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Rolla Peace News August 24, 2021 |
Dear Friends:Editor's note: Please consider writing for our newsletter. It's always very exciting to be able to publish submissions from our readers.In this newsletter is: 1. NOON VIGIL FOR PEACE: THURSDAY, AUGUST 26, 2021 2. THE MISFIT MATHEMATICIAN (Tom's column, http://tomsager.org) a) From Our Readers: Peace Vigils and Newsletter b) From Our Readers: Anthem by Leonard Cohen c) From Our Readers: Turkey Responds to Devastating Wild Fires d) From Our Readers: Planting Trees e) From Our Readers: The Taliban and Women f) From Our Readers: The Taliban and Statues 1. NOON VIGIL FOR PEACE: THURSDAY, AUGUST 26, 2021 We vigil for peace in front of the Rolla Post Office, THIS THURSDAY, AUGUST 26, FROM NOON TO 1:00 PM (and most subsequent Thursdays until Peace is established). Please join us this Thursday in saying NO MORE WAR AGAINST AFGHANISTAN or any other country. The temperature is predicted to be around 90. If you do not feel comfortable standing with us in front of the Post Office, please consider driving by and showing your support for our message by honking your horn and flashing a peace sign. Note 1: Since there are so few of us, generally 2 or 3, no need to cancel; but let's maintain social distancing. Note 2: In case of inclement weather, vigils may be canceled or terminated early. 2. THE MISFIT MATHEMATICIAN (Tom's column, http://tomsager.org) a) From Our Readers: Peace Vigils and Newsletter b) From Our Readers: Anthem by Leonard Cohen c) From Our Readers: Turkey Responds to Devastating Wild Fires d) From Our Readers: Planting Trees e) From Our Readers: The Taliban and Women f) From Our Readers: The Taliban and Statues From Our Readers: Peace Vigils and Newsletter A reader writes: “Good for you, Tom Sager! Please keep it up. I don't always agree with you. But your viewpoint is vital.” My response: Thank you for the encouragement. InshaAllah (God willing) I intend to hang in there a little while longer. From Our Readers: Anthem by Leonard Cohen A reader writes: “Glad to hear the anthem by Leonard Cohen. I had forgotten about his songs. Afghanistan is such a tragedy from start to finish the whole 20 years.” My response: Anthem is one of my favorites. I listen to it over and over again. So sad and yet so hopeful. Leonard Cohen is gone; but he left us such an incomparable gift in his music and poetry. From Our Readers: Turkey Responds to Devastating Wild Fires A reader writes: “Turkish people were very passionate about putting out the fires; unfortunately, the government didn’t have enough airplanes and played politics on the airplane issue. Long story.” My response: Like many parts of the world, Turkey was hit by intense heat waves and devastating fires this summer. I think the Turkish people did well. They appear to have been successful in putting out their fires, while fires continue to burn in many other places, including the western United States. Turkey received a lot of help in firefighting from many friends, from Russia to the United States. International cooperation is so very important. Turkey has big plans to plant seven billion trees by 2023. Seven billion trees can sequester a lot of carbon which will reduce global warming and make such devastating fires less likely in the future. We wish Turkey a great success in this very important endeavor. From Our Readers: Planting Trees A reader writes: My response:“I read an article today from WaPo [The Washington Post] about a project in Pakistan to plant trees. Lots of trees. Ten billion of them, to be precise. I knew nothing about this project. Turns out it's been around for about six years. It started in a province with a one-billion-tree goal, was successful there, and was expanded to include the whole country. The idea behind it is to fight global warming. Nice that somebody is trying to do something about it.” Kudos to all countries like Pakistan and Turkey that are planting large numbers of trees. Growing a forest is not as easy as it might seem. Like the young of our own species, seedlings must be nurtured until they reach a certain level of maturity. Trees co-evolved with humans. It is unlikely that any of us would be here today, were it not for the trees. If we are to survive in a changing climate, it is absolutely necessary that we grow and nurture our forests and replant them where they have been destroyed or degraded. Here is an important tree initiative: Africa's Great Green Wall will stretch across the width of Africa from Senegal to Djibouti and hold back the Sahara Desert, which threatens to engulf land to the south. It is way past time for wealthy countries to step up to the plate, and supply the funding necessary to make this initiative happen. And here is one of my favorite projects. El Porvenir is working in Nicaragua to restore watersheds. This includes not only planting trees but also nurturing them and building paths, ponds, fences and other infrastructure, thereby creating an entire ecosystem which allows the land and its inhabitants to flourish. While not on the grandiose scale of the above initiatives, small projects like these may be even more important. This is how we reclaim the Earth — one watershed at a time. And lets not forget our own small tree-planting efforts here in Rolla where citizens planted over 40 trees in Buehler Park to replace aging trees that are nearing the end of their life cycle. Nurturing the seedlings, especially during periods of drought, was key to the success of this effort. Kudos to Chief Forester, Ross Melick. And here are two lines from a famous poem by Joyce Kilmer: From Our Readers: The Taliban and Women“Poems are made by fools like me, A reader writes: My response:“I still don't know if the original invasion of Afghanistan was justified. Perhaps it was, but we certainly should have gotten out quickly. However, it seems to me that the one bright spot in the occupation was the improvement of the condition of women there. Things are rarely totally black and white. Sometimes there are shades of gray. I feel that after the inevitable victory of the Taliban, the condition of women there will deteriorate. I would like to see you write about this in an upcoming Peace News.” I can hardly think of anything worse for women (and men and children) than war. 20 years of war and occupation perpetrated on Afghanistan by the United States, NATO and other foreigners have left Afghanistan one of the ten poorest countries in the world and the poorest outside of Africa. To take just one incident: 14 years into the US War Against Afghanistan, The United States bombed a Doctors Without Borders hospital in Kunduz killing 42: patients, doctors and other staff alike. Immobile patients in the ICU burned in their beds. Survivors were mowed down from the air as they attempted to flee. The only hospital serving a large area in northern Afghanistan was totally destroyed. I find it disingenuous for a country that commits such atrocities to even talk about the condition of women in Afghanistan. If the Taliban can bring Peace to Afghanistan, I don't see how the condition of women (and men and children) can help but improve. I think the world should be supporting this effort to bring Peace to Afghanistan. Instead the West is freezing Afghanistan's accounts in foreign banks, cutting off foreign aid, and Joe Biden is talking nonsense about the Taliban wanting to be “recognized by the international community as being a legitimate government.” After what the “international community” has done to Afghanistan for twenty years, I should wonder why the Taliban would give a rat's ass to be recognized by the international community. Afghanistan is owed reparations big time by the international community. Foreign aid be damned. And here is a short article by feminist Nandini Archer expressing a similar point of view. From Our Readers: The Taliban and Statues The same reader also writes: My response:“From a personal viewpoint I saw the stone Buddhas in Bamiyan when I was in Afghanistan. These were cultural treasures. My thought upon hearing that they were destroyed by the Taliban was that these people are f---ing crazy. But they are more than crazy. I think they are evil.” I am not in favor of carving mountains into statues. Mountains in their natural state are so much more ecologically functional and beautiful than any work of art we mere humans create. With that said: I think the decision on whether to “rewild” mountains that have been defaced by human activity should be left to local inhabitants who live in the vicinity. People half way around the world who feel an attachment to statues that have been carved into mountains should certainly be able to negotiate their maintenance with local inhabitants. Here's an interesting statement on the destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas from Mullah Mohammed Omar, co-founder and former leader of the Taliban: “I did not want to destroy the Bamiyan Buddha. In fact, some foreigners came to me and said they would like to conduct the repair work of the Bamiyan Buddha that had been slightly damaged due to rains. This shocked me. I thought, these callous people have no regard for thousands of living human beings—the Afghans who are dying of hunger, but they are so concerned about non-living objects like the Buddha. This was extremely deplorable. That is why I ordered its destruction. Had they come for humanitarian work, I would have never ordered the Buddha's destruction.” Rolla Peace News is distributed by email once a week on Tuesday evenings (except on rare occasions) and is posted on the web at http://tomsager.org (click on Rollaites for Peace: near the top of rightmost column).Wage peace, Tom yushasager (at) yahoo.com |