International Affairs

And the Devil Laughed

Posted on by David Rodeback

Let’s talk for a few minutes about Israel, Hamas, Iran, what happened on October 7, and how people have responded in the United States and around the world. Ever since that day, I’ve been jotting down and revising my thoughts. But I was in the middle of a concerted campaign at afelection.info and elsewhere to inform and influence a local election. That absorbed all my available time for blogging, among other things. Election Day came two weeks late this year in Utah, but it’s over, and we won. You were probably busy too. Meanwhile, around the world, the devil laughed.

I just now deleted most of the words I’ve written and rewritten about that day and its continuing aftermath — 2,000 words, give or take. We don’t need them for two reasons. First, my essential thoughts here are quite simple.

I’ll be talking about evil — the evil of the original attack and the evil of celebrating it, then and now.

Then I will refer you to a wise, insightful, and urgently necessary speech I watched on YouTube last week. The speaker is Bari Weiss, a prominent American liberal, not a leftist; the difference is large and consequential. Though I am a conservative, and some of her politics and mine (on other subjects) don’t mesh, I beg you to watch it at least once. Then share it with others if you dare.

It is everything I wish I had time to write here and more; that’s the second reason we don’t need more of my words here. And perhaps Ms. Weiss, as a liberal, will reach readers who would tend to dismiss the same thoughts if they came from my mouth or pen, because so many of my stated views are conservative.

After that, I’ll suggest a second video.

Perspectives on Ukraine (3 & 4): Putin’s Sanity and a Clear Line

Posted on by David Rodeback

Last time, I wrote of my feelings about Russia and Ukraine and described pieces of the two nations’ history together. It was both a disclosure and a starting point for discussing the present war and its implications. Today’s two perspectives focus more directly on the war. The first, er, third, involves our attitudes about the current Russian autocrat — specifically, Vladimir Putin’s sanity. The fourth is a consideration which ought to inform our responses.

3. Don’t Dismiss Vladimir Putin as Insane

It’s tempting to say Vladimir Putin is insane, end of story. After all, he is a dictator. He invaded another nation to build his empire. He and his proxies have occasionally mentioned nuclear weapons. And his forces have deliberately targeted civilians, including refugees and hospitals. In our enlightened twenty-first-century hauteur, we’d like that list of offenses to be diagnostic.

Some have a further motive, conscious or otherwise, for questioning Putin’s sanity. They’re not comfortable with the basic moral categories, good and evil. If they can dismiss him as insane, they don’t have to face the fact that he is evil. Yes, evil, not merely misunderstood.

Vladimir Putin - Putin's sanity
Russian President Vladimir Putin

But there’s more at stake than morality. If we ascribe Putin’s offenses to insanity, we risk missing things we need to see and learn. Then we end up doing the wrong things or not doing the right things. Either way, people die who didn’t have to die.

Perspectives on Ukraine (1 & 2): Feelings and History

Posted on by David Rodeback

It began a few weeks before Russian forces invaded Ukraine on February 24, 2022. People who know me began asking me what I thought of the situation.

I studied that area of the world formally for some years, and I’ve watched with more than the typical American’s interest ever since. So it’s no surprise that virtually every day brought at least one e-mail message, text message, phone call, or face-to-face query from a friend, family member, neighbor, or coworker. What will happen next? How bad will it get? What does Russian autocrat Vladimir Putin want, and how far will he go to get it? Has he lost his mind? What should the US and the rest of the world do — and not do — to stop him?

These queries have become less frequent as the war has proceeded. Inflation, abortion, and the mass slaughter of schoolchildren and teachers are more than mere distractions; they deserve our sober attention too. But most of the questions I’ve heard about Ukraine are still open. I still hear them often, and they still matter immensely.

The Afghanistan Rescue and the American Spirit

Posted on by David Rodeback

Displayed on a shelf in my home office is a wool cap from Afghanistan, a pakul or kapul, depending on which regional language you choose. It’s flat on top, and the fabric is thick and coarse. It can be worn with the sides rolled up for warm weather or rolled down several inches for cold weather, of which Afghanistan has plenty. It was never intended to fit me, and it doesn’t. I keep it to honor a friend of mine and a friend of his.

It was a gift to me from a retired US Army Special Forces officer who deployed with a Utah National Guard unit to Afghanistan in the first half-decade of our 20-year presence there. It was a gift to him from the tribal leader – more governor than warlord – of a certain region in Afghanistan.

Recommended Small, Daily Doses

Posted on by David Rodeback

Books

Many books make sense, more or less, if you read them in small pieces, day after day. Some don’t. Here are some books that are particularly well suited to brief, daily reading.

Audio

A valuable companion to Reagan, In His Own Hand is Reagan in His Own Voice, which features audio recordings of dozens of his radio spots, with some commentary for context. This lives on my iPod and brings back memories of many early mornings in my youth.

(Links here are to my Amazon store. Purchases support this site.)

Do you have favorite daily doses?

Losing Our Souls at the Border

Posted on by David Rodeback

We mortals can’t have government without politics, and I’m not sure we’d want to.

Politics brings partisanship, which in small doses is healthy and in large doses is toxic. When partisanship takes command of our minds, hearts, discourse, and policy, things get very ugly. Look around.

Lately, I wonder if we still have a political soul.

I’ve watched politics and government for decades. I don’t remember things being as toxic as they are now — not even in the late 1960s and early 1970s. I’m not saying we’re on the verge of civil war, or that things are as bad as when our nation was in one. But we’re now routinely forgetting that some problems are real, not just political. Among other things, this insures that we’ll make them worse.

As you’ve probably heard, children are spilling over our southern border in astonishing numbers. Many of them are unaccompanied by a parent. It’s not a new problem; it’s at least two years old. But the news of it is newer than that.