"Of all the creatures, man is the most detestable. Of the entire brood, he's the one that possesses malice. He is the only creature that inflicts pain for sport, knowing it to be pain.

The fact that man knows right from wrong proves his intellectual superiority to the other creatures; but the fact that he can do wrong proves his moral inferiority to any creature that cannot."

Mark Twain 

Cause of Wars

“Peace? Why, my fellow citizens, is there any man here or any woman, let me say is there any 'child here, who does not know that the seed of war in the modern world is industrial and commercial rivalry?”

Speech at the Coliseum in St. Louis, Missouri, on the Peace Treaty and the League of Nations (5 September 1919), as published in "The Public Papers of Woodrow Wilson (Authorized Edition) War and Peace: Presidential Messages, Addresses, and Public Papers (1917-1924) Volume I Page 637. Addresses Delivered by President Wilson on his Western Tour - September 4 To September 25, 1919. From 66th Congress, 1st Session, Senate Document No. 120, and in Addresses of President Wilson : Addresses Delivered by President Wilson on his Western Tour - September 4 To September 25, 1919 - On The League of Nations, Treaty of Peace with Germany, Industrial Conditions, High Cost of Living, Race Riots, Etc. (1919)

Governance of affairs

“Since I entered politics, I have chiefly had men's views confided to me privately. Some of the biggest men in the United States, in the field of commerce and manufacture, are afraid of somebody, are afraid of something. They know that there is a power somewhere so organized, so subtle, so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive, that they had better not speak above their breath when they speak in condemnation of it.” 

Woodrow Wilson – The New Freedom: A call for the emancipation of the generous energies of a people (Google eBook)

“Benevolence, Or Justice?”

“We have, not one or two, but many, fields of endeavor into which it is difficult, if not impossible, for the independent man to enter. We have restricted credit, we have restricted opportunity, we have controlled development, and we have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated, governments in the civilized world — no longer a government by free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and the duress of small groups of dominant men.”

Woodrow Wilson – The New Freedom: A call for the emancipation of the generous energies of a people (Google eBook) - Section IX: “Benevolence, Or Justice?”

Musings on Franklin D. Roosevelt Speech to Democratic National Convention (June 27, 1936)

Faced with the rise of Fascism in Europe, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt chose to warn his countrymen of the internal dangers to our country from what he called “economic royalists”.  As I read the speech, I thought how penetrating his remarks were and how pertinent they continue to be. Here are some excerpts from FDR’s prophetic speech on the occasion of accepting his nomination for President of the United States at the Democratic National Convention of 1936:

… That very word freedom, in itself and of necessity, suggests freedom from some restraining power. In 1776 we sought freedom from the tyranny of a political autocracy-from the eighteenth century royalists who held special privileges from the crown. It was to perpetuate their privilege that they governed without the consent of the governed; that they denied the right of free assembly and free speech; that they restricted the worship of God; that they put the average man's property and the average man's life in pawn to the mercenaries of dynastic power; that they regimented the people.

And so it was to win freedom from the tyranny of political autocracy that the American Revolution was fought. That victory gave the business of governing into the hands of the average man, who won the right with his neighbors to make and order his own destiny through his own Government. Political tyranny was wiped out at Philadelphia on July 4, 1776.

Since that struggle, however, man's inventive genius released new forces in our land which reordered the lives of our people.. The age of machinery, of railroads; of steam and electricity; the telegraph and the radio; mass production, mass distribution-all of these combined to bring forward a new civilization and with it a new problem for those who sought to remain free.

For out of this modern civilization economic royalists carved new dynasties. New kingdoms were built upon concentration of control over material things. Through new uses of corporations, banks and securities, new machinery of industry and agriculture, of labor and capital-all undreamed of by the fathers-the whole structure of modern life was impressed into this royal service.

There was no place among this royalty for our many thousands of small business men and merchants who sought to make a worthy use of the American system of initiative and profit. They were no more free than the worker or the farmer. Even honest and progressive-minded men of wealth, aware of their obligation to their generation, could never know just where they fitted into this dynastic scheme of things.

It was natural and perhaps human that the privileged princes of these new economic dynasties, thirsting for power, reached out for control over Government itself. They created a new despotism and wrapped it in the robes of legal sanction. In its service new mercenaries sought to regiment the people, their labor, and their property. And as a result the average man once more confronts the problem that faced the Minute Man.

The hours men and women worked, the wages they received, the conditions of their labor-these had passed beyond the control of the people, and were imposed by this new industrial dictatorship. The savings of the average family, the capital of the small business man, the investments set aside for old age-other people's money-these were tools which the new economic royalty used to dig itself in.

Those who tilled the soil no longer reaped the rewards which were their right. The small measure of their gains was decreed by men in distant cities.

Throughout the Nation, opportunity was limited by monopoly. Individual initiative was crushed in the cogs of a great machine. The field open for free business was more and more restricted. Private enterprise, indeed, became too private. It became privileged enterprise, not free enterprise.

An old English judge once said: "Necessitous men are not free men." Liberty requires opportunity to make a living-a living decent according to the standard of the time, a living which gives man not only enough to live by, but something to live for.

For too many of us the political equality we once had won was meaningless in the face of economic inequality. A small group had concentrated into their own hands an almost complete control over other people's property, other people's money, other people's labor-other people's lives. For too many of us life was no longer free; liberty no longer real; men could no longer follow the pursuit of happiness.

Against economic tyranny such as this, the American citizen could appeal only to the organized power of Government. The collapse of 1929 showed up the despotism for what it was. The election of 1932 was the people's mandate to end it. Under that mandate it is being ended.

The royalists of the economic order have conceded that political freedom was the business of the Government, but they have maintained that economic slavery was nobody's business. They granted that the Government could protect the citizen in his right to vote, but they denied that the Government could do anything to protect the citizen in his right to work and his right to live.

Today we stand committed to the proposition that freedom is no half-and-half affair. If the average citizen is guaranteed equal opportunity in the polling place, he must have equal opportunity in the market place.

These economic royalists complain that we seek to overthrow the institutions of America. What they really complain of is that we seek to take away their power. Our allegiance to American institutions requires the overthrow of this kind of power. In vain they seek to hide behind the Flag and the Constitution. In their blindness they forget what the Flag and the Constitution stand for. Now, as always, they stand for democracy, not tyranny; for freedom, not subjection; and against a dictatorship by mob rule and the over-privileged alike.

The brave and clear platform adopted by this Convention, to which I heartily subscribe, sets forth that Government in a modern civilization has certain inescapable obligations to its citizens, among which are protection of the family and the home, the establishment of a democracy of opportunity, and aid to those overtaken by disaster.

But the resolute enemy within our gates is ever ready to beat down our words unless in greater courage we will fight for them….

We are poor indeed if this Nation cannot afford to lift from every recess of American life the dread fear of the unemployed that they are not needed in the world. We cannot afford to accumulate a deficit in the books of human fortitude….

Better the occasional faults of a Government that lives in a spirit of charity than the consistent omissions of a Government frozen in the ice of its own indifference….

Here in America we are waging a great and successful war (FDR is not talking here of WW II, which had not yet started, but rather the war against our own “Economic Royalists”). It is not alone a war against want and destitution and economic demoralization. It is more than that; it is a war for the survival of democracy. We are fighting to save a great and precious form of government for ourselves and for the world.

I accept the commission you have tendered me. I join with you. I am enlisted for the duration of the war.

Saudi woman driver freed after agreeing to quit campaign | World news | The Guardian

Saudi Arabia, the only country in the world that bans women from driving, arrested activist Manal al-Sharif for “violating public order”. Her lawyer said she had been charged with driving without a license. But, a happy ending. She was released and "Sharif expressed "profound gratitude" to King Abdullah for ordering her release and appeared to abandon her call for women to be allowed to drive".

Saudi woman driver freed after agreeing to quit campaign | World news | The Guardian

In defense of Tony Kushner

At first I thought I would just a post a small comment but I felt compelled to speak in defense of a fellow human-being.   Forgive me for haranguing.

Here is an ethical individual who realizes the importance of critical inquiry and the search for truth as essential aspects of Judaic faith in whose sacred texts knowledge and wisdom are emphasized in achieving cognition and the realization of a higher Self. Wisdom, as the ability to differentiate good from evil, allows for moral behavior. Wisdom, as knowledge that is true and right, allows for problems to be solved and avoided. Wisdom aids creative forces versus destructive ones; helps establish order and harmony over chaos. Such wisdom we need to heal the wounds of the past and to build a better future in peace.

“The LORD founded the earth by wisdom and established the heavens by understanding.” (Proverbs 3:19)

“By wisdom a house is built, and through understanding it is established; through knowledge its rooms are filled with rare and beautiful treasures.” (Proverbs 24:3-4)

Can such a house be built for all people to peacefully live in? Compelled by a pure heart and intentions, many, such as this individual, seek wisdom that is not worldly or evil, a wisdom that can help built such a house. “But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, and easy to be intreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and without hypocrisy. And the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace of them that make peace.” (James 3:17-17) Such individuals seek wisdom and understanding needed to build houses in peace, and yet they find themselves assailed by those of same creed in an attack that shows hypocrisy on moral grounds while harming and stifling the pursuit of peace.

“My people are destroyed from lack of knowledge.” (Hosea 4:6)

This dire warning ought to be taken seriously. Not only the censure against this individual shows the powerful current drowning out voices of reconciliation in action, not only it endangers all people in the Middle-East and all over the world by inciting the unintelligently passionate ones on all sides, but more importantly, right here at home, it undermines that which is vital to the existence of democratic societies—freedom to enlighten. Such a rough-treatment being directed at this individual is a brazen attempt at suppressing that most dangerous of voices, the voice of reason; and that is alarming. This individual had eloquence and the support of influential individuals coming to his aid and so he was able to speak in his own defense. But what about all of those voices that are silenced and suppressed? If this individual can be bulldozed openly in a free country and within an academic environment, I wonder what treatment people are getting who are left with no homes, water, let alone a homeland.

Dialogue and critique are virtues that all lovers of liberty and reason support and find essential in measuring freedom here, in Israel, in Palestine, in Iran, or anywhere else. The right to question the wisdom of one’s own nation ought to be allowed if citizens are to remain free, yet this individual is being pu(ni)shed for questioning the policies of a foreign country?! At issue is liberty, the freedom to speak and criticize constructively. Aryeh Neier was castigated for defending the despicable Nazi’s right to march to Skokie, and perhaps his defense of enemies’ civil liberties went over-board for some. But does that imply that no one can speak without reprimand in defense of those that are deemed enemies but who are in reality equally entitled to escape oppression in their own neighborhood and in their own homeland?!  It is hypocrisy for us as humans to “remember”, to “never forget” deliverance by Lord’s hand from Egypt, from the horrific experiences of Holocaust, from the bowels of darkness, ignorance, hatred and malice, while subjugating another nation to force. We are commanded to remember and such remembrance ought not to serve oppression but liberty for all. Liberty, knowledge, and wisdom are virtues that accommodate and should not threaten authentic peace(ful). And such virtues ought to compel us to speak in defense of the likes of Tony Kushner.