Hello Everybody,

Remember the events of 9-11?
Terrorists slamming passenger buildings
into skyscrapers, a five-sided military
office, and a field of dreams?

Remember the actions of a US president,
who stood between two huge firemen at the
rubble in NYC, telling all Americans to
"go shopping" and "hug your children"?

We even made that date a national holiday,
calling it Patriot Day.

We also built a new skyscraper in NYC to
show the world who and what we are.

Of course, the US president asked our
NATO allies to help rid the terrorists
from Afghanistan, which had been given
sanctuary there by a group that called
itself the Taliban. The US and some
of its allies are still there today.

After the events of 9-11, that same US
president chose to launch an invasion of
Iraq, which had absolutely nothing to do
with those attacks, and posed no danger
to the national security of the US.

Nobody seems to know why the US remains
in Iraq today, or even why US troops were
sent there in the first place.

The more things change, the more things
stay the same. Do people ever learn?

The War of 1812 was no different than any
other war in human history. And all future
wars will be the same as wars from times
past. Regardless of which sides have fought
or will fight those wars.

Yet, there are some folks who get it.

Peace. That is the answer. The only
answer there can be. Why is it that adults
have such a difficult time understanding
that basic concept?

There is war. And there is anti-war.
With nothing in-between. Which side are
you on?

Here is my response to 9-11, or Patriot Day.
A poem, written by Esther Talbot, age 10, in
1814. In response to the War of 1812. But
in reality, a response to all wars.

This little girl understood far more about
the horrors of war than most grown men of her
own time, as well as future times.

What can a little girl know about war and peace?
Children are supposed to be protected from such
horrors, by their parents and other adults.

But she understood. She fully understood.
What she wrote was her own response to war.
It is the same response grown adults were
too afraid to express amongst members of
their own kind, as most adults felt it was
their duty to pledge allegiance to those
who had sworn to protect them all from the
horrors of war.

Peace
by Esther Talbot, 1814

Come, gentle Peace, with smiling ray,
Beam on our land a cloudless day;
Beneath thy influence serene,
The olive wears immortal green.

Come, gentle Peace, resume thy reign,
With all thy virtues in thy train;
And then Columbia's soil shall grow,
As verdant Paradise below.

Signed,
- All the caring people of this world (if any)

--
Nobody Beats Our Meat

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* Origin: news://eljaco.se (2:203/2)