A Passover Present From Obama

American Thinker ^ | April 18 2011 | James Lewis

[TPOOH]

Excerpt.....

For Mr. Geert de Wilders, leader of the new anti-fascist Resistance in the Netherlands, who is now on trial in Amsterdam for telling the truth.

"The lights are going out all over Europe."

- Geert de Wilders, Feb. 7, 2011. Attributed to Winston Churchill.

"I want my Al Jazeerah."

- Naomi Wolf in the Huffington Post.

Some liberal Jewish friends last week invited me to their Passover Seder tonight, and I had such a sick feeling about sitting with friends who are in massive denial of reality that I had to excuse myself.

I can't do it this year.

Passover celebrates the liberation of the Jewish people from national humiliation and slavery in ancient Egypt. Easter commemorates Jesus' Last Supper in Jerusalem, when, as an observant Jew, he also recited the Passover story. For serious Christians, Easter is a yearly reminder of the life, death, and meaning of Jesus of Nazareth.

By all means let us celebrate the holidays. But let's not forget that they are more than feel-good celebrations. They are meant to sound warnings, too.

If you don't understand that those warnings apply to us today you don't understand your own holidays.

Egyptian bondage was not a feel-good time for the Hebrew people, and the Crucifixion is a not a feel-good symbol. These are not Hallmark cutie holidays. They were shaped by people who were not sloppy, sentimental, goofy liberals. And no, Jesus wasn't one of those either, no matter what your neighbor thinks.

Passover and Easter are stories of ultimate hope, but they are also pretty unflinching warning about human evil. They are centuries-old warnings, but they are pretty relevant today, aren't they?

There is a reason why Judaism and Christianity put the problem of human evil at the forefront of their teachings. Slavery is evil...

[ClearCase_guy]

"The lamps are going out all over Europe. We shall not see them lit again in our time" is a remark attributed to British statesman Sir Edward Grey on the eve of the First World War.

Not Winston Churchill.

[Malesherbes]

Good correction.

I like this one which does apply to WWII:
“A calm twilight under which the garden stretches itself at ease. The flag hangs limply on its flagstaff. It is odd to feel that the world as I knew it has only a few hours more to run.”
- Harold Nicholson, diplomat, politician, diarist.