A Hard Rain is Fallin' - Right Now

So things haven’t gotten better in the Middle East, have they?

Doom and gloom are on the airwaves on late night t.v. The preachers are having a jolly ole "end time" party.

But I think that an entire blog should be dedicated to the asinine ability that some fundamentalist christians (yes, with a lower case “c”) have in interpreting the ancient texts concerning prophetic and apocalyptic literature. To say that they are WAY off base is an understatement.

But beyond all the mumbo-jumbo, it’s simply bad. Israel ain’t backin’ down. Lebanon has no idea what hit them. Syria is sweating. Iran is licking their chops. Iraq is, well, Iraq is just what we have made it.

Thanks George………..

So what’s a boy to do?

Billy Joel’s song “We Didn’t Start The FIRE” comes to mind. This goes on and on and has for so long. Each generation is guilty as charged. I don’t know if we can ever have a righteous war again (think WWII).

But I feel that the United States is implicit in all of this. We are the only ones that can stop it. And I really don’t think we’re even trying very hard. We have expended so much of our goodwill and the only thing we have left is economic diplomacy – which is alive and well but we need to do something before it gets too far out of hand.

It’s so convoluted over there and the media doesn’t do a good job explaining all of that stuff to the public.

Syria backs Hezzbollah. Iran backs Hezzbollah. Syria hates Iran. Iran hates Syria. So we have two divergent theories backing a terrorist group whose aim is the destruction of Israel and their own self preservation.

Iran has been run by the clergy for a few decades now and that just scares the hell out of the arab countries that are run by regular people – like Syria. So they all walk a tightrope. The only thing they can agree on is that they hate Israel.

And that premise, while bad for us and for Israel, isn't all bad because the Arab Nations will never be together because they all hate each other. It would be very bad if they all got together and took action. I'm not sure if our great white fathers in Washington, DC have the balls to bomb the oil fields. Anyway, that, again is a WHOLE 'nother topic.

The news seems to focus on the "political fallout" from the conflict(s). But the thing I am always left with is what about the people. What about the father that is trying to feed his children? What about the mother whose husband is gone and she is trying to provide shelter for her family? What about the children themselves, what do they learn?

What will it take before all God's children can lay down with each other and think amazing thoughts without trying to kill each other?

When can the love be brought forth???

And I didn’t mean to get into a political discussion because music started this train of thought for me today.

It was Bob Dylan’s “A Hard Rain’s Gonna Fall”. This was written in the cold war, before Vietnam, before all of the stuff that has come after it. We have made so much progress in so many areas – but we still kill each other and understanding seems to be as far away as it ever has.

The answers – hell, I don’t have any. All I know is that we need to try.

Remember that on election day.

Check out the lyrics and feel what it means............

Oh, where have you been, my blue-eyed son?
Oh, where have you been, my darling young one?
I've stumbled on the side of twelve misty mountains,
I've walked and I've crawled on six crooked highways,
I've stepped in the middle of seven sad forests,
I've been out in front of a dozen dead oceans,
I've been ten thousand miles in the mouth of a graveyard,

And it's a hard, and it's a hard,
it's a hard, and it's a hard,
And it's a hard rain's a-gonna fall.

Oh, what did you see, my blue-eyed son?
Oh, what did you see, my darling young one?
I saw a newborn baby with wild wolves all around it,
I saw a highway of diamonds with nobody on it,
I saw a black branch with blood that kept drippin',
I saw a room full of men with their hammers a-bleedin',
I saw a white ladder all covered with water,
I saw ten thousand talkers whose tongues were all broken,
I saw guns and sharp swords in the hands of young children,

And it's a hard, and it's a hard,
it's a hard, it's a hard,
And it's a hard rain's a-gonna fall.

And what did you hear, my blue-eyed son?
And what did you hear, my darling young one?
I heard the sound of a thunder, it roared out a warnin',
Heard the roar of a wave that could drown the whole world,
Heard one hundred drummers whose hands were a-blazin',
Heard ten thousand whisperin' and nobody listenin',
Heard one person starve, I heard many people laughin',
Heard the song of a poet who died in the gutter,
Heard the sound of a clown who cried in the alley,

And it's a hard, and it's a hard,
it's a hard, it's a hard,
And it's a hard rain's a-gonna fall.

Oh, who did you meet, my blue-eyed son?
Who did you meet, my darling young one?
I met a young child beside a dead pony,
I met a white man who walked a black dog,
I met a young woman whose body was burning,
I met a young girl, she gave me a rainbow,
I met one man who was wounded in love,
I met another man who was wounded with hatred,

And it's a hard, it's a hard,
it's a hard, it's a hard,
It's a hard rain's a-gonna fall.

Oh, what'll you do now, my blue-eyed son?
Oh, what'll you do now, my darling young one?
I'm a-goin' back out 'fore the rain starts a-fallin',
I'll walk to the depths of the deepest black forest,
Where the people are many and their hands are all empty,
Where the pellets of poison are flooding their waters,
Where the home in the valley meets the damp dirty prison,
Where the executioner's face is always well hidden,
Where hunger is ugly, where souls are forgotten,
Where black is the color, where none is the number,
And I'll tell it and think it and speak it and breathe it,
And reflect it from the mountain so all souls can see it,
Then I'll stand on the ocean until I start sinkin',
But I'll know my song well before I start singin',

And it's a hard, it's a hard,
it's a hard, it's a hard,
It's a hard rain's a-gonna fall.