Category Archives: tragedy

On vertigo

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Vertigo is a strange unbalanced sensation that makes you want to throw up. Climbing around spooky old Spanish castles and cathedrals, I’ve had my share of strange experiences, looking down from high stone keeps and creepy pigeon-infested bell towers, climbing weird spiral staircases, and crossing flimsy medieval catwalks. I didn’t understand poor Jimmy Stewart until I looked over the wall and into the moat from atop the main keep of the castle in Segovia–straight down almost two hundred feet. My palms get sweaty, my neck gets goosebumps, and something odd happens to my stomach. It’s not so much I’m afraid of heights, but I also hate walking on transparent floors which you can see through. I don’t mind flying, proof of which are my more than seventy trips to Europe in thirty years. Yet, looking over the edge from some high-up place–a rocky, mountain path with no railing, a glass elevator, a very high suspension bridge. Vertigo is more about how your brain is trying to deal with the imminent danger it seems to be perceiving. It’s almost as if your body is bailing out at the worst possible moment, just when you need strong legs and a clear head, both things seems fail. Seeing birds fly below your horizontal line of sight is unsettling and a little nerve-racking. I can’t watch high wire acts or trapeze artists, and rock climbers give me the heebie-jeebies. I have no idea why people try to climb vertical walls using only their hands and feet. Although I drive over freeway fly-overs, the bay bridge in Tampa gives me second thoughts. I once drove over it by accident. Sky-scrapers don’t give me second thoughts, but I won’t look down a stairwell from the twenty-seventh floor. Heights don’t paralyze me, don’t leave me speechless, but they leave me thinking. As long as I don’t have to look down into the abyss of empty space in front or below me, I am very happy with being up high. Vertigo, however, always catches me by surprise, robbing me of my courage. I know it’s totally irrational, but rationality has nothing to do with it. So don’t ask me to skydive, bungee jump off a bridge, repel down the side of building, or ride a scary roller-coaster that turns its victims upside-down. Perhaps my sense of self-preservation is too great for high-risk behaviors or dangerous hobbies. Vertigo is a physiological response, however, which is very real regardless of what provokes it. As a child I never liked the slides in parks, but I didn’t mind climbing the rope up to the top of the gymnasium, touching the iron ring on the ceiling, and coming back down, even though that climb was forty or fifty feet. Yet, looking off of a balcony into all that empty space between me and the floor makes me sweat. I suppose that rock climbers and hang gliders who have no fear of heights, no vertigo, won’t understand this strange feeling of utter helplessness and blind numbing fear. Yet, the vertigo that Jimmy Stewart feels in Hitchcock’s 1958 psychological thriller about dopplegangers and simulacra is very real, paralyzing, strange. So I avoid scaffolding, catwalks, multi-floored stairwells, glass elevators, transparent floors, high places with low railings, scary theme park rides, balconies, high suspension bridges. I just don’t know how the birds do it–having wings helps I assume.

On vertigo

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Vertigo is a strange unbalanced sensation that makes you want to throw up. Climbing around spooky old Spanish castles and cathedrals, I’ve had my share of strange experiences, looking down from high stone keeps and creepy pigeon-infested bell towers, climbing weird spiral staircases, and crossing flimsy medieval catwalks. I didn’t understand poor Jimmy Stewart until I looked over the wall and into the moat from atop the main keep of the castle in Segovia–straight down almost two hundred feet. My palms get sweaty, my neck gets goosebumps, and something odd happens to my stomach. It’s not so much I’m afraid of heights, but I also hate walking on transparent floors which you can see through. I don’t mind flying, proof of which are my more than seventy trips to Europe in thirty years. Yet, looking over the edge from some high-up place–a rocky, mountain path with no railing, a glass elevator, a very high suspension bridge. Vertigo is more about how your brain is trying to deal with the imminent danger it seems to be perceiving. It’s almost as if your body is bailing out at the worst possible moment, just when you need strong legs and a clear head, both things seems fail. Seeing birds fly below your horizontal line of sight is unsettling and a little nerve-racking. I can’t watch high wire acts or trapeze artists, and rock climbers give me the heebie-jeebies. I have no idea why people try to climb vertical walls using only their hands and feet. Although I drive over freeway fly-overs, the bay bridge in Tampa gives me second thoughts. I once drove over it by accident. Sky-scrapers don’t give me second thoughts, but I won’t look down a stairwell from the twenty-seventh floor. Heights don’t paralyze me, don’t leave me speechless, but they leave me thinking. As long as I don’t have to look down into the abyss of empty space in front or below me, I am very happy with being up high. Vertigo, however, always catches me by surprise, robbing me of my courage. I know it’s totally irrational, but rationality has nothing to do with it. So don’t ask me to skydive, bungee jump off a bridge, repel down the side of building, or ride a scary roller-coaster that turns its victims upside-down. Perhaps my sense of self-preservation is too great for high-risk behaviors or dangerous hobbies. Vertigo is a physiological response, however, which is very real regardless of what provokes it. As a child I never liked the slides in parks, but I didn’t mind climbing the rope up to the top of the gymnasium, touching the iron ring on the ceiling, and coming back down, even though that climb was forty or fifty feet. Yet, looking off of a balcony into all that empty space between me and the floor makes me sweat. I suppose that rock climbers and hang gliders who have no fear of heights, no vertigo, won’t understand this strange feeling of utter helplessness and blind numbing fear. Yet, the vertigo that Jimmy Stewart feels in Hitchcock’s 1958 psychological thriller about dopplegangers and simulacra is very real, paralyzing, strange. So I avoid scaffolding, catwalks, multi-floored stairwells, glass elevators, transparent floors, high places with low railings, scary theme park rides, balconies, high suspension bridges. I just don’t know how the birds do it–having wings helps I assume.

On "The Game of Thrones"

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I stopped reading this book on page 218, disgusted by George R. R. Martin’s total disregard for either his readers or his characters, so if that’s what you like about him, stop reading now because I’m throwing him under the bus. Perhaps some people find it refreshing to have every single good character in the book killed or maimed in some hideous way, but I find it boorish. Good characters do die sometimes, no doubt, verisimilitude has to be a part of any good novel, but Martin pushes the envelope just a little too far in dashing his readers hopes and expectations for any kind of happy resolution. In a certain way, he is a writer/conman who just keeps pushing his readers down the road of desperation and depression. Some readers like their novels dark and depressing, bereft of any hope or sentiment, maybe that’s what they expect out of life so that’s how they pick their novels. I don’t mind if my hero is in danger, that she has a challenge to resolve, that he suffers hardship or even dies, but there is a strange cruelty in Martin’s writing. His sadism as a writer transfers to a novel that makes people–his readers–suffer through all sorts of misfortunes and tragedies. The idea of dystopia is fundamental in the literature of the 20th and 21st century, and there is a long history of dystopic writings such as On the Beach, Brave New World, and 1984. Those are only three, but one might add Cormac McCarthy’s The Road to that list. Dystopia is certainly an important part of the Martin post-post-modern world, but it should be ingested in small dosis–too much, all at once, and it will make you a very dark person indeed. Martin’s world is a dystopia, no doubt, a decadent pseudo-medieval setting of wrecked castles, corrupt and traitorous rulers, and heroes who are not heroes. Martin’s dark take on his society was at first, for me, refreshing, mysterious, filled with interesting characters, but after 200 pages, the handwriting is on the wall. Why should I bother to depress myself with this kind of writing? Just when you think he’s letting one of his characters succeed, he kills them in some horrific way. He has a sadistic twist in his writing where he allows the evil people to wallow in their excesses while at the same time he punishes the good with nasty tragedies and unjust punishments. Novels, no matter how dark, need to allow their fictional inhabitants a chance to succeed and breath, and if the world does work, the evil will be vanquished and punished because in the real world we don’t get this kind of satisfaction very often, so we look for our heroes in books. The real world is a valley of tears, where the good people fail, our friends get sick and die, our relatives suffer from unemployment and exploitation. I have no doubt that many readers are right at home in Martin’s novels and do appreciate my comments, but I would have it no other way. Hundreds of thousands of readers like his books, but I am quite sure that there are plenty of readers out there who feel tricked, fooled, sad that they read all of those pages only to find that the bad guys have flourished, the good are all dead, and there really was no point in reading this in the first place. Life is too short to read novels that depress and sicken you. The ironic part of this is that when I started out reading this first novel I thought it was pretty good. No, I was wrong.

On "The Game of Thrones"

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I stopped reading this book on page 218, disgusted by George R. R. Martin’s total disregard for either his readers or his characters, so if that’s what you like about him, stop reading now because I’m throwing him under the bus. Perhaps some people find it refreshing to have every single good character in the book killed or maimed in some hideous way, but I find it boorish. Good characters do die sometimes, no doubt, verisimilitude has to be a part of any good novel, but Martin pushes the envelope just a little too far in dashing his readers hopes and expectations for any kind of happy resolution. In a certain way, he is a writer/conman who just keeps pushing his readers down the road of desperation and depression. Some readers like their novels dark and depressing, bereft of any hope or sentiment, maybe that’s what they expect out of life so that’s how they pick their novels. I don’t mind if my hero is in danger, that she has a challenge to resolve, that he suffers hardship or even dies, but there is a strange cruelty in Martin’s writing. His sadism as a writer transfers to a novel that makes people–his readers–suffer through all sorts of misfortunes and tragedies. The idea of dystopia is fundamental in the literature of the 20th and 21st century, and there is a long history of dystopic writings such as On the Beach, Brave New World, and 1984. Those are only three, but one might add Cormac McCarthy’s The Road to that list. Dystopia is certainly an important part of the Martin post-post-modern world, but it should be ingested in small dosis–too much, all at once, and it will make you a very dark person indeed. Martin’s world is a dystopia, no doubt, a decadent pseudo-medieval setting of wrecked castles, corrupt and traitorous rulers, and heroes who are not heroes. Martin’s dark take on his society was at first, for me, refreshing, mysterious, filled with interesting characters, but after 200 pages, the handwriting is on the wall. Why should I bother to depress myself with this kind of writing? Just when you think he’s letting one of his characters succeed, he kills them in some horrific way. He has a sadistic twist in his writing where he allows the evil people to wallow in their excesses while at the same time he punishes the good with nasty tragedies and unjust punishments. Novels, no matter how dark, need to allow their fictional inhabitants a chance to succeed and breath, and if the world does work, the evil will be vanquished and punished because in the real world we don’t get this kind of satisfaction very often, so we look for our heroes in books. The real world is a valley of tears, where the good people fail, our friends get sick and die, our relatives suffer from unemployment and exploitation. I have no doubt that many readers are right at home in Martin’s novels and do appreciate my comments, but I would have it no other way. Hundreds of thousands of readers like his books, but I am quite sure that there are plenty of readers out there who feel tricked, fooled, sad that they read all of those pages only to find that the bad guys have flourished, the good are all dead, and there really was no point in reading this in the first place. Life is too short to read novels that depress and sicken you. The ironic part of this is that when I started out reading this first novel I thought it was pretty good. No, I was wrong.

On Shylock and the Merchant of Venice

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Shakespeare’s strange creature, a moneylender from his “The Merchant of Venice” is a man driven by justice in a world that treats him unjustly. As a Jewish man living and working in a Christian community he is subject to strict laws regarding his physical movements, where he lives, who he does business with, and what business he can do. Nothing about how he is treated by the governing Christian authorities is just, fair, or unbiased. He must wear special clothing denoting his religious orientation so there can be no doubt by anyone who meets him that he is a Jew. Within the context of the play, the Christian moneylenders cannot and do not charge interest on loans they might make, but Shylock, being Jewish, is allowed to charge interest. He feels discriminated against because his Christian competitors can lend against him, cutting into his business. At one point, Bassanio, a young Venetian nobleman, asked Antonio for a loan. Antonio is having cash flow issues, so they turn to Shylock for the money, Bassanio borrows the money and Antonio guarantees the loan. In a curious turn of events, Shylock does not ask for interest, but if the loan is not paid on time, Shylock wants a pound of Antonio’s flesh. The play’s denouement occurs in a rather infamous courtroom scene presided over by a cross-dressing Portia who is acting as judge. Antonio has failed to repay the loan within the specified period, and Shylock is demanding justice. What Shylock does not understand, and what Portia understands only to well, is that justice is not meted out equally. There is justice for the Christian men who rule Venice, but women and Jews are forced to live with bias, bigotry, and injustice. As a woman, Portia is being forced to marry someone by her father, and as a woman, she has no say in the matter. The fact that she is cross-dressing in order to act within the trial pays tribute to the disenfranchised nature of all women within this society, their complete lack of agency and choice, and their inability to get justice from any of the established sources of power–the courts, the city council, or the Church. Shylock, though he keenly feels the bias and bigotry that informs his world, will insist on battling on this uneven playing field. Yet he fails to understand that his condition could be even worse because women have less rights than he has. An offer is made to Shylock to repay Bassanio’s loan, but since the details of the loan have not been fulfilled, Shylock wants his pound of Antonio’s flesh. In a very moving speech, the cross-dressing judge, Portia, urges Shylock to take the money and forget about justice, especially when Shylock insists on following the contract to the letter of the law, demanding, for once, that he be given justice and his contract demands a pound of flesh. Portia reminds Shylock that showing mercy and accepting the money would be a better solution than the one he is demanding. Shylock is immovable in his demand, but before Shylock can take his pound of flesh, Portia reminds him that if they are really going to stick to the letter of the law, then he, Shylock, cannot spill a drop of Antonio’s blood, which would be a violation of the contract which makes no mention of blood, just flesh. Shylock is foiled, Antonio is not hurt–all because one man, ignoring the good advice of someone who knows better, cannot understand the difference between mercy and justice and the fact that justice is not equal for all. The play speaks directly to the problem that justice is not meted out equally, that Lady Justice is not blind, and that all disadvantaged or marginal groups might hope for is a good solution, if not an equitable one. The play, then, is not hopeful when seen through a modern optic that deplores the obvious antisemitism marshaled by Antonio or the lack of agency which Portia must endure. One man is destroyed, another flourishes, justice is not observed, and the world turns.

On Shylock and the Merchant of Venice

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Shakespeare’s strange creature, a moneylender from his “The Merchant of Venice” is a man driven by justice in a world that treats him unjustly. As a Jewish man living and working in a Christian community he is subject to strict laws regarding his physical movements, where he lives, who he does business with, and what business he can do. Nothing about how he is treated by the governing Christian authorities is just, fair, or unbiased. He must wear special clothing denoting his religious orientation so there can be no doubt by anyone who meets him that he is a Jew. Within the context of the play, the Christian moneylenders cannot and do not charge interest on loans they might make, but Shylock, being Jewish, is allowed to charge interest. He feels discriminated against because his Christian competitors can lend against him, cutting into his business. At one point, Bassanio, a young Venetian nobleman, asked Antonio for a loan. Antonio is having cash flow issues, so they turn to Shylock for the money, Bassanio borrows the money and Antonio guarantees the loan. In a curious turn of events, Shylock does not ask for interest, but if the loan is not paid on time, Shylock wants a pound of Antonio’s flesh. The play’s denouement occurs in a rather infamous courtroom scene presided over by a cross-dressing Portia who is acting as judge. Antonio has failed to repay the loan within the specified period, and Shylock is demanding justice. What Shylock does not understand, and what Portia understands only to well, is that justice is not meted out equally. There is justice for the Christian men who rule Venice, but women and Jews are forced to live with bias, bigotry, and injustice. As a woman, Portia is being forced to marry someone by her father, and as a woman, she has no say in the matter. The fact that she is cross-dressing in order to act within the trial pays tribute to the disenfranchised nature of all women within this society, their complete lack of agency and choice, and their inability to get justice from any of the established sources of power–the courts, the city council, or the Church. Shylock, though he keenly feels the bias and bigotry that informs his world, will insist on battling on this uneven playing field. Yet he fails to understand that his condition could be even worse because women have less rights than he has. An offer is made to Shylock to repay Bassanio’s loan, but since the details of the loan have not been fulfilled, Shylock wants his pound of Antonio’s flesh. In a very moving speech, the cross-dressing judge, Portia, urges Shylock to take the money and forget about justice, especially when Shylock insists on following the contract to the letter of the law, demanding, for once, that he be given justice and his contract demands a pound of flesh. Portia reminds Shylock that showing mercy and accepting the money would be a better solution than the one he is demanding. Shylock is immovable in his demand, but before Shylock can take his pound of flesh, Portia reminds him that if they are really going to stick to the letter of the law, then he, Shylock, cannot spill a drop of Antonio’s blood, which would be a violation of the contract which makes no mention of blood, just flesh. Shylock is foiled, Antonio is not hurt–all because one man, ignoring the good advice of someone who knows better, cannot understand the difference between mercy and justice and the fact that justice is not equal for all. The play speaks directly to the problem that justice is not meted out equally, that Lady Justice is not blind, and that all disadvantaged or marginal groups might hope for is a good solution, if not an equitable one. The play, then, is not hopeful when seen through a modern optic that deplores the obvious antisemitism marshaled by Antonio or the lack of agency which Portia must endure. One man is destroyed, another flourishes, justice is not observed, and the world turns.

On firemen

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Being a fireman is a very strange job, and all of us non-firemen owe them a huge debt of gratitude every time they answer an alarm. Ever since men and women have lived in wooden structures there have been firemen, and history is checkered with the stories of horrendous fires that have destroyed hundreds of thousands of structures and tragically ended the lives of tens of thousands of people. Human beings fear uncontrolled fire, and they should. The fireman is a relatively modern invention of the late 18th century although loosely organized fire brigades have existed for centuries before that. Ben Franklin is often credited with organizing the first volunteer fire brigade in Philadelphia to fight this terrific scourge of colonial America, where most all of the homes were wooden structures of one kind or another, and open fires were used for both cooking and heating, making life in the colonies a dangerous proposition.To this day, houses burn down every day–lightening, bad wiring, dangerously stored chemicals, children playing with fire, unattended cooking fires, smoking in bed, malfunctioning furnace, bad hot water heater. Into the chaos steps the fireman, big coats, helmets, and boots, red trucks, hoses, and axes. To say that this job is dangerous is to underestimate, certainly, the real danger of an uncontrolled fire, and the collateral damage of collapsing structures,dangerous smoke and fumes, possible explosions and host of possible complications. Central Texas just lost ten firemen to an explosion in West,Texas. Firemen die every day in the line of duty, so one wonders what drives the soul of fireman to constantly put their life in danger on a regular basis.Of course, some people are fearless, and don’t give danger a second thought even though their lives may be on the line. Others are service oriented and want to help others through a sense of civic duty. Still others will do it as a job, although one wonders about how much money it takes to make a person risk their life for a paycheck. The fireman in American culture is iconic, and many a young boys have dreams of one day becoming a fireman. The job may seem romantic, heroic, mythic, maybe, but the reality is that people make mistakes,fires happen, and modern organized societies need fire-fighters, so young men,motivated by a series of factors, sign on as firemen. The job of fireman is,then, a paradox of danger and heroism. Perhaps it is this mix of the heroic and the tragic which creates this strange aura of romantic hero wearing a red helmet. I know firemen, and I appreciate their work, their rushing in where others fear to tread, their total lack of fear. Communities need public servants to help them deal with the chaos of disaster and the destruction of accidental fires. Literally, they might rescue us from our own mistakes and folly. As long as there are firemen, in spite of their (our) best efforts,tragedies will happen, and firemen will lose their lives, and the job of fireman will forever be an exotic mix of heroism, danger, and thrills lived out in smoke, fire, and water, soot and sweat. As long as firemen continue to save their communities, little boys will want to be firemen.

On firemen

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Being a fireman is a very strange job, and all of us non-firemen owe them a huge debt of gratitude every time they answer an alarm. Ever since men and women have lived in wooden structures there have been firemen, and history is checkered with the stories of horrendous fires that have destroyed hundreds of thousands of structures and tragically ended the lives of tens of thousands of people. Human beings fear uncontrolled fire, and they should. The fireman is a relatively modern invention of the late 18th century although loosely organized fire brigades have existed for centuries before that. Ben Franklin is often credited with organizing the first volunteer fire brigade in Philadelphia to fight this terrific scourge of colonial America, where most all of the homes were wooden structures of one kind or another, and open fires were used for both cooking and heating, making life in the colonies a dangerous proposition.To this day, houses burn down every day–lightening, bad wiring, dangerously stored chemicals, children playing with fire, unattended cooking fires, smoking in bed, malfunctioning furnace, bad hot water heater. Into the chaos steps the fireman, big coats, helmets, and boots, red trucks, hoses, and axes. To say that this job is dangerous is to underestimate, certainly, the real danger of an uncontrolled fire, and the collateral damage of collapsing structures,dangerous smoke and fumes, possible explosions and host of possible complications. Central Texas just lost ten firemen to an explosion in West,Texas. Firemen die every day in the line of duty, so one wonders what drives the soul of fireman to constantly put their life in danger on a regular basis.Of course, some people are fearless, and don’t give danger a second thought even though their lives may be on the line. Others are service oriented and want to help others through a sense of civic duty. Still others will do it as a job, although one wonders about how much money it takes to make a person risk their life for a paycheck. The fireman in American culture is iconic, and many a young boys have dreams of one day becoming a fireman. The job may seem romantic, heroic, mythic, maybe, but the reality is that people make mistakes,fires happen, and modern organized societies need fire-fighters, so young men,motivated by a series of factors, sign on as firemen. The job of fireman is,then, a paradox of danger and heroism. Perhaps it is this mix of the heroic and the tragic which creates this strange aura of romantic hero wearing a red helmet. I know firemen, and I appreciate their work, their rushing in where others fear to tread, their total lack of fear. Communities need public servants to help them deal with the chaos of disaster and the destruction of accidental fires. Literally, they might rescue us from our own mistakes and folly. As long as there are firemen, in spite of their (our) best efforts,tragedies will happen, and firemen will lose their lives, and the job of fireman will forever be an exotic mix of heroism, danger, and thrills lived out in smoke, fire, and water, soot and sweat. As long as firemen continue to save their communities, little boys will want to be firemen.

On Boston

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As I write this chaos continues to assail Boston, even in the wake of the tragic bombing of the Marathon this past Monday. Perhaps the added chaos this evening is related to that bombing. The FBI seemed to be hot on the trail of a couple of suspects today, so it would not be surprising to find out that a shooting at MIT and further police action in Watertown was related to the terror bombing of Monday’s race. Ever since moving to Spain in 1979 I have had to deal with terrorists, bombs, shootings, and all the associated law enforcement that go with the human tragedy of senseless violence in the name of some irrational nationalism or imaginary political ideology. In the end, all you have is dead innocent victims that had nothing to do with any of that fruitless political struggle. Terrorism destroys both the lives of the innocents and their families and the terrorists themselves, who turn themselves into common criminals because they see their only answer to life’s difficult questions to be violence. Since they cannot attack an entire country, they attack the innocent, a slaughter of lambs, if you will, but what they fail to recognize is that no government worth its salt will ever give into terrorists. The police just work all that much harder to destroy the terrorists, which really only means that the prisons and jails fill up with terrorists, the political objectives become obscure or forgotten, and new terrorists are born to take the place of those who are dead or in jail. Terrorism is a snake eating its own tail, self-perpetuating, blind, filled with faulty thinking and irrational objectives, and it turns normal people into common criminals–murderers, thieves, liars. In the end, no one is particularly happy with the results. The terrorists are dead or in jail, their objectives unfulfilled; the victims are dead or grieving for with the loss of a loved one; law enforcement is frustrated because they could never prevent any of it–they only get clean-up duties. The big problem with bombers is that they never really understand that no matter how much they hurt the people they hate, those people will, eventually, bounce back. Those who have died are beyond reach of pain and their struggles are over. Those who have lost limbs will learn to walk again, readjust their lives, have families, love, grow old, and will eventually die of old age in God’s good time. And all those idealistic political agendas will have served nothing, nothing will change, nothing will be achieved but the destruction of some lives. The funny/ironic part about terrorists is that they are just normal people until they let themselves be lead astray by faulty irrational thinking and a belief that political goals can be achieved through violence. Most political extremism is illusory, foolish, irrational, vacuous, superficial, and/or unrealistic. Bombs will never change the basic objectives of a free market capitalism. If fact, I would hazard to say that terrorism does the exact opposite of what it proposes to do and reinforces democratic objectives and strengthens governments and law enforcement. In the meantime, however, our hearts are broken, our tears burn, the lump in our throats does not go away, and we stare at the ground in shame and horror, unable to understand why our world is so imperfect and broken.

On Boston

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As I write this chaos continues to assail Boston, even in the wake of the tragic bombing of the Marathon this past Monday. Perhaps the added chaos this evening is related to that bombing. The FBI seemed to be hot on the trail of a couple of suspects today, so it would not be surprising to find out that a shooting at MIT and further police action in Watertown was related to the terror bombing of Monday’s race. Ever since moving to Spain in 1979 I have had to deal with terrorists, bombs, shootings, and all the associated law enforcement that go with the human tragedy of senseless violence in the name of some irrational nationalism or imaginary political ideology. In the end, all you have is dead innocent victims that had nothing to do with any of that fruitless political struggle. Terrorism destroys both the lives of the innocents and their families and the terrorists themselves, who turn themselves into common criminals because they see their only answer to life’s difficult questions to be violence. Since they cannot attack an entire country, they attack the innocent, a slaughter of lambs, if you will, but what they fail to recognize is that no government worth its salt will ever give into terrorists. The police just work all that much harder to destroy the terrorists, which really only means that the prisons and jails fill up with terrorists, the political objectives become obscure or forgotten, and new terrorists are born to take the place of those who are dead or in jail. Terrorism is a snake eating its own tail, self-perpetuating, blind, filled with faulty thinking and irrational objectives, and it turns normal people into common criminals–murderers, thieves, liars. In the end, no one is particularly happy with the results. The terrorists are dead or in jail, their objectives unfulfilled; the victims are dead or grieving for with the loss of a loved one; law enforcement is frustrated because they could never prevent any of it–they only get clean-up duties. The big problem with bombers is that they never really understand that no matter how much they hurt the people they hate, those people will, eventually, bounce back. Those who have died are beyond reach of pain and their struggles are over. Those who have lost limbs will learn to walk again, readjust their lives, have families, love, grow old, and will eventually die of old age in God’s good time. And all those idealistic political agendas will have served nothing, nothing will change, nothing will be achieved but the destruction of some lives. The funny/ironic part about terrorists is that they are just normal people until they let themselves be lead astray by faulty irrational thinking and a belief that political goals can be achieved through violence. Most political extremism is illusory, foolish, irrational, vacuous, superficial, and/or unrealistic. Bombs will never change the basic objectives of a free market capitalism. If fact, I would hazard to say that terrorism does the exact opposite of what it proposes to do and reinforces democratic objectives and strengthens governments and law enforcement. In the meantime, however, our hearts are broken, our tears burn, the lump in our throats does not go away, and we stare at the ground in shame and horror, unable to understand why our world is so imperfect and broken.