denounce the building of a mosque several blocks from "Ground Zero" in New York City.  Now, another group will utilize their free speech rights to burn copies of the Quran on September 11th.  Although that is their right, I suggest we send several hundred thousand more troops to Afghanistan.  That is the only way we can show the Afghan People that we are there to promote their freedoms, including their freedom of religion and the exercise thereof.  I mean, how else can we demonstrate our faith in them and their freedoms while we burn and denigrate their religion here?  Yeah, more troops will be needed to force our freedom on them.

Presently, laws in the United States can't stop the construction of the mosque, but how far from 1933 are we?

Many people refer to Nazis when they talk about the persecution of Jewish people in 1930-40 Germany.  The Nazis didn't invent anti-Semitism.   The People did.  The Nazis took a popular idea from The People, and ran with it.  In 1933, Adolph Hitler was elected, the Nazis came to power, and they implemented their campaign promises.  (That might make Hitler and the Nazis some of the most capable politicians ever.)

As the People today talk against the building of a religious structure, they forget the history of German persecution of the Jewish People.  Today, the question would be, "What will the ramifications of those acts (no mosques, no Qurans, no Muslims in this place or that place) be?"  In 1933, the Germans, the Nazis and Hitler never asked that question; to them The Jewish People were "bad."  Ironically, The Germans, The Nazis and Hitler implemented policies that lost their war six years before invading Poland.

Before the German racial laws were enacted in 1933, most Nobel Prizes in Physics were awarded to Germans.  After 1933, most of the Nobel Prizes in Physics went to Americans.  The following is a list of European-Jewish physicists that emigrated to the United States and the United Kingdom to work directly or indirectly on the Manhattan Project--the United States operation to build atomic weapons.  (Some where not Jewish, but because they had family member that were Jewish, the German racial laws classified them as such.)

Manhattan project participants:

• Niels Bohr.  Nobel Prize for Physics in 1922.  Left Denmark in 1943 before being arrested by German police.
• Enrico Fermi.   Nobel Prize for Physics in 1938.  Moved to New York because of anti-Semitic laws promoted by Mussolini's Italian government.
• Wolfgang Pauli.  Nobel Prize for Physics in 1945.  Although Roman Catholic, his father, grandparents and great-grandparents were Jewish.
• Felix Bloch.  Nobel Prize for Physics in 1954.  Left Germany in 1933.  Worked at Los Alamos National Laboratory.
• Albert Einstein.  Nobel Prize in Physics in 1922.  Emigrated to U.S. in 1933.  Co-authored the Einstein-Szilard letter asking Roosevelt to start a project to develop nuclear weapons.
• James Franck.  Nobel Prize in Physics in 1925.  
• Isidor Isaac Rabi.  Nobel Prize in Physics in 1944.  
• Leo Szilard.  Co-author of Einstein-Szilard letter.
• Edward Teller.  "Father of the Hydrogen Bomb."  Moved to Copenhagen in 1933, then to U.S. in 1934.
• Eugene Wigner.  Nobel Prize for Physics in 1963.  Left Germany before the Nazis came to power in 1933.
• Hans Bethe.  Nobel Prize for Physics in 1967.  Left Germany in 1933.  Oppenheimer, leader of the Manhattan Project, make Bethe Director of Theoretical Division.
• Nicholas Kurti.  Left Germany in 1933.

Jewish Physicists that worked in Britain, but their work contributed to a successful Manhattan Project:

• Francis Simon.  Moved to Britain in 1930, before Nazis rose to power.  His work on gaseous diffusion to separate Uranium 235 was used in part of the Manhattan project.
• Otto Robert Frisch.  Moved to Britain in 1933.  Helped design first theoretical mechanism for detonating an atomic bomb.
• Rudolph Peierls.  German who was working in Britain when Hitler came to power and decided to stay.  Co-authored the detonating mechanism with Frisch.

For reference here are a few Jewish folks that worked on the Manhattan Project:  (Although anti-Semitism was high in the U.S. in the 1920s and 1930s, The People of the U.S. never pushed for separate policies toward The Jewish here.)

• Robert Oppenheimer.  Born in New York.  Headed the Manhattan Project.
• Richard Feynman.  Born in Queens, New York.  Nobel Prize for Physics in 1965.  Manhattan Project.
• Julian Schwinger.  Born in New York City.  Nobel Prize in Physics in 1965.  Los Alamos National Laboratory.

What would have happened if the Nazis hadn't taken a popular idea and made it policy?  Possibly a mushroom cloud over New York City and Los Angeles instead of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and this would be written in German.

At the very least the German People and the Nazis weren't hypocrites (to a certain extent).  They threw out their brain trust with the average People.  Those People speaking against the mosque in New York City and burning the Quran in the South of the United States can't sidestep the hypocrisy label.  They believe that since Muslims brought down the Twin Towers, then Muslims shouldn't be able to build a mosque close to Ground Zero, even while Catholics were able to put up a statue of Jesus Christ across from where the Alfred P. Murrah Building in Oklahoma City was blown up by terrorist Timothy McVeigh.  While McVeigh wasn't a practicing Catholic, he was raised as one and attended Mass regularly.

The hypocrisy continues.  All the 9/11 hijackers where Muslims, but 15 were from Saudi Arabia and two were from the United Arab Emirates.  Both countries are major exporters of oil.  NO ONE SEEMS TO BE BOYCOTTING ARAB OIL.  Oddly, there is nothing in the First Amendment, or the entire Constitution that prohibits Congress, or The People, individually or collectively from boycotting Arab oil.

The First Amendment to the United States Constitution set out those rules of conduct that the Forefathers deemed essential to a free, fair and successful new country.  It seems those rules of conduct are out of fashion for Muslims in this country at this time.

Maybe we should repeal it.  Then it will be 1933.

Terrorists in Terrorist's Clothing

The Associated Press released a partial story this morning on a Christian militia planning to kill police officers.  (Link to story here.)

The difference between an Islamic terrorist and a Christian terrorist is largely a matter of "them" versus "us."

In perusing online news articles of Islamic terrorists you will see comments like, "Kill them all, let God sort 'em out," and "Those barbaric Muslims are at it again."  (See point on "Kill 'em all.")

Comments on Christian terrorists have comments like, "Ruby Ridge and Waco 2.0 with all the fixings and dead children," and, "Politics, try to make it look like there is a vast conspiracy against Obama.  Actually we just don't want socialist ruining this country."

As long as they are "us," they are good.  As long as they are "them," they are bad.

Too bad we don't live in a country where "All men are created equal."



For information on terrorists of many flavors, Jessica Stern has a great book, Terror in the Name of God: Why Religious Militants Kill.

Romans Eliminate Christianity

The U.S. is NOT making the same mistakes in Afghanistan that it made in Vietnam.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

The U.S. is going out of its way to make new and more modern mistakes.

On Wednesday, 9 December, BBC News reported that General Stanley McChrystal told Congress:

"I don't think that we can finally defeat al-Qaeda until he's (Osama bin Laden) captured or killed."

"Doing some fancy mouthwork he went on to say that killing or capturing Bin Laden would not spell the end of al-Qaeda, but that the movement could not be eradicated while Bin Laden remained at large." (BBC quote)

Link to the report can be found here.

How times change. Imagine the lambasting General William Westmoreland would have received if he had suggested the Vietnam War could not be won without killing Ho Chi Minh. Ho Chi Minh died in 1969. The war raged on for half a decade.

Additionally, remember the Galilean Herald-Tribune's headline in 30 AD

Pontius Pilate Squelches Christianity With Seditious Jesus' Elimination

Maybe the U.S. isn't making a modern mistake at all.

American Assassinations, Inc

Two Pieces of Sophomoric Advice and Consent

Recently there have been stories about a secret assassination program being run, allegedly, by former Vice President Dick Cheney. One example can be found here: Lawmaker won't deny CIA program was Cheney assassin ring.

It brings back memories about a column written at The University of Montana's Kaimin newspaper, by journalism student, Jacob Baynham. Most of his opinion piece was rather benign, but his final sentence boiled my blood. "It can be messy to try to remove brutal dictators, but sometimes it is the only just option." His piece can be found here: The Picture Beyond the Frame: Bread, brutes and the sanctity of an international border

The following is what I wrote as a letter-to-the-editor for the Kaimin:

Brother Baynham’s final statement in Wednesday’s Kaimin is bold, decisive and profound, “It can be messy to try to remove brutal dictators, but sometimes it is the only just option.” It demonstrates how short sighted the Founding Fathers were when they didn’t create a cabinet-level Department of Assassination of Brutal Dictators. To be a just country we must push for that department.

The best choice for secretary of the department would be a decider—someone who is bold and decisive. Brother Baynham has those qualities, but since George W. Bush is already “The Decider,” Baynham would have to be “The Decider’s Apprentice.” In that position, Brother Baynham would be able to use his pen to tell others to use their swords.

This is great! Although Brother Baynham is probably too young to remember, it brings back those heady days of the 1970s and 1980s, when death squads roamed Africa, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala. They weren’t afraid to limit assassinations only to brutal dictators. If the words of priests and nuns got in the way of political expediency, they were cut down. If a newspaper worker sharpened his pen without engaging his brain, he was removed.

Assassination is a dirty business, but sometimes it is the only just business. The problem is it addresses only the product of the product. Like the Sorcerer’s Apprentice, when one is removed, it becomes two, two become four, four become eight. . .

What is more profound is that the lead in “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” was Mickey Mouse, not a decider.

As I read the articles about Cheney and recalled the words of a college student, I find myself wondering who was more sophomoric? Thirty years after Frank Church lead a democratic change that brought transparency to black ops, we are revisiting the situation. It's possible that we have already gone where Church warned us not to go:

I don't want to see this country ever go across the bridge... I know the capacity that is there to make tyranny total in America, and we must see to it that this agency and all agencies that possess this technology operate within the law and under proper supervision, so that we never cross over that abyss. That is the abyss from which there is no return.

Compare to Solzhenitsyn's words here: Two Terrorisms

Two Terrorisms

In the course of conducting research on terrorism, I came across some similarities between two very different books. One is, The Gulag Archipelago, 1918-1956, by Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn; the other is, Terror in the Name of God: Why Religious Militants Kill, by Jessica Stern. My copy of Archipelago is an abridged version that incorporates all three volumes and seven parts into one volume (ISBN 0-06-000776-1). Stern's book is ISBN 0-06-050532-X.

In today's world we may not see Solzhenitsyn's work describing terrorism. His brand of terrorism came from the state--USSR. 21st Century terrorism is usually referring to groups or individuals that attack non-combatants, such as the September 11th hijackers. Solzhenitsyn is describing state orchestrated terrorism.

This is what he has to say about how evildoers (in his case the Soviet government) justified their actions:

The imagination and the spiritual strength of Shakespeare's evildoers stopped short at a dozen corpses. Because they had no ideology.
Ideology--gives the evildoer the necessary steadfastness and determination. That is the social theory which helps to make his acts seem good instead of bad in his own and others' eyes, so that he won't hear reproaches and curses but will receive praise and honors. That was how the agents of the Inquisition fortified their wills: by invoking Christianity; the conquerors of foreign lands, by extolling the grandeur of their Motherland; the colonizers, by civilization; the Nazis by race; and the Jacobins (early and late), by equality, brotherhood, and the happiness of future generations.
Thanks to ideology, the twentieth century was fated to experience evildoing on a scale calculated in the millions. This cannot be denied, nor passed over, nor suppressed. (77-78)

Compare Stern's words from her introduction:

Although we see them as evil, religious terrorist know themselves to be perfectly good. To be crystal clear about one's indentiy, to know that one's group is superior to all others, to make purity one's motto, and purification of the world one's life work--this is a kind of bliss. This is the bliss offered to those who join religious terrorist groups (41). Participants in the Crusades, the Inquisition, and the kamikaze suicide-bombing raids all understood the appeal of purifying the world through murder. It is a bliss I have seen among terrorists described in this book. This powerful yearning for bliss cannot be denied if we are to fight terror in the name of God, the gravest danger we face today. (xxviii-xxix)

Different books. Different themes. Different time frames, and yet, such similarity in content and tone. Solzhenitsyn didn't use religion, but used ideology. Stern used religion, but didn't use ideology. (possibly an unspittable hair) Solzhenitsyn wasn't just talking about the organs of Soviet government, but the Soviet populous as a whole. A population of people who allowed terrorism to be conducted on their friends, relatives and neighbors. A population that knew what was happening, but never attempted to stop the deportations and murders by their government.

Stern addresses religious terrorism by Christians, Jews and Muslims. Stern gives an overview, with amazing depth, to show similarities between terrorist of the three religions, and then goes on to tie everything together. (Yes, Christians, Jews and Muslims are all people.)

How far are each of us from being ideologues? Does a country only know when it has become an ideologue or a terrorist after the Nuremberg trials, . . . after The Gulag Archipelago, . . . after ??? Something to think about.

"The unexamined life is not worth living." Socrates (469-399 BC)