Sunday, November 30, 2008

Twisted world

Here's one of many ironic twists on the Mumbai bombings, according to a report published online by AFP :

-----------------

British actor Joey Jeetun was caught up in the violence when the Leopold cafe , a restaurant popular with expatriates, was attacked.

The 31-year-old, who played a suicide bomber in a British television documentary, said terrorists assumed he was dead because he was covered in other people's blood. He was then detained as a possible suspect and held for 13 hours in a police cell.

------------------


Let's pray that India does not go ballistic (figurative or literal) on Pakistan. It's rather clear so far that the Pakistani government had no way of preventing this group from doing it, since there's too much of Pakistan that's not in their control. (That is a problem Pakistan must fix, but it won't be easy.)

Friday, November 28, 2008

Sad News

Spirithome.com extends its sympathies to the people at Synchronicity in Virginia, and to the Lubavitcher community worldwide, who have lost loved ones and friends during this murderous assault in Mumbai.

For all the talk about targeting American, British, and Israeli citizens, it must be noted that so far as can be told from the current information, the two Synchronicity dead were killed in the initial assault at the Oberoi, when they were two of many who were unfortunate enough to be eating in the restaurant where the terrorists' bullets first struck. They were apparently not part of any special 'targeting'. No other Americans have been reported dead (so far), except the US/Israeli rabbi at the Chabad center. A British/Cypriot charter boat/yacht magnate was also killed, and several Israelis at the Chabad center. Several Australians, an Italian, and a Japanese natural gas businessman were also killed; possibly one from China and from Singapore as well, though that's very unclear at this chaotic point. Meanwhile some 90% of the dead were citizens of India, and South Mumbai is awash with British and Americans living there and doing business there. So if the terrorists were 'targeting certain foreigners', as reported in the press, they were dreadful at it. (Unless, as is likely, Hindi are 'foreigners' to them. But what do they care -- they're terrorists. More blood, more bombs, more fires, more fear. Which is the whole point.)

India must know that Americans are with them 100% on this. We need to make person-to-person contacts with those who we know from Mumbai, and let the immigrants and the students in the US know too. They do not stand alone.

Saturday, November 22, 2008

Obama, and other notes

I'm still debating in my mind whether to keep celebrating Barack Obama's victory, or cringing in fear of what could be happening before his January 20 inauguration. That's two months in which W. is still the President. He's already disapproved sensible Democratic economic proposals, continues to speak against any particular regulation of businesses, still thinks nothing of ordering strikes into other countries, and has done nothing to keep track of how the bailout monies are used nor to make the banks use it to give out loans. Also, I wonder who'll be on his list of pardons; every administration puts up a bad pardon or two, but I smell a raft of them for folks involved in government cover-ups and business corruption.

It won't be fun.

-------------------------------------------

As usual, I stunk at guessing the baseball playoffs. I've picked the winner twice in five years, 3 times in the last eight. This year was my usual miss. Next : football playoffs and NCAA basketball. I do a lot better with football, though I was as surprised as everyone else at the Giants' rise last year. I got to watch their conference championship game against Favre and the Packers last year on a big-city bar's big screen. (Even though I was more interested in the Amazing Race finals, which was what I was there to watch.) The Giants look even better this year. So far, so do the Titans -- however, they get to face Favre and the team that used to be known as the Titans. The Jets should use the throwback uniforms in this game, to add more to the battle of the Titans. Except that would be titanic. Which would give us that sinking feeling.

Re the Race : Nick and Starr vs. Toni and Dallas. (And the winner is : Starr and Dallas??) The rest don't count. This year's crop had many poorly-picked teams, but really great tasks and locations. I know some TAR fans are sick of seeing India, but it is probably the single most different, strangest, and most varied country in the world. They could go there every year, and not exhaust the many facets India offers. I hope next time they go there, they try Chennai. Frankly, I'm sick of Moscow, their next stop. Let's hope the tasks stay this good.

Tuesday, November 18, 2008

Way Too True to be Good

This is as good an excuse as any to read the Cerulean Sanctum blog (and there are many good reasons).

Dan Edelen posted a picture from a Cindy Jacobs - related prayer event. On the one hand, it's not what it seems. On the other hand, maybe it ultimately is what it seems, considering who so many CBN-types kiss up to.

http://ceruleansanctum.com/2008/10/the-american-religion-on-parade.html

(Enjoy the photo. Then, go ahead -- explore the rest of the blog site.)