Random Catch-up Musings

-The students that I went to the football match in Ankara with traveled to Bursa last weekend for a match against their "brother team". The tradition is for each team's supporters to cheer for the other team during the game. This practice came about in memory of a student from Bursa who came to Ankara for university and had many friends in both places before he was killed in the military. So often sports is idiotically divisive, so I found this to be a refreshing and enlightened thing for them to do. I think it would be wonderful if high schools in the US and other countries had a similar tradition with their rivals. If you know of any that do exist, please let me know!

-Shimon Peres, President of Israel, received an honorary degree from Bilkent this afternoon. Among my favorite quotes from him: "If you want to serve the future, don't be afraid to be part of the minority." "
"When you win a war, your people are united and applaud you. When you make peace, your people are doubtful and resentful."
"If you serve a great cause you will be a great man."
"Unless you learn to be a teacher of yourself you will lose the flow of modernity."
Much as I disagree with the actions of the Israeli state during the time that Peres has been one of its leaders, I have to give credit to his efforts for peace and his optimism as a leader. At least his rhetoric was far more positive than most of the Israelis who spoke at Brown, even if that was mostly due to the respective locations and audiences of the speakers.

-It is a little surreal to be living in a country that President Bush is 1) trying to convince to NOT invade another country and 2) actually being listened to by. Lost in all the talk about Pakistan this week was the fact that Bush and Rice seem to have actually headed off a major invasion by Turkey, at least for the time being. Which is pretty amazing, if you think about it. This time last week I was resigned to another sequel to the spring of 2003, with a flag that had less blue on it. Now, there are tinglings of pride that we may have done something positive in the region through diplomatic intervention. Hostages were released by the PKK. Political tensions are declining. And there was far less bloodshed and ill-will than if a major military invasion had occurred. Stay tuned, we are still waiting for the other shoe to drop somewhere here.

-My new favorite game to play each morning as I scan the headlines is "Will This Make the 100 Worst Moments of the Bush Administration?" My friend Will emailed me the TrueMajority.org report on the first Bush veto that has been overridden, and at first I was sure that had to be in there. But Bush will have been in office for over 400 weeks by the January after next, meaning only about one event for month can make the top 100 list on average. Does the veto override get this month's nod? Probably, but crony-licious appointee Harriet Myers awarding a prize to a blatantly racist Halloween costume has to get consideration, right? And what about the depths of embarrassment we've seen as one of his key allies in the war on terror imposed "emergency rule" on Pakistan because the Supreme Court was in danger of ruling he couldn't be president and head of the military at the same time? Isn't this somewhat akin to talking up your boyfriend for years to your friends and then having to explain why the word "fryalator" appears prominently on his resume? Well not exactly, but you get the idea. Musharraf is shedding his final vestigial shards of legitimacy and Bush is just kind of awkwardly asking him to stop, with about the same effectiveness I would have defending Shaq in the low post. (High post is a different story, by the way.) So my proposal is for several 100 Worst Moments editions, like Foreign Policy, Emergency Relief, Failed Initiatives That Might Have Actually Been Good Ideas, The Patriot Act, and No Child Left Behind. Then we could combine them into The 1001 Worst Moments collection. Then of course librarians would have the difficulty of deciding whether to put it next to Stephen King or Gordon Wood, but I'll leave that question to Mike.

-Rev. Kendrick gave an excellent sermon this morning at First Unitarian Boston that I was able to catch thanks to the glories of streaming radio on the internet. One of his essential points was that only through silence can we answer the most important questions in our lives (he used the example of when Pontius Pilate asked Jesus "What is truth" and Jesus was silent). He cited Laozi also as a religious leader who acknowledged that since words cannot be used to answer the deepest questions, the greatest teachers dedicate themselves to service. And yet, UUism is a religion that calls for speaking out: against injustice, against oppressive power structures and against hatred and violence. How can we reconcile these teachings? As ever, I wish us all tranquility and perseverance as we embrace the paradox.