Povey Prattle

1 .  It was called "the war to end all wars" .   Of course it didn't!  As I have written elsewhere, the first world war was simply the first act,  placed into  intermission by the armistice in 1918, with the second act taken up in 1939. "The War to End All Wars".  That's a bit like spreading tuberculosis to end tuberculosis. 2. To make the world safe for democracy.   (U.S. President Woodrow Wilson). Democracy for who?  Certainly not for **Negroes (as they were then called) in the U.S.A. They had fought with enormous skill and bravery on the western front.  They returned to an America with defacto racism in the north, and with dejure racism in the former confederate states ( "Jim Crow" laws, brutality and lynchings). (Remember please that Woodrow Wilson was an ardent segregationist. When he became President he re- segregated the Federal Civil Service). 3. To make the United Kingdom "a land fit for ...

Canadian Great War Memorial, Vimy. The Germans had requested peace negotiations five weeks before the Armistice.  Half a million causalities took place during those weeks. The Armistice ( in truth it was a German surrender - at the insistence of Marshall Foch)  was signed at 5:00 a.m. to take effect at 11:00 a.m.   Word sped quickly down the lines. Some Commanders could not respect the spirit of the Armistice and insisted that the fight be carried on until the magical hour of 11:00 a.m.   There were more casualties in those five hours than for both sides than on D-Day. Black members of the American 92nd Division were ordered to advance  at 10:30 a.m. The "official" toll recorded seventeen deaths and three hundred and two missing or wounded. The blood lust of the politicians and the generals led to  More than Nine Million men killed in action. At least Twenty One Million wounded, many maimed...

This morning one of our local National Public Radio stations had one of those  "'experts' talk and listeners call in" programmes about The Great War  (a.k.a. World War One). One caller spoke of his Scottish born great-uncle who had served in that blood bath.  The uncle served and survived the war, one of only three out of sixty three soldiers from his home town who returned home. The uncle spoke to his great nephew about his being a Boy Scout (before 1914) and his experience of the semi-militaristic drills the boys were put through, even as they carried wooden rifles.   "We were", said the old man" being groomed for the glory of war".  "Beware" he said "of any culture which grooms its populace to believe that war is glory". The glory of War?   Not in that 1914-1918 festival of blood. And to hell with our current world leaders who lie, deceive,  and spend billions of our dollars/pounds/euros in the pursuit of ...

As the one hundredth anniversary of Armistice Day in Europe approaches... There is a common misconception that it was the torpedoing and sinking of the S.S. Lusitania on May 7th 1915 led to the American intervention in the Great War. 'Twas no so.  The only U.S. response to that sinking was this: On May 13, 1915, the  U.S. government  sent a note to Berlin expressing an indictment of the principles on which the  submarine  war was being fought, but this note and two following ones  constituted  the immediate limit of U.S. reaction to the  Lusitania  incident.   ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ "The U.S. was officially neutral until April 1917 when the United States declared war on Germany. Earlier in that year the German Ambassador   Bernstorff presented [...] Germany's response to (President) Wilson's recent 'peace without victory'...

I became an American citizen in the Springfield, MA Courthouse in 1984.   The next day I went to City Hall in Pittsfield, MA and registered to vote. I have voted in every election since then, save for one primary election when I was out of the country.  I voted today in Sarasota County's  Precinct 125, not far from my home. (There are 319,000 registered voters in Sarasota County. There are approx. 100 voting precincts which seems to be more than reasonable to me.   40% of the County's registered voters had voted by mail or through early voting before our polls opened at 7:00 a.m.   Those, such as I, who choose to vote in person, were sure to find a precinct near to their homes.  No excuses!  If you will drive four miles to your favourite  restaurant you can sure as eggs over easy  drive to your assigned voting precinct. ------------------------------------------------------------ I showed up at 7:45 a....

When the church gets in bed with the state,  the message of the christian gospel will always become subservient to the demands of the state. Here for instance are the words of the C of E Bishop of London in the early days of the Great War. The Bishop of London, Arthur Winnington-Ingram, emerged as the most vocal supporter of the war effort in 1914, speaking publicly in support of recruiting drives and the armaments industry. Later in the war he urged his younger clergy to consider enlisting as combatants rather than as chaplains.  Winnington-Ingram saw the war as a “great crusade to defend  the weak against the strong”. The language he used to describe  Germans was intentionally xenophobic. In one sermon he said:  “Kill Germans! Kill them!” ... not for the sake of killing, but to  save the world… Kill the good as well as the bad… Kill the  young men as well as the old… I look upon it as a  war for  purity . I ...

It began as you will remember when I visited my neighbour Rabbi Michael Shefrin last Sunday morning to express my anger and grief at the terrorism at Pittsburgh's Tree of Life Synagague. The Rabbi and I had few words.  We simply help on to each other and wept. I chose not to attend Sarasota's public vigil last Monday evening.  However approx 2,200 people, Jews, Christians, Muslims, people of other faith and people of no faith were there. Nor did I attend Friday Shabbat prayers at my local Temple Emman-uel. Again, many non Jews were there - it was standing room only. Instead I  chose to attend the Saturday morning prayer service.  That service  usually has an attendance of 12-14  - that attendance was quadrupled! I dressed for the occasion, wearing a blazer, slacks and my clerical collar.  Rabbi Shefrin of course knows me, but I wanted the congregants to know that an easily identifiable Christian minister was there. I sat with the Rabb...