Israel vs. Hezb'Allah

[ZEUS]

I think the Lebanon I remember as a 16 year old ('69-'70) was one of the most beautiful, magical,places in the world. A cosmopolitan, almost European style...some how infused with 6000 years of culture and continuity. The place where humans first learned seafaring,the result being,a place made up of little bits of the whole worlds ideas and ways. My description comes up short. I look now and feel only hollow. When all the humans are gone, maybe then the Cedars will regrow... it will be beautiful again.

Chopper, that's great... poetic even.
In man as a whole, sometimes the only thing that seems to be evolving is the use of technology, propaganda, and weaponry to display power. True power would be to overcome the urge to have it. If there is a Godhead which created all Chopper described above and more why would it also create a "religious following" so vain to destroy it? I think we are all witness to a glorified gang war full of excuses! The innocents of the neighborhoods suffer the most and there is more than one way to fall victim... How can it end when those who fight fail to see what they should be fighting for?

[WyrreJ]

I can second Chopper. My aunt spent most of high school there (my grandfather worked for Aramco for a while) and she has said that it was an incredible place.

[E-ZooZoo One]

After my last post, I've found myself re-reading quite a bit of Twain...
It turns out that there are a few more quotes I'd like to share:

“Man is a Religious Animal. He is the only Religious Animal. He is the only animal that has the True Religion
-- several of them. He is the only animal that loves his neighbor as himself, and cuts his throat if his theology isn't straight. He has made a graveyard of the globe in trying his honest best to smooth his brother's path to happiness and heaven.”

“Man is the only animal that deals in that atrocity of atrocities, War. He is the only one that gathers his brethren about him and goes forth in cold blood and calm pulse to exterminate his kind. He is the only animal that for sordid wages will march out... and help to slaughter strangers of his own species who have done him no harm and with whom he has no quarrel.... And in the intervals between campaigns he washes the blood off his hands and works for "the universal brotherhood of man" - with his mouth.”

“Man is the only animal that blushes -- or needs to.”

- Mark Twain (excerpts from ‘The Lowest Animal’ essay)