It may be wise not to look upon President Donald Trump’s defection from the 2015 Paris Agreement(l’Accord de Paris) as a decision dooming our ailing planet. Nor can it be seen as reflecting the will of the citizens of the United States. Climate change remains a major concern for countries around the world, the survival of planet Earth being at stake. If planet Earth dies, we all die. With respect to climate change, action cannot be delayed as we are already seconds before midnight.
Three European Nations React
A mere hour after President Trump announced his decision to withdraw from the Paris Agreement, Italy, Germany, and France stated jointly that the Paris Agreement could not be renegotiated. (See United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, Wikipedia.)
Again, a mere hour after Mr Trump made his decision public, French President Emmanuel Macron offered a refuge in France to American climate scientists. Some of these scientists, and they are numerous and highly skilled, have gone to Washington and warned President Trump of the imminent danger climate change posed, but to no avail. It could well be that the President’s decision is not an American decision, but Donald Trump’s decision. Ironically, President Trump’s daughter Ivanka and her husband, Jared Kushner, opposed the President’s decision.
But I am also reading that there is considerable resistance in the United States. After listening to former President Obama’s farewell address, I wrote that he probably felt that a democracy was its own corrective or “that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.” (Abraham Lincoln ‘s Gettysburg Address.)
“Thirty cities, three states, more than 80 university presidents, and more than 100 companies are part of a growing group intending to uphold the Paris Agreement, the climate-change accord that President Donald Trump on Thursday announced the US would be exiting.”
The group is being organized by billionaire philanthropist Michael Bloomberg.
Michael Bloomberg, the UN special envoy for cities and climate change, at the C40 Mayors Summit in Mexico City on December 1. Reuters
Conclusion
After Mr Trump’s visit to Europe, Chancellor Merkel‘s political rivals agreed with her that Europe would have to look after itself. However, it turns out that Mr Trump’s decision to pull the United States out of the Paris Agreement has unleashed widespread disappointment, in the United States in particular, but also everywhere.
Mr Trump may be a dangerous man, but he is predictable. He announced that he would not allow Muslims to enter the United States and is now planning another travel ban, but Americans will find a way to defeat it. Three men were stabbed and two died protecting Muslim women on a train in Portland, Oregon. The United States has long been a refuge to the oppressed. President Trump’s Islamophobia has not affected all the citizens of the United States. Besides, it is selective. He travelled to Saudi Arabia and signed an arms deal.
President Trump is also trying to take away from Americans what protection they enjoyed under the Affordable Act Care. Law-abiding American citizens pay their taxes and are therefore entitled to the security citizens of other and poorer countries enjoy.
The next link takes the reader to comments by Sir Richard Branson who may be saying that, in a democracy, if a people is threatened, it will rush to its own rescue.
Times have changed. Medical tests are now performed using sophisticated tools that often cost a fortune. Such innovations and other changes have made the cost of healthcare prohibitive. Consequently, it is no longer possible for most individuals to pay health bills out-of-pocket. The rising cost of healthcare has also led to the unaffordable premiums demanded by Insurance Companies and to aberrations such as refusing benefits to the victims of a catastrophic disease. Diseases such as cancer are viewed as pre-existing and therefore uninsurable conditions.
Insurance and Pharmaceutical Companies
Insurance companies are businesses and, as businesses, their main objective is to make a profit. They therefore adjust rules and raise premiums accordingly. The same is true of pharmaceutical companies. Medications are priced so pharmaceutical companies make money. It is not possible to make America “great again” by ignoring so obvious a fact as costly advancements in medicine.
A large number of societies, in Europe for instance, have recognized that individuals cannot afford today the healthcare they could afford fifty years ago. Therefore, governments around the world have relieved citizens by funding healthcare, thereby keeping up with the times and ensuring the safety of citizens. The United States has been slow to modify its social contract. But on 23 August 2010, the Affordable Care Act was voted into law.
Life as Privilege
The rules started to change after World War II. Governments around the world, beginning to my knowledge with the Scandinavian countries, set about putting into place, social programmes that protected the people. In the United States, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt‘s New Deal brought relief to impoverished Americans. As for the Affordable Care Act, it is also a new deal that has made it possible for millions of Americans to see a doctor. However, unconscionable and somewhat petty Republican Senators seem bent on destroying it and letting people die, women first. A Republican Senate, led by Mitch McConnell, is therefore making it abundantly clear that life is not a right, but a privilege, the privilege of those who can pay. What will they do if they fall on hard times?
The Affordable Care Act is essential legislation and it cannot be taken away from United States citizens unless Senate has something better to propose and to implement. Societies must face reality. Healthcare is too expensive for individuals to protect themselves. Even those who have health insurance are denied the care they require. Nations therefore need a health plan. Besides, a new administration has nothing to gain by picking up its rifles and shooting at the former administration.
The American Civil War is over and, according to the Declaration of Independence, one has a right to Life.
Detail of Elihu Vedder‘s mural Government (1896), in the Library of Congress. The title figure bears a tablet inscribed with Lincoln‘s famous phrase. (Photo and caption credit: Wikipedia)
President Obama bids his Nation Farewell
On Tuesday 10 January 2017, President Obama gave his farewell address to his nation. The subscript was: “Yes we can,” his rallying cry and perhaps the rallying cry of most democracies. Democracy is not a perfect form of government. Too many voters are uninformed or misinformed, but a democracy remains the best form of government we have. However, on 8 November 2016, democracy failed the United States. Americans voted into office a nominee who is unable to play his role as President of the United States. I suspect a large number of his supporters did not know Mr Trump. It seems, moreover, that rules deemed sacred under his predecessors have to be less stringent to accommodate President-elect Donald Trump. It started during the electoral campaign.
According to Canadian scholar Marshall McLuhan the medium is the message. I may be rearranging Mr McLuhan’s theory, but not by much. When Americans voted Mr Trump into the presidency, they probably embraced an image. They saw in Donald Trump a successful white American and felt so comforted that they elected him and conferred upon him a degree of immunity. In the case of Mr Trump, sexual misconduct seemed a lesser offence. So did lying. In fact, whether or not Mr Trump had paid his taxes did not seem to matter, nor did his inability to fulfill the duties of a president of the United States. He’s “the Donald!”
Mr Trump may have known he would need assistance. He appointed his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, as his main advisor. As for Mr Kushner’s wife, Ivanka Trump, she will probably play the role of first lady more than Melania Trump, Mr Trump’s wife. Mr Kushner has not come up through the ranks, but it doesn’t seem to matter. It is as though the presidency were under revision.
Still fresh in my mind is the obstructionism and scapegoating President Obama faced day after day. He could not do anything right, but incoming President Trump is unlikely ever to do anything wrong. I suspect Mr Trump is the one who will criticize the press, and not the press Mr Trump.
President-elect Donald J Trump
Democracy
Yet, as noted above, it appears President Obama is of the opinion that democracy is its own corrective. In a democracy, the government is the people. One elects one’s leader(s) and one then attempts to keep them honest. There is little doubt that, four years from now, Americans will vote again and that a different president may be elected, but protecting the planet cannot wait four years.
President Obama’s address was indeed empowering. Americans remain the government. At times, President Obama seemed to be inviting Americans to get organized and to resist: “Yes we can.”
Can fallible democracy be its own remedy? It may be, in the long run. But in the short term mistakes may be made. President Obama stated that he would support a good health care plan, if a good health care plan was proposed. I could be mistaken, but it seems President Obama was expressing confidence in Donald Trump. It may have been simple civility.
And now, Mr Trump is saying that “big pharma” is “getting away with murder.” That would be Bernie Sanders‘ opinion. Pharmaceutical companies are like Insurance Companies. They are businesses and their goal is to make a profit.
However Senate took a “major step toward repealing health care law.” As a result, there could be another election sooner than we think. There is a huge price to pay for destabilizing and humiliating a nation. And there is an even greater price to pay for letting less affluent citizens suffer and die. What these politicians are doing is denying the middle class and the poor the services the well-to-do can afford.
Conclusion
I will miss President Obama enormously. The United States’ first black president earned the respect and the admiration of the world. For eight years, a humble but brilliant Barack Obama was the world’s finest leader.
I have read several articles about Mr Trump and my opinion remains unchanged. In fact, I believe he may jeopardize the safety of I do not understand that the Republicans chose him as their nominee to the office of President of the United States.
However, Republicans have started to distance themselves from Mr Trump because of his avowed intention to prevent not only Muslims, but Mexicans and people originating from Latin-American countries, from entering the United States.
Although Mr Trump has lost the support of some key members of the Republican party, he remains defiant. He will finance his way to the Presidency. But will the citizens of the United States vote for a man who does not represent a party?
The Atlantic Monthly
The Atlantic Monthly published a series of articles on Mr Trump, one of which is about his mind. I am a little wary of such articles, but do believe that Mr Trump’s manners and language preclude his being considered an appropriate candidate to the office of President of the United States. As we say in Quebec, Donald Trump n’est pas sortable (he’s not fit to be seen). It may therefore be difficult for those Republicans who have turned their back on him to adopt a new stance.
The tragic Orlando Massacre invites serious reflection on the issue of discrimination, a sturdy perennial. The President of the United States cannot discriminate against people on the basis of ethnicity and faith. Nor can he discriminate against people on the basis of gender and sexual orientation. But Mr Trump does discriminate against Muslims, all Muslims, and Mexicans as well as other Americans of Latin-American origin. The United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that:
“Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status.”
See Discrimination, Wikipedia.)
The good news is that Mr Trump now agrees with President Obama “for watch list gun ban.” Wayne LaPierre of the National Rifle Association disagrees, but the fact remains that one cannot shoot without a gun and that arming people will not address the problem of terrorism. Omar Mateen had access to a powerful weapon and several guns.
The Second Amendment lost its validity the moment the United States had a militia. However, if one enjoys marksmanship, there are facilities where such individuals may engage in their sport. Marksmen and women will not hurt anyone if their weapon is kept in a secure area. Sadly, some gun owners do not put their weapon(s) away from the reach of children which has caused siblings to shoot a sister or a brother. Children may think the gun is a toy.
Walking down the street carrying a gun can also lead to tragedies. For instance, the police may at times pull the trigger too quickly because of fear of being shot. It would be my opinion that endangering the life of innocent people is a breach of the social contract and that it negates the Second Amendment.
The Pulse
The Pulse was a club where L.G.B.T. (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and trans) socialized as is their right. Discriminating against people on the basis of sexual orientation seems extremely narrow-minded. As a WordPress colleague pointed out to me, people of different sexual orientation have a right to Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
I agree fully. Gays deserve the same respect as other law-abiding members of society, which includes gathering on a Saturday evening to socialize and relax. No one was creating a disturbance at the Pulse. I encourage you to read Half-man of Orlando (colltales.com). Virginia Woolf wrote Orlando (1928).
Islamic Fundamentalism
As stated in an earlier post, although Mr Mateen claimed allegiance to the Islamic State, it does not appear he was directed to kill for Isil. However, as he was in the process of murdering people, he did tell the police that the United States should “stop bombing” Syria and Iraq. The Obama administration considers the Orlando massacre a crime of terror and hate, and it will welcome more Muslim refugees. The refugees are the victims of Islamic fundamentalism and rigid autocracies.
Americans are divided with respect to the role they should play in the Middle East, but in the end, it will be, and should be, for the Middle East to determine its fate.
Conclusion
In short, the Orlando Massacre has so many facets and it raises so many issues that it may well be one of the most significant events in recent history.
Our next topic is angels and archangels. They are zoomorphic beings because they combine the features of a human being and those of an animal.
So this post is an in-between update.
I had to devote the last few days to politics. I accepted to do some writing. Canada will be electing a Prime Minister next Fall and the choice is growing clearer as the days grow shorter. I believe it will be a victory for the Liberal Party of Canada, led by Justin Trudeau who is energetic, young and has a great deal of charisma. However, by then, the Russians might have moved in.
US President Barack Obama
I will discuss briefly President Obama’s Republican Congress. The results of the mid-term election were devastating. Mr. Boehner’s goal is to get tax-cuts for the rich. It is as though former slave owners wanted to be compensated for the loss of their slaves. They are wealthy once again, but they buy and elect candidates who are anti-tax extremists.
At any rate, the gap between the rich and the poor will be wider and too many Americans will be lining up in soup kitchens. Americans can also expect a more robust military engagement in the Middle East. There may not be money to feed and house the citizens of the United States, but hardline Republicans have not progressed beyond the Civil War and Manifest Destiny. There’s money for wars. Getting on one’s horse, armed to the teeth, and rushing into wars is behaviour anti-tax extremists in Congress will not object to. They live in the past.
It could also be that Congress will attempt to jeopardize the Affordable Care Act, which means that Americans who are diagnosed with cancer will be left to die in pain because an Insurance Company will look upon their illness as a pre-existing condition. There may be a rapid end to the Affordable Care Act.
Countries depend on the Middle East: Oil
Many countries depend on the Middle East because of its oil. Europe does. Besides, Isis is a group of demented terrorists who are not necessarily citizens of Iran and Iraq, but come from other countries and behead innocent civilians. President Obama did not want to engage in warfare but found himself caught between a rock and a hard place. At any rate, whatever he does, he’s always wrong. As you know, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is probably receiving advice from Russian President Putin.
But how does one let Jihadi John torture and kill? Therefore fighting him and other jihadists seems an obligation. But Jihadi John may not be a true jihadist, but a trouble-maker. Military engagement in the Middle East is very dangerous and Canadians have joined the Coalition.
The Consequences
The citizens of the United States have an extraordinary president, one of very few American presidents the entire world respects, but on a gloomy day in early November, he was treated as though he was garbage. Money allowed more Republican candidates to enter Congress and further sabotage the social programmes President Obama wishes to put into place and the economy of the United States. So, the rich will indeed get richer, the poor, poorer, and the middle-class will shrink into nothingness. There may be two more years of obstructionism, scapegoating, and various unpalatable games.
The Choice
The choice was obvious. If Mr. Boehner would rather die than allow a raise in the minimum wage, one had to put an end to a Republican-led Congress. It seems that the greater problem facing America is not Isis, but American extremism and materialism.
The results of the mid-term elections also seem a vote against intellectual superiority. Could it be un-American to be exceptionally intelligent and have values! Why support a President who knows what he is doing? Un-American! Born in division, living accordingly.
Meanwhile…
‘Our interests are concentrated in the Arctic,’ said Russian President Vladimir Putin at a youth camp outside Moscow on Friday. (Alexei Nikolskyi/RIA Novosti/Reuters)
Russian President Vladimir Putin: a Threat
This is old news. But would you believe Russian President Vladimir Putin plans to take what he claims is his: the Canadian Arctic? Oil!
This is our territory, and we will renew our infrastructure and the infrastructure of the Emergencies Ministry, because we need to provide security for convoys and shipping along the trade route,’ the Russian news agency quoted him as saying.
When he gets here, we will, of course, feed him poutine. After all, in French, Vladimir Putin is Vladimir Poutine. Poutine is a combination of oily french fries, cheese and a rich brown sauce. It’s lethal but legal. All arteries get clogged and one has a stroke.
So there we are, Russian President Vladimir Putin is moving in, and if he survives French Canada’s ultimate weapon, greasy poutine, it could be that he will find his way to the White House.
Conclusion
President Obama did not lose. The loser is the average American. That is a tragedy and I am truly saddened. Millions of Americans voted for the Democrats and must also feel the end has come. But the end has not come, not if one doesn’t want it to come.
Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country. JFK
President Obama heard President Kennedy and he has been serving his country. He has been serving men and women. He is the foremost leader in the world, but he now needs you. In a democracy, everyone paves the road to the future.
As for racism and guns, put these away. They belong to a past Americans must bury. All of us are first and foremost human beings who want to live in peace and harmony.
Stone sign affixed on the rue Jacob building (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
In this building, formerly the York Hotel [Paris], on 3 September 1783, David Hartley, in the name of the king of England, and Benjamin Franklin, John Jay and John Adams, in the name of the United States of America, signed the definitive peace treaty recognizing the independence of the United States.
—ooo—
Five years after Louis XVI hesitatingly signed the Treaty of Alliance (1778), which ensured the future independence of a country to be named the United States of America, the Treaty of Versailles (sometimes called the Treaty of Paris) was signed at the Hôtel d’York in Paris, a hotel that no longer exists, the above stone sign commemorates the victory of the young Republic. The Treaty of Versailles proclaimed the independence of the United States.
When the Treaty of Versailles was signed, in 1783, Thomas Jefferson had yet to assume his duties as United States Minister Plenipotentiary to France, an office now known as that of Ambassador. Moreover, and ironically, France itself would not become a republic until 22 September 1792, and not under the best of circumstances.
The names engraved on the stone shown above are those of members of the American Delegation in Paris, architects of the United States of America:
Benjamin Franklin (17 January 1706 – 17 April 1790), the “first American,” and perhaps the main artisan of an independent United States;
John Jay (12 December 1745 – 17 May 1829), of the American Delegation, the 2nd Governor of New York and an opponent of slavery;
John Adams (30 October 1735 – 4 July 1826), also of the American Delegation in Paris and the second President of the United States of America.
It could be said that all parties gained from the Treaty of Versailles/Paris. The United States was an independent nation and Benjamin Franklin had made sure both France and England would be its trading partners. As for France, it had regained the prestige it lost when it ceded Canada to Britain under the terms of the Treaty of Paris, signed in 1673, but Canada remained a British colony. However, in 1783, Benjamin Franklin did glance northwards. The mostly French-language British Province of Quebec shrank significantly. Please see the maps.[i]
Expansion
The United States would expand, but it would be to the west rather than the north. In 1803, under the presidency of Thomas Jefferson, the United States would purchase Louisiana from France. Again, ironically, the groundwork for the Louisiana Purchase, was one of Thomas Jefferson’s contributions to the United States as Minister to France. Jefferson had kept alive an alliance with France. The French did not look upon the sale of Louisiana as a severe loss. Louisiana had been disputed territory between France and Spain and the United States needed a port to the south. In short, France would have lost Louisiana. It may therefore have been in its best interest to sell it. Am I writing this?
Thomas Jefferson, by Rembrandt Peale(Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Thomas Jefferson
In May 1785, Thomas Jefferson (13 April 1743 – 4 July 1826), the 3rd President of the United States and a good friend of the Marquis de La Fayette, was installed as the United States Minister, or United States ‘Ambassador’ to France. Like his predecessor, Benjamin Franklin, Jefferson was a polymath who had read abundantly, played the violin, spoke several languages, but suffered violent attacks of migraine. He was a man of the Enlightenment and truly impressed the French, but not in the same manner as his predecessor, Benjamin Franklin, who was milling financial and military support for the American Revolutionary War, and did so as a “regular” in various French Salons and the Café Procope, major institutions in France, and importing racoon hats, “du nouveau,” something new, for the ladies of the French court and Salons. These ladies only wore the “trendy” and would not be caught otherwise. The French did however name Benjamin Franklin to the French Academy as an honorary member. As for Jefferson, his legacy would be one of the mind, to the French and to the world. I will not speak of his dependence on slaves.
Thomas Jefferson arrived in Paris in 1785 and left on 26 September 1789 in order to serve as the United States’ first Secretary of State, under George Washington (22 February 1732 – 14 December 1799). In other words, Jefferson left France a mere two weeks before Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord, Prince de Talleyrand suggested, on 10 October 1789, that France resolve its financial crisis by confiscating the wealth of Church, which it did on 2 November 1789. During his stay in Paris, Jefferson was a witness to vain attempts on the part of Louis XVI to pay the huge debt accrued mainly because of wars it had fought, one of which was the American Revolutionary War. The American Revolutionary War was indeed a catalyst in the apocalyptic French Revolution. France had supported the future United States’ effort to break its ties with Britain. But who could have predicted a catastrophe that would ignore the liberalism of the Age of Enlightenment to persecute the clergy and the nobility, by killing thousands of its innocent citizens?
The American Declaration of Independence
Franklin was in France to rally the French to the American cause of independence from England. Such would not be Jefferson’s task. Given that he had drafted the American Declaration of Independence, a text reflecting the liberalism of John Locke, Thomas Jefferson’s main contribution to the French Revolution would be the lofty idealism he had contributed to the American Declaration of Independence, which he had drafted almost single-handedly. Jefferson was in a position to play an active role in the actual drafting of the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen (Déclaration des droits de l’homme et du citoyen), a pivotal text in the history of France, written mainly by Jefferson’s friend, La Fayette, with assistance on the part of Thomas Jefferson, and issued on 26 August 1789, a month to the day before Jefferson left France to take up his duties as first American Secretary of State.
Le Pressoir (The Pressurizer) (Photo credit: Google Images)
George Washington: the “Proclamation of Neutrality”
On 22 April 1793, after the execution of king Louis XVI (21 January 1793), George Washington issued a Proclamation of Neutrality. The United States declared it would remain neutral in conflicts between France and Great Britain and in Wars abroad. Americans breaking this rule could be prosecuted. (See Proclamation of Neutrality, Wikipedia.) Yet, the American Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was a catalyst in the apocalyptic French Revolution. France had been the main financial and military supporter in the Americans’ effort to break their ties with Britain. But, again, who could have imagined a catastrophe that would ignore the liberalism of the Enlightenment and persecute the clergy and the nobility.
Therefore, would that the Parliament of Paris had ratified Charles Alexandre, vicomte de Calonne‘s proposal of imposing taxes across the board. Would, moreover, that the Assembly of Notables, created by Louis XVI, in 1787, had seen fit to implement universal taxation. Levying taxes from the First and Second Estates, the Church of France and its nobility, was the only solution to France’s financial crisis. Its participation in the American War of Independence cost France 1.3 billion livres.
In 1787, the Parliament of Paris refused to register Charles Alexandre, vicomte de Calonne‘s[ii] proposal to tax all three estates, the only way to remedy France’s desperate financial crisis. Louis XVI therefore created an Assembly of Notables, 144 individuals handpicked by him, whose duty it would be to save France from bankruptcy. The Marquis de La Fayette was a member of king Louis XVI’s Notables, but Louis’ élite team also refused across-the-board taxation. It was proposed, instead, that the matter of tax reform be handled by the Estates-General which had not convened since 1614.
“While the an [sic] Assembly of Notables had no legislative power in its own right, Calonne hoped that if the Assembly of Notables could be made to support the proposed reforms then this would apply pressure on parlement to register them. The plan failed, as the 144 Notables who made up the Assembly included Princes of the Blood, archbishops, nobles and other people from privileged positions in society, and they did not wish to bear the burden of increased taxation. The Assembly insisting that the proposed tax reforms had to be presented to a representative body such as an Estates General.” (See Assembly of Notables, in Wikipedia)
Conclusion
To end this post, one could state that “the rest is history.” But it need be retold that, on 10 October 1789, Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand (and the Comte de Mirabeau) proposed that France confiscate the wealth of the Church and convert it into assignats: paper money, which was approved by the Assembly on 2 December 1789. Calonne’s proposal that all Estates be taxed turned into greater misery, the confiscation of the property of the Church of France. To harm the Church of France further, Talleyrand, a member of the clergy, l’évêque d’Autun (the bishop of Autun), also proposed the Civil Constitution of the Clergy, a law passed on 12 July 1790. The Civil Constitution of the Clergy did not separate separate Church and State, a separation proposed by the Baron de Montesquieu, among others. Laïcité was part of the programme of the Enlightenment, but the Civil Constitution of the Clergy subjugated the Church of France to the State, which was not laïcité.
By 12 July 1790, Thomas Jefferson was no longer the American Minister to France. His mission terminated on 26 September 1789, as indicated above.
To sum up, I need simply say that Thomas Jefferson was in Paris as he was in the United States: a superior mind. The video is about Thomas Jefferson.[iii]
Preliminary Treaty of Paris(Photo Credit: Wikipedia)
[ii] Calonne was Louis XVI’s Controller-General of Finances. He was appointed to this office in 1783. Jacques Necker, however, remained in the background.
[iii] Here is the text (short) of Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence (just click). It completes the video.
Monticello, Jefferson’s home designed by Jefferson (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
I am Belaud (pronounced ‘below’), the little fur person who shares Micheline’s life. She has asked me to write a note on her behalf. She somehow got interested in “The Fox and the Crow” and started writing a post she could not finish.
She is lucky to be able to count on me when such “accidents” occur. The best remedy, I told her, is to slash and slash. She explained that there were times when one could not slash and slash. Since the Syrian crisis and the debt-ceiling crisis, one nearly overlapping the other, she has not been her usual self. What would she do without me?
Micheline is now returning to her post. The arrangement is that she will discuss the moral in one post and will provide additional information in a separate post. I explained that she may run out of pictures, but this does not appear to be the case.
About me, Belaud
I am a pure-bred chartreux and, as we will see, a celebrated cat, but Micheline does not take me to shows. The two of us stick to a humble lifestyle. She says class is irrelevant. After all, she is, on her maternal grandmother’s side, a descendant of Alix de France, one of Eleanor of Aquitaine‘s (1122 or 1124 – 1 April 1204) two daughters by King Louis VII.
During the years she spent in Nova Scotia, she didn’t know this and knowing has not improved her life. She cannot play a musical instrument in this apartment and selling it, the apartment that is, would not buy her a little house or a townhouse however humble.
Joachim du Bellay (c. 1522 – 1 January 1560; aged 37) was the first French author who felt French could be a literary language. He was a member of the Pléiade, an informal academy. He wrote their manifesto: Défense et illustration de la langue française (La Deffence, et Illustration de la Langue Francoyse, 1549.)
There is one poem Micheline loves: Heureux qui, comme Ulysse, a fait un beau voyage,…(Happy is he who, like Ulysses, has gone on a beautiful trip,…). Du Bellay was in Rome, but missed la doulceur angevine, gentle Anjou.
Despite lineage, no great author has made Micheline into a celebrity. But Joachim du Bellay eulogized his cat Belaud, one of my ancestors:Sur la mort de Belaud. I don’t think anyone will eulogize Micheline, not even me, except modestly, if I’m still alive. Public speaking scares me.
Peace Dove, by Pablo Picasso, 1949 (Photo Credit: Google Images)
“After a strike, one can expect anything:” clarification
I received two comments from persons who did not understand the meaning of a quotation. In an interview, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said that “after a strike, one can expect anything.” The statement is not mine and it may be unclear.
After a strike, i.e. the gassing to death by sarin of 1,429 Syrian citizens, by forces under the command of Bashar al-Assad, Syrian President Assad can expect anything: retaliation.
Similarly after a “punitive” strike on Syria by the United States, the United States can expect retaliation on the part of ?
Strike A: Assad on Syria (civil war) = Strike B: the US on Assad
Danger: Since President Assad is a protégé of Russian President Vladimir Putin, we do not know who would strike after strike B, but in all likelihood, there would be retaliation and Assad may be helped by his ally, Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Because of its status as a “superpower” the United States is currently expected to intervene in the Syrian crisis. Therefore, at the moment, the US’ status as superpower is placing a heavy and perhaps unfair burden on US President Barack Obama and on his people.
Moreover, the US has now been called an “exceptional” nation, which would give it not only the right to strike but also the responsibility to do so. Is this acceptable?
However, on 16 September 2013, United NationsSecretary-GeneralBan Ki-moon reported that it had been determined by the United Nations that 1,429 Syrian citizens were gassed to death near Damascus, on 21 August 2013. This is a “war crime.” Therefore, it would be my opinion that matters have changed. It is now official that Assad’s forces acted in violation of an international law. Theoretically, this is a matter for the United Nations to deal with.
I did not intend to write a post on Syria today. In fact, I did not intend to write any more posts on the Syrian crisis. This link will take you to the latest development:
I will close by saying that I grieve profoundly for those who have had to flee Syria, for those who have been prevented from fleeing Syria, and for the families and friends of those who were gassed to death.
Micheline Walker
