T P O

T   P   O
The Patient Ox (aka Hénock Gugsa)

G r e e t i n g s !

** TPO **
A personal blog with diverse topicality and multiple interests!


On the menu ... politics, music, poetry, and other good stuff.
There is humor, but there is blunt seriousness here as well!


Parfois, on parle français ici aussi. Je suis un francophile .... Bienvenue à tous!

* Your comments and evaluations are appreciated ! *

Wednesday, May 11, 2016

Educating Myself about War - by Hénock Gugsa

 
Ethiopian soldiers in the Korean War
Educating Myself about War 
- by Hénock Gugsa - 

Recently, someone on Facebook suggested that I educate myself on the military and the good that it does.

No, thanks, I think I'll pass on that.
I already know that the main purpose and function of the military is for engagement in wars.  They may call it "peace keeping", "defense", and getting rid of "threats". But it all boils down to ===> W A R !!

Well, war is a product of hate ... and there is hate on all sides. The question here, however, is how you conduct war ... the degree of detachment or cold-bloodedness is what is worrisome. On one side, you have snipers, drones, and maybe carpet-bombing. On the other, you have RPG's, IEDs, and self-exploding humans.  And in peace-time, there is all that "unexploded ordinance" (bombs, mines) left behind to do more damage!

War is all ugliness, and how you measure war "heroism" is an even more dubious exercise.  But that is another discussion for another day.

How much more do I need to know or to educate myself about war? Not much ... just that it is fabricated and especially cancerous when you conduct it thousands of miles away from your shores and in a foreign land that was not your equal and did not threaten you at all.

So again, no thanks, I don't need to educate myself ... I know enough about war!


Friday, May 6, 2016

Silver Linings! - by Hénock Gugsa


Attila's Hun troops
 Silver Linings!
// by Hénock Gugsa //
Think about it! This is a strange situation we are in. In Donald Trump's never-imagined rise to his current status as leading candidate of the GOP, there really have been many silver linings in the gray clouds.
1-   He has exposed all the dirty laundry of the Republicans.
2-   He has demonstrated the inanity of the media by exploiting them and showing them up as the moronic talking heads that they are.
3-   Donald Trump is not unlike Attila the Hun. He indirectly drove the Roman Empire to the ground by attacking the Goths who in turn invaded the civilized power of the world at the time.  Donald has routed the establishment’s run-of-the-mill candidates and brought the Republican Party to its knees.
4-   The theater of absurdity in which he is the leading actor is waking up a lot of Americans to realize their true natures.  We are truly seeing Americans as they are, all of them … the wise, the foolish, the insanely idiotic, and the dangerous.
5-   In Trump’s world, the rule is that there are no rules!  He has amply demonstrated that he is not here to be given power, instead he is here to outright take it.
6-   He demolished every one of his republican opponents, and he is going to do the same with Hillary Clinton.  The reason is because she is no different from the people he has already vanquished … remember Jeb Bush.
7-   The only formidable obstacle to Trump is someone with impeccable integrity, stamina, and unwavering principles and ideas about where this country should be heading.  Trump, the revolutionary of the right, meet Sanders, revolutionary of the left!
8-   America has been going down the wrong path for most of the last thirty-five years.  And now, Donald Trump is about to push us over the precipice to uncharted territories.  It is time to wake up and save the republic … let us go back to the basics, let us bring back “The Constitution of the United States of America”!
9-   Go Bernie!!
10- God save America!!!

The ever-delightful Chris Pratt