Morning Reads

Was Jesus gay?
At a time when the church is having increasing difficulty in dealing with the concept of homosexuality, a lesbian author has published a book featuring an erotic love story between Jesus Christ and his disciple John. (source)

Well, if Jesus was gay, and there have been many others who thought he might be gay, a lot of “Christians” are going to have a lot of explaining to do someday on the way they have treated their gay brethren. That’s all I can say about it. I don’t even want to think of where that puts people like Fred Phelps and his ilk.

U.S. Not Winning War in Iraq, Bush Says for 1st Time
President Bush acknowledged for the first time yesterday that the United States is not winning the war in Iraq and said he plans to expand the overall size of the “stressed” U.S. armed forces to meet the challenges of a long-term global struggle against terrorists.

As he searches for a new strategy for Iraq, Bush has now adopted the formula advanced by his top military adviser to describe the situation. “We’re not winning, we’re not losing,” Bush said in an interview with The Washington Post. The assessment was a striking reversal for a president who, days before the November elections, declared, “Absolutely, we’re winning.” [...]

“We need to reset our military,” said Bush, whose administration had opposed increasing force levels as recently as this summer. (source)

Well, I think the one who needs to be “reset”, is the President.

On a dimly brighter side, he is coming a bit closer to reality. Is this not a good thing?

The reality is that we hardly have the troop strength to send in the 20,000-30,000 troops that are being talked about. Also, everyone, with the exception of the President, agrees that these numbers could not be maintained for a long duration. In my opinion, we are sending 30,000 more targets to Iraq. It’s simply not enough to make a difference.

Pentagon mulling show of force to Iran
WASHINGTON - The Pentagon is considering a buildup of Navy forces in the Persian Gulf as a show of force against Iran, a senior defense official said Tuesday.

Speaking on condition of anonymity because the idea has not been approved, the official said one proposal is to send a second aircraft carrier to the region amid increasing tensions with Iran, blamed for encouraging sectarian violence in neighboring Iraq as well as allegedly pursuing a nuclear weapons program. [...]

In Tehran, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Tuesday that U.N. sanctions would not stop Iran from pursuing its uranium enrichment program, which he has said is for peaceful development of energy.

Bush administration officials have repeatedly declined to rule out the use of force against Iran, though they have also said their first choice is to rely on diplomacy. (source)

Perhaps I was too hasty in suggesting that the President is coming closer to reality.

We are now talking about taking on Iran as well? And this after we just told India to develop nuclear weapons at will? I can actually understand Iran’s reasoning here.

Before diplomacy can work, as the Bush Administration claims to be their “first choice,” the United States must be willing to TALK TO IRAQ. If our ego has grown so big that we are unable unwilling to do that, then there will be no diplomacy.

But aside from all of this, Iranian President Ahmadinejad is not doing so well himself politically in his own country. He may not be President much longer, and he has little say on what will happen with nuclear development within Iran. He talks big, and he talks with force, but internally, the Iranian government is becoming unsettled and irritated by many of his hard line conservative stances.