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Reality VS Excuses

 For a little over a year now I have been following a young lady on a few different social media platforms and a Telegram, phone app, channel. She lives in Kyiv, the capitol city of Ukraine. In these places she documents her experiences of living in a country that is being invaded. Living in a city that is under constant missile and drone attack. She shoots photos and videos of being under missile attack with her cat. Photos and videos of the aftermath of these attacks on her city and country. And her and her cat. She is tired a lot. She also shoots photos and videos of her daily life. And I am struck by how normal they can appear. She goes to get coffee. Goes to work. Goes to places where she can hike in nature and try to be detached from the reality that is living in a war time city and country. Of just living her life to the best of her ability during a very difficult time. A few days ago the President of her country fired the Minister of War for reasons that I have no clue abou...
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The Stranger in the Mirror

 In the late 1990's a Television show appeared called Babylon 5. I found it after it's run was over. I very much liked, and still like, this show. It was Science Fiction, with a prewritten 5 year story arc, good casting, good writing, and good acting. In my opinion. In this show there were two very advanced races of beings. One was called the Vorlons. The other was called the Shadows. They were represented as being millions of years older and more advanced than humanity and the other "younger" races. Each race had a demand question. What I mean by that is a question that demanded an answer. It was in this question that they figured out who you were and how they could use you. For the Vorlons the question was "Who are you"? For the Shadows the question was "What do you want"? For most people these questions are very hard to answer. Even if, or especially if, we think that the answers to these questions are self evident. And, I also submit for your c...
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Law and Humanity

 I recently wrote about the importance and the use of the Rule of Law. And I am still absolutely committed to the idea that the Rule of Law must be paramount. Not the rule of the strong. Not the rule of the rich. Not the rule of the "elite". The Rule of Law. And I also want to write about The Rule of Law and Humanity. I believe that Law and Humanity must not just co-exist. They must be intertwined. So often throughout our history the law did not have any Humanity in it. For example, in the United States Slavery was legal and people were property that their "masters" could do anything they wanted to. And helping slaves to escape, teaching them how to read, those were illegal. During Jim Crow time in the United States it was not legal, per say, to lynch Black People. Although it may as well have been. The people who were supposed to enforce the law were on the side of the lynchers. So it may as well have been legal. During the time of the Nazis in Germany it was legal...
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Nuremburg Trials

 In November of 1945, with a big part of Europe in ruins as a result of World War Two, the Allied Powers, France, The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, the Soviet Union, and the United States of America, convened a "Special International Court" in Nuremberg Germany. They chose this location as it had been the location of many of the largest Nazi rallies during the early Nazi regime. And they really wanted to make clear, thru this symbolism and other things, that the Third Reich was DEAD and gone. In the subsequent trials they tried the people who were still alive who had been leaders of the Nazi machine and many of the functionaries who carried out the orders of those leaders. In the initial trial the defendants were 24 Nazi leaders who were indicted on charges of Crimes Against Peace, Crimes Against Humanity, War Crimes, and Conspiracy to Commit these crimes. Of those initial trials 21of 24 defendants were convicted. In subsequent trials more were convict...
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When Did I

 From 1987 to 1990 there was a television show called "My Two Dads". Was a pretty decent show from what I saw, which was not much. I saw maybe a half a dozen episodes. That was about it. There was this one scene that I saw that I have remembered ever since. It is the only scene that I remember from that show. That is how powerfully it impacted with me. In this scene the daughter, who was twelve or thirteen I think, had done something that was considered rather bad and one of the two dads, played by Paul Reiser, was taking her too task. He was obviously angry and while not quite yelling was very intense. And his hand, with his index finger extended, was shaking in her face. And in mid career he just stopped. He put his hand in front of his face, with his hand clenched and index finger pointed up, said with a mix of surprise and ugh, "When did I grow my father's finger"? That is the only thing that I remember from that show. I felt like it was important, did not r...
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Differences of Opinion

 For a long time now there have been memes and other such stuff going around the internet, especially social media, that goes like this: "I saw a post that I didn't agree with I didn't get offended I didn't comment I didn't feel the need to change their mind I still like the person I just kept scrolling and went on with my day More should practice this" The first thing that I want to say is that I understand why this sentiment keeps getting put out there. The amount of noise going on in this world these days is amazing. And a lot of it is pretty ridiculous. And people get overwhelmed with all the noise and just wish it would stop. I get it. My problem with this sentiment is that it gives silence to those who are causing genuine harm to our society and those of us in it. And I am also reminded of the "Good" Germans of the 1920's, 30's, and 40's. They were the people who did not make noise. Did not see things as any more than a disagreement...
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Religion and Me

 When I was young my Mum used to take me to the Methodist church. When we lived way out in the country there was one about a mile away. Also out in the middle of nowhere. When we moved into the "big city", about 15,000 people, the church was about 2+ miles away. And for a lot of Sundays my Mom would dress me, and the brothers and sisters still at home, up nicely and take us to the service. This church had a 9 pin 2 lane bowling alley downstairs where one had to set the pins by hand. I discovered that fairly quickly. My Mom had a lot of us to watch so slipping away was not that difficult. And I always liked to explore. So I did and I found this bowling alley. So I would often go downstairs and hang out by myself in that bowling alley. I was the most social introvert you ever met. I craved company and hated having people around me. Weird I guess. I actually tried bowling once during the service. And of course, it made too much noise and one of the church folk came down and caug...
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