Category Archives: May You Live In Interesting Times

Why You Should Avoid Attack Ads, Slogans, and Sound Bytes

Attack ads, slogans, and sound bytes harm because they obscure. Climate change, cyber warfare, and economic recessions cannot be explained in a few words. Conflicts in Syria and Ukraine pit al-Qaeda and different ethnic groups into an alphabet of amorphous foes. They require a more intelligent probing than is found in a few celebrity-studded newscasts.

The new world order requires a citizenry that thinks.

Swastika The Nazis came to power in Germany in a society of educated, middle class citizens. An unsuccessful war and economic problems led a significant proportion of the population to look for simple solutions like blaming Jews. Instead they might have examined issues like the world wide recession and its effects on Germany. They might have found a way to deal with the heavy debt placed on the country by the treaty that ended World War I. Instead, they allowed themselves to be caught in the hyper nationalism championed by the Nazis.

Start thinking with this article. Based on a study, it asks if the United States can still claim to be a democracy.

Like It or Not, We’re Americans. What Do We Do With It?

“. . . whether or not we want to care about the freedom of others, we are expected to. I’ve never been to a refugee camp or bombed out city or political prisoner’s home where people told me: ‘Why isn’t Brazil helping us,’ or ‘We’re angry at Russia and China.’ Because of who we are, how we see ourselves, and the power we project, it’s always us people look to. You can see that as a burden. I see it as our greatest strength, a quality that distinguishes us from every global power that has come and gone in history. It’s also an opportunity.”

—Remarks by Tom Malinowski (Assistant Secretary; Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor at the State Department; from his speech “Human Rights and National Security: A Value-Based Foreign Policy”)

“What Would America Fight For?” The Economist asked in its May 3rd, 2014, issue. The question appeared against a backdrop of the latest crisis, how to respond to Russia’s Putin as he unilaterally grabs chunks of other countries, most recently Ukraine. The Economist remarked: “American power is not half as scary as its absence would be.”

America, whether we like it or not, became the country that other countries expect to fix things. It is, as Mr. Malinowski said, an opportunity to do good. The problem is that power is easy to abuse.

Why was it, we ask now, that we got involved in Iraq? Something about weapons of mass destruction? Which, after lives were lost and treasure wasted, turned out to be a myth.

A knee-jerk military reaction to the world’s problems is foolish. The opposite response, to suppose that we have no reason to become involved with problems far from our shores, is equally tragic. Such a response, after we turned inward following World I, was rudely shattered by Pearl Harbor. And the terrorism that began on September 11, 2001, surprised us, in part, because we ignored festering problems when we won the Cold War.

Foreign policy, unfortunately, has become politicized. Better to act on a quote attributed to Senator Arthur Vandenberg at the start of the Cold War: “Partisan politics should stop at the water’s edge.”

Do We Practice Our Religion Or Merely Own It?

I read with interest a recent column by Ross Douthat in The New York Times. Apparently practicing Christians have less divorces and out-of-wedlock births than the unaffiliated. Nominal Christians, however, (they call themselves Christians but don’t attend church much) have higher rates of both than non-believers.

Douthat states: “The social goods associated with faith flow almost exclusively from religious participation, not from affiliation or nominal belief. And where practice ceases or diminishes . . . the remaining residue of religion can be socially damaging instead.”

I was taken with his idea that support networks are important for the practicing of faith. Faithfulness to beliefs and corresponding behavior will more likely succeed if one shares it with a support network. That is the reason for groups as diverse as Alcoholics Anonymous and Weight Watchers.

We value the rugged individual, yet a shared journey is more likely to be successful.

Read the column for Douthat’s full treatment of the subject.

Why Haven’t We Killed Osama bin Laden’s Dream?

The May 7^th 2011 issue of The Economist featured Osama bin Laden on its cover with the caption “Now, kill his dream.” The al-Qaeda instigator of the 9/ll attacks had been killed by U.S. Navy seals the week before.

Bin Laden is dead, but his influence lives on, directly or indirectly, in numerous bloody attacks since then: in Nigeria, in Boston, in London, in Syria, and a dozen other places.

An article in the magazine outlined bin Laden’s dream. He wished to purge present day Islam of its “corruptions” and “secular influences.” He concluded that taking lives of innocent men, women, and children in that cause was justified. Unfortunately, lives still are being lost in brutal efforts to fulfil bin Laden’s dream.

According to a State Department report on terrorism, released this week, “core” al-Qaeda is much reduced in ability. However, local al-Qaeda groups, such as Boko Haram in Nigeria, have increased in strength. Boko Haram recently was in the news for kidnaping 230 girls from a school.

Kill his dream, but how?

By acting out dreams of our own that prove stronger. Forgiveness instead of hate. Seeking the good of others instead of idle pursuit of pleasure. Integrity instead of corruption.

Dictatorship: New Spring Fashion

When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1989, I worked in a small north Georgia town as a historic preservation planner. I watched the world-changing events on television in my cramped historic house, used during the Civil War as a hospital for wounded and dying soldiers.

Touched by the reminders of that war, I rejoiced at this peaceful revolution. Cheering crowds shredded the Iron Curtain as they hammered down the Wall in Berlin and ousted Communist regimes in other eastern European countries.

For the next episode, I was privileged to work closer to the front lines. I was in Saudi Arabia working for the State Department when the Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein was defeated by the first alliance since World War II that included Russia.

A decade later, terrorism, two wars, and a world-wide recession blunted that optimism. Then it revived with the “Arab spring” that begin in late 2010, leading to the overthrow of several Arab dictators. When the Arab spring froze into what some call the “Arab winter,” pessimism returned.

So have the dictatorships.

Vladimir Putin in Russia, Bashar al-Assad in Syria, and the generals in Egypt, among others, push against what a short time ago seemed an unstoppable march to self-government.

What happened?

The lack of job growth worldwide played a part, including a major recession. Even more, the growth of tycoon-laced corruption in some of the new nations, especially in Russia, meant that the newly-hatched democracies never learned to fly according to the rules of a civil society. The former Soviet republic, Ukraine, was one such failed hope.

Unfettered capitalism did take root, the kind that flourished in the United States in the Gilded Age. Without a corresponding growth in such institutions as an impartial court system, an accountable police force, and an independent press, the industrial titans gained too much power.

Ukraine has recently struggled to return to democracy but it is hampered by the leftovers of a corrupt regime. Russia’s Putin took advantage of the country’s weakness. That is often the way dictators amass power.

Oso, Washington, and Aleppo, Syria

Oso Washington We live less than a hundred miles from the huge landslide in Oso, Washington, the tragedy that killed over twenty people. Several are still missing.

The citizens of the area have united to alleviate the tragedy. One of our grocery stores asks customers if they wish to round up to the nearest dollar for their purchases. The accumulated money will be given to Oso relief. Our hardware store also is collecting money. Customers can “buy” tools and supplies for the relief effort.

Banks and other organizations are accepting donations. Benefit concerts have been scheduled.

Such community effort and empathy are heartwarming.

I am reminded of tragic suffering in other places. I wish these tragedies could be alleviated, too.

Yet we should remember when sympathy involved us in a country called Somalia, with disastrous consequences to young soldiers. Or our engagements in Iraq which resulted in so many killed, wounded, and damaged Americans and Iraqi men, women, and children. Or Afghanistan, where young girls are targeted for wishing to attend school despite the price we paid there in lives and treasure.

We do well to be cautious of unwise involvement.

Child in Aleppo Yet the blood marked face of the little girl in Aleppo, Syria, stares out of the picture, uncomprehending as to why one would want to hurt her. She is dressed attractively. Her family must love her very much, and perhaps she will survive. Others, surely, are more damaged by the barrel bombs, full of shrapnel and nails. The bombs do not differentiate between military and civilian. Those who employ them do not intend that they should.

God knows we don’t need another military engagement. Better to press and wait for some kind of diplomatic solution. But perhaps we could spare sympathy and prayers for the people of Aleppo, Syria, as we rightly do for the people of Oso, Washington. And give donations to reputable relief organizations working with refuges who have fled in huge numbers.

Empathy for those horribly caught up in tragedy need not stop at the world’s boundaries.

Remembering Rwanda Twenty Years Ago: How a Young Rwandan Woman Found Meaning

Left To Tell cover Immaculée Ilibagiza, a young woman born in Rwanda, tells of her horrifying time during the Rwandan massacres that began in April, 1994, twenty years ago this month. Most of her family were slaughtered. Hidden in a bathroom with seven other women, she endured ninety-one days of cramped hiding. She tells her story in Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust.

Immaculée was born into a middle-class family of educators. She attended schools, including college. Suddenly the horror broke out. Hatred flared between otherwise peaceful neighbors. Terrified masses crowded into churches but were murdered anyway, sometimes burned with their churches—by those supposedly of their own Christian faith.

How did people who had given allegiance to the same Christian Jesus turn into angry, brutal mobs?

All of Immaculée’s family except herself and one brother died. After a miraculous survival, she was able to meet with the killer of her mother and one of her brothers. The man was now a prisoner, wearing dirty clothes, his hair matted, filthy. Before her, the murderer began sobbing. Immaculée said she felt his shame.

“I reached out, touched his hands lightly, and quietly said what I’d come to say.

‘I forgive you.’”

Then, she said, her heart eased. Later she told the astonished jailer, “Forgiveness is all I have to offer.”

We take away from this story the power of forgiveness to heal, as much for the sinned against as for the sinner. The only hope we have for dousing the bitter strife that inflicts the globe in a multitude of conflicts is the sacrifice of our hatred. We have a right to hate, but we choose not to hate and thus free ourselves by forgiveness.

Five Lessons This Christian Learned From Living in Muslim-Majority Countries

1. As I experienced life in a conservative Middle Eastern country, I learned what many Muslims of that country believe about Americans: Americans can’t live without binging on alcohol. Americans abuse drugs. They also favor couples living together without marriage, and they love X-rated movies. They don’t care if their daughters become prostitutes. Muslims who have never lived outside of their culture may believe most Americans are Christians.

Veiled women 2 2. Rural Muslims tend to become more conservative when they move to the city. Nomadic Arabs that we met while in the desert appeared less strict in matters of dress and other habits than their urban cousins. This reminded me of the denomination I know best, Southern Baptists. Southern Baptists became more conservative when they left their rural roots. In 1990, Nancy Ammerman, then a professor at Emory University, wrote Baptist Battles: Social Change and Religious Conflict in the Southern Baptist Convention, which portrays this shift.

3. In the conservative country where I lived and worked, Christians weren’t free to worship openly, though western Christians usually worshiped without interference if they didn’t broadcast their religious activities or try to convert Muslims. Christians from other areas of the world—Ethiopia or the Philippines, for example—lived less protected lives.

4. Based on my knowledge of the arrests and mistreatment of some Christians in Muslim majority lands, I don’t see actions against Christians in this country as persecution. Some Christians may suffer in the sense that anti-war protesters suffer for civil disobedience, but it is not, in my opinion, persecution.

western women 5. Some Muslims are dismayed at the infiltration of Western culture into their own. One of their writers called it “westoxification.”

Ammerman wrote in her 1990 book: “In a relatively undisturbed setting, religious practices are tightly interwoven into the fabric of life. . . . But when change occurs, everyday patterns of life are thrown into disarray . . .” So it is with Muslims as with Southern Baptists, notwithstanding that their beliefs are quite different.

Georgia On My Mind: Six Reminders from a Political Cartoon as Russia Invades Crimea

I have a cartoon in my files from 2008 when Russia invaded the country of Georgia. David Horsey drew the political cartoon for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Georgia, located between Europe and Asia, choose to leave the Soviet sphere after the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. In 2008, the Soviet Union invaded and annexed portions of their former satellite. The reactions were similar to our reactions today to Russia’s designs on the Ukraine.

From the cartoon in 2008:

1) Europe is concerned that the gas they buy from Russia may be cut off.

2) NATO is glad Georgia is not one of their members; otherwise, they’d have to do something.

3) The United Nations avoids the issue.

4) American cable news isn’t interested in the situation in Georgia. They continue with stories of celebrity scandals.

5) The President plays volleyball.

6) The average American is concerned only with the one word they think they understand: Georgia. Are Russians invading Atlanta?

No Vacation in Siberia. What a Shame.

John McCain The U.S. has issued visa sanctions against several Russian tycoons in protest of the Russian takeover in Crimea, meaning the tycoons will be prohibited from visits to the U.S.

In retaliation, Russia announced sanctions against several U.S. senators. I like Senator John McCain’s response the best:

“I guess this means my spring break in Siberia is off, my Gazprom stock is lost, and my secret bank account in Moscow is frozen.”

Sometimes humor is the best weapon.

What Are Our Choices in an Age of Revived Dictatorships?

A headline in today’s Seattle Times portrays the challenge: “Putin takeover signals a different kind of ‘Cold War.’” The Ukraine is threatened with loss of territory. Russians encroach on certain sections of that country, taking advantage of the confusion in the Ukraine after a corrupt leader was overthrown.

Vladimir Putin Russia’s Putin appears only one of many neo dictators, snatching a country back into the age of baronial privilege, in which favored elites rob the country of its wealth and ignore wishes of the majority. Ancient tribal hatreds threaten Libya. Egypt seems turned back toward another military government. South Sudan is again wracked by mayhem. Atrocities by a ruling minority group in Syria rival those of the Holocaust.

The headline, however, should remind us that we survived decades of that first, nuclear-threatening Cold War. We made mistakes, including ill-chosen wars of choice. However, we avoided a massive conflict with the Soviet Union. We waited through a period of dictatorships while we probed diplomatic opportunities. We grew our economy and created a vibrant middle class. And eventually our patience was rewarded.

Years ago, one of our politicians said that our nation’s differences stop at our shore. We can choose emotional, knee-jerk reactions to these crises or we can choose patience, well-considered responses, and a spirit of cooperation, both among our political parties and with our allies.

Who Do We Blame When Kids Fail?

When I was growing up, my parents enjoyed life with each other and with my brother and me. They read books and newspapers and discussed ideas at the supper table. My father always had a job. My mother worked part time as well. The money coming in placed us in the middle of the middle class, far from the one-percent, but we never missed a meal or suffered major medical expenses that weren’t covered by insurance. We were part of a loving church community.

Why shouldn’t I be judged by a higher standard of accountability than children born in circumstances like New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof describes: “But if you’re one of the one-fifth of children in West Virginia born with drugs or alcohol in your system, if you ingest lead from peeling paint as a toddler, if your hearing or vision impairments aren’t detected, if you live in a home with no books in a gang-ridden neighborhood with terrible schools — in all these cases, you’re programmed for failure as surely as children of professionals are programed for success . . . When kids in poverty stumble, it’s not quite right to say that they ‘failed.’ Often, they never had a chance.”

To whom much is given is much required. Hold all of us accountable. If we blame poor Americans who make irresponsible choices, Kristof says, blame rich Americans who are irresponsible as well. You could start with the ones who scammed Americans with mortgage abuses.

War-War or Jaw-Jaw?

Acording to The New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, not everything that happens in the Middle East is about us. At some point the region has to grow up.

We no longer have the desire nor the means to do the heavy lifting, not to mention that our past military excursions there have shown mixed results, at best. The possibility that the United States might bomb Syria if Assad didn’t give up chemical weapons was hugely unpopular in this country. A couple of decades or so ago, pictures of children dying of starvation in Somalia led us to intervene militarily in that country—disastrously. Today, even images of grotesque deaths from chemical warfare do not move us to consider similar actions.

Friedman’s column suggests that a lack of pluralism plagues the Middle East. The region will be forever convulsed, he says, unless it embraces diversity. The Iraqi Shiites have to allow Iraqi Sunnis to be part of the power structure, as well as other minorities.

When the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt overplayed its hand by trying to turn a fairly secular nation into an Islamic republic, people revolted. Now the military may be doing the same thing in reverse by persecuting the Islamists.

Don’t even begin with the Syrians: each group appears to lust after the annihilation of the others.

Perhaps when enough blood has been shed, the principals will no longer confuse governance with religion. They may reach that stage sooner if we stay engaged and provide opportunity to change from “war war” to “jaw jaw.” Winston Churchill coined this phrase during the time of another seemingly endless confrontation called the Cold War.

Market Forces and Good Works

The phenomenon of secular interests taking over “good works” from religious groups has gone on for centuries. Once governments understood the benefits of an educated population, for example, they began taking over the education function from religious institutions for much of the population, offering free schooling for all children. Social security and other programs that aid the less well-off have increased consumer purchasing power when citizens were lifted out of poverty, gaining favor with some economists.

Now corporations have entered the picture.

“Philanthropy Meets the Market,” an article in The World in 2014, published by The Economist, predicts that corporations will invest more in goods works, such as improving water quality. From enlightened self-interest, certain corporations (i.e., soft drink companies) understand that world markets must have access to safe water. As populations grow and use more water not only for drinking but for agriculture, water supplies become endangered. Corporations now pay for activities like digging wells for fresh water. Until recently, charitable and religious groups led in this kind of work.

Those who wish to do good, however, expect to find plenty to do. No doubt enough need exists to keep all comers busy for some time.

Working Less In Order to Work More?

A report from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office predicts that the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) may result in some Americans choosing to work less. According to the report, they may choose to work less (meaning, presumably, in paid employment) because they don’t have to remain in a job solely to gain health insurance. The report raises interesting questions.

First, why have we allowed health insurance to be tied to jobs? This results in unenthusiastic workers who can’t change to jobs more suitable to their interests. Corporations also must compete on the world market with corporations from Europe and other countries who don’t need to pay for this insurance because their governments provide it.

Second, why is health care so expensive in the United States? Canada and other advanced countries have, studies indicate, healthier populations than the U.S., but at less cost. Apparently, many Americans could afford to work less at paying jobs if they were guaranteed insurance for unexpected medical expenses.(Obviously, the working poor need all the work they can find.)

Third, why will workers supposedly work less? Do they plan to watch more TV in their extra hours? Or do some wish to spend more time with their children? Or take care of elderly parents? Or engage in civic or charitable work? Or experiment with a business of their own? Or write a novel?

Since the beginning of the industrial revolution, work has narrowed to fit one pattern for men and eventually for women who entered the labor force in increasing numbers. Everyone works a certain number of hours per week, period. Special arrangements have to be made for sickness, family emergencies, time off to explore other interests, or extreme weather.

The changes in health insurance could present an opportunity to define new work patterns. Such patterns might allow Americans flexible work schedules and hours more suited to individual goals and the unpredictable world they live in.

Border Crossings

My husband and I surveyed the beautiful Inner Harbor in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, a few weeks ago and explored it for hours. We had arrived from our home in Washington state, taking an hour-and-a-half ferry ride across the Strait of Juan de Fuca.

An American walking around Victoria feels at home. Many stores and hotels accept U.S. money, though they may return Canadian change. Other differences strike the observer: more recycling, subtle accents, and metric distances and weights.

I once attended a business luncheon in Montreal that showcased economic ties between Canada and the U.S. An American businessman commented on the similarities between the two countries. He didn’t think of Canadians and Americans as all that different, he said.

Mistake, I thought. Canadians generally consider themselves quite different from their neighbors to the south and sometimes resent our taking them for granted. The differences range from stricter control of guns to what they consider as less arrogance in world affairs.

The border that we crossed to reach British Columbia is one of the friendliest in the world. It is still a border. Much has changed since the 1990’s, when I lived in Montreal and would cross on holidays into New York. The agent at the small border post greeted me with a “hello, how are you, ma’am,” and the briefest of glances at my passport. In those days, an American didn’t even need a passport following short stays in Canada.

In 1999, an Algerian, Ahmed Ressam was arrested coming into the United States from Canada with a trunk of explosives. He later said he planned to bomb the Los Angeles airport. Ressam was arrested at our own point of departure for Victoria—Port Angeles, Washington.

The aura of peace and frontier isolation as one looks from the small town of Port Angeles to the snowy peaks of the Olympics was shattered that day. Now American citizens must have a passport or other enhanced documentation when they return into the United States from Canada.

Failed States

After two wars, Americans are exhausted financially and morally. We have pulled out of Iraq completely and are drawing down from Afghanistan. Though Iraq technically was not a failed state, at least not until we entered it, our involvement there appears part of our desire to change regimes and rebuild nations.

Michael J. Mazarr wrote an article in Foreign Affairs discussing our involvement with “failed states.” (“The Rise and Fall of the Failed-State Paradigm; Requiem for a Decade of Distraction,” Foreign Affairs, January-February 2014.)

At the conclusion of the Great Power struggles of the Cold War, we confronted the “non-state” terrorist. Our entry in the 1990’s into Somalia and our intervention in other failed states since then came about, Mazarr suggests, because we wanted to cut the poverty and corruption out of which terrorists come.

Certainly, many terrorists come from failed economies and societies. The leaders, however, are more likely to emerge from a fairly well-off middle class. Often they are incensed at government corruption or at decadent habits (pornography, broken homes, etc.) that they perceive as drifting in from Western cultures.

In the current world scene, the United States is unlikely to engage in invasions of other countries or to become embroiled in land wars, because we perceive that these policies haven’t worked. Should we than turn our backs on violent human rights abuses, as is happening in Syria?

Perhaps we should choose a more patient path. That includes working with other nations in painstaking efforts to build trust between enemies. Efforts include talks that seem endless—in other words, in tasks that may continue into our grandchildren’s time. But sometimes if we stand in the wings, we can take advantage of war weariness to find workable solutions. We have to be present. We do not have to invade.

We Are No Longer the World’s Greatest Polluter

China has overtaken the United States in pollution levels. We are no longer the world’s greatest atmospheric polluter. Chinese cities recently have suffered dangerous levels of smog. China is discovering a darker side to becoming the world’s second greatest economic power.

A half century and more ago, some cities in the United States suffered smog equal to what China is experiencing now. In 1948, toxic smog from industries in Donora, Pennsylvania, is reported to have killed twenty people and left thousands sickened. Concern over air pollution grew and eventually led to the Federal Air Pollution Control Act of 1955. This was the first national law designed to improve air quality. This and other legislation means that the U.S. continues to lead the world in most economic spheres but not in pollution.

We still are the world’s second greatest polluter. Interestingly, the Chinese now seek leadership in another area of development. They are investing in what is called “green” technology, that is, technology which encourages growth with less pollution.

A race to develop green technology is blessedly different from an arms race. If we invest in such technologies in this country, we might continue to lead the world economically without the scourge of pollution. In addition, the development of sustainable energy would lessen our dependence on unstable parts of the world for fossil fuels, an added benefit.

Place Lovers

We are creatures of place. In novels and movies, the setting of the story can prove as important as any character: the Russian Jewish community of Fiddler on the Roof, or Gilead’s Iowa religious setting, or Flannery O’Conner’s southern gothic background in her short stories. We are shaped by place, even in this era of generic fast food restaurants and blockbuster movies.

Place is felt strongly by the displaced. The first who felt it were the native Americans in the United States who were displaced by European settlers. The English who left homes in the British Isles for America experienced their own displacement as they tried to make early colonial America a subset of their former home. Germans moved in among the English-speaking communities. Jewish, Irish, Polish, and Italian immigrants arrived. The descendants of freed slaves moved north after the Civil War. Southern whites dealt with an increasingly changed landscape. Asians, Hispanics, free Africans, and Caribbean islanders came. Recently, Southeast Asians and Middle Easterners have wandered in.

Love of the old place, left behind family, and foreign heritage compete with attachment to the new place. Volumes have been written about the hybrid-American young adult seeking identity between two cultures.

Both old and new communities lay obligations on us. Americans of long duration in this country do well to recognize the gifts that newcomers bring, from the crop picker to the Ph.D. engineer. Newly-naturalized Americans retain pride in former cultures yet owe an allegiance to this country that supercedes allegiance to the old.

Not so much a bland melting pot as a rich-hued tapestry, somber tones alternating with cheerful ones.

Understanding Iran

Iran, ancient Persia, is a Muslim majority country whose inhabitants speak a derivative of Persian, not Arabic. The recent agreement between the United States, Iran, and five other nations on Iran’s nuclear capabilities is our first significant exchange with the country in over three decades. Iran agreed to curb its nuclear activities in exchange for limited sanctions relief. Opinions differ, to say the obvious, on how effective the deal is.

Drop out of the news for a while and read fiction to better understand this unique culture. Digging to America by Anne Tyler, for example, presents a touching international blend of an all-American suburban family and an Iranian-American one. They meet in an airport while waiting for the arrival of their adopted babies from China. The story follows the families through the years, allowing the reader glimpses of the Iranians’ past lives and their adjustment to America.

Or try a nonfiction book. We have not had diplomatic relations with Iran since 1979, when radical Iranians, followers of the theocratic leader, the Ayatollah Khomeini, seized the U.S. embassy in Tehran and took U.S. diplomats hostage for 444 days. All Fall Down, by Gary Sick, an official in the Jimmy Carter administration during the Iranian hostage crisis, gives a fascinating blow-by-blow description of the events. The hostages were released literally in the last few hours of Carter’s time in the White House.

Or listen to one of the former hostages, Michael Metrinko, held captive and treated badly at times. He was quoted earlier in the fall as saying, “I happen to like Iranians . . . I had a lot of close Iranian friends and still do . . . I don’t like the government of Iran. Politically, I despise it. But it’s there. Almost 80 million people. Vast resources. We as a country, a government, absolutely have to have relations with Iran. Deal with them in business, international relations, politically. Let people move back and forth. The world is too dangerous a place not to do this. Not doing that is crazy. We have to be able to talk to them quickly if the need arises.”

Ann Gaylia O'Barr

Culture and World Events from a Christian Perspective