Apr. 07, 2002 - 20:37 MST

THE WONDERING JEW

Eh ?

Elie Wiesel in an article in today's Parade Magazine again emphasizes that we should remember. Remember the past, remember the cruelty, the starvation forced on helpless people, also, remember the Death Camps that the world seems to want to forget.

How far are we from the same fate if the fanatics conquer us as they might easily do if we are busy forgetting and disregarding what is going on, Over There. Over There might be Over Here if we ignore what happens to other people.

He makes a point, often said by other people -- a fanatic only sees black and white -- no shades of gray, one is either completely for the fanatic and his aims and ideals or is a deadly enemy. No room for mercy, no room for thought, no room for compassion, no room for understanding.

With that mindset it seems, violence and terror are merely tools to herd the human sheep -- usable by the fanatics and severely punished by death to those who feel differently. Fanatics and terrorists push their programs to the maximum limit to force obedient mindless zombies to do their will.

How long will we Joe Blows say in essence, "Yeah, yeah -- lettum kill each other, save us the trouble." The Twin Towers demonstrated we are vulnerable as any overseas country. True, running around with our small flags flapping on cars is a small demonstration of patriotism, however each man flying a flag from his car without making an effort to gather with people and organizations who are attempting to reverse the fatal tide of fanaticism seem to me to be just doing lip service.

We didn't see many flags flying from cars before 9/11 did we ? Do people think that flying the flag will do anything other than say, "Hey, I am one of the good guys," will that further the effort to prevent the one way thinking that makes fanatics ?

Or will we simply lay back, ignoring the terrible threat until we have been overrun and then saying in all stupidity, "Eh ?" . . . . . . .

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