Re: Today's Bad News
Reply #375 –
The political, economic and military situation is unchanged. This is mostly pandering to the crazies. It's great for the crazy Muslims and the crazy Jews, neither of whom matter much in the US, and the crazy Christians, who do. A bit like ISIL; though with a different narrative (i.e. their reading of the Book of Revelation), they too want to hasten Armageddon and the end of the world.
I don't think we have that kind of crazy among us anymore, there might have been a couple in the old Opera forums. For the rest of us it is more the division of unavoidable trouble (e.g. Saudi Arabia and Iran are not going to find peace and tranquility through Buddhist meditation), from trouble we that could do without. This symbolic gesture would be in the latter category. Except for the crazies this doesn't have any tangible effect, and most likely it will signify nothing in the long run. Another endtime scenario is appearing though.
I believe many, many years ago I claimed in the Opera forums, with great confidence, that the Israel-Palestinian/Arab conflict was essentially over, and Israel had won. Israel had won separate peace with Egypt, Turkey, Jordan and Saudi Arabia. Iran was sidelined, Iraq was disrupted, only Syria remained (and Syria could be bought). I also believe that was where I put up my Israel-Kurdistan-Iran model of the troubles in the Middle East: As the Israel-Palestinian conflict died down, the Kurdish question in Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran would escalate, and finally we would have the great showdown between Iran and Saudi Arabia. Now 15 years later it seems clear that history didn't follow my grand scheme. The drivers are the same, but Israel dithered. Dictators are trouble, but they can be bought off, countries broken in civil war can't. Instead of Israel, Kurdistan, Iran sequentially, we have them simultaneously.
I definitely wouldn't have thought so 15 years ago, but now there may be a sequence of events that will lead to the end of Israel as a Jewish state, the motivation for the two-state solution. Maybe future historians will say that fall began with a small misstep like this.