Tuesday, July 18, 2006

"Oh, I Don't Leave Until Tomorrow".

That's what my on-the-ball husband said to me this morning as I was getting ready to take son to class. Everything was ready for packing, bags on bed to pack clothes, time set for when to reserve car service to airport, then Mr. Engineer Man looks at his itinerary. Alas, KLM Royal Dutch Airlines isn't expecting him until tomorrow afternoon. Then he will fly non-stop Houston to Amsterdam, then Amsterdam to Atyrau, Kazakhstan. A mere 7,000 plus miles of travel. So, to say it is impossible to plan around here, well, it's an understatement. I guess he'll be home for dinner after all.

Last night on the local 10:00 news, a protest was shown from in front of the Israeli embassy by the pro-Palestine folks. About a dozen or so were there for the camera, holding placards and voicing contempt for the notion of Israel defending herself. Then the newscast did a blurb from the Israeli diplomat here. What, in the whole big city of Houston, were there no pro-Israel rallies? We'll never know, I can guarantee you that for a fact.

Houston is a hugely diverse city. I would venture to say the most diversified, after NYC. We are the fourth largest city in this country, as the Chamber of Commerce reminds us at every opportunity, and you would be hard pressed to name a country or territory on planet earth not represented here. A favorite section of town here for me is a section populated by Asians and the street signs are in Vietnamese or Chinese, besides English. Great food and fun shopping there. The Hong Kong Grocery is a favorite for lots of people I know.

This is why I continue to be a little on the cynical side of local press coverage of world events. To blatantly slant one way or another is a disservice to the city in general. The Houston Chronicle has a website and a new addition is a section for reader blogs. Readers are invited to submit samples of their blog and if a slot is open in a vast number of categories, you will be considered for addition. I read the politics section. Shocking, I know. Anyway, it was interesting for a while. One liberal blog, one somewhat moderate with liberal leanings blog, then a conservative blog. I already was a reader of the conservative blogger, a local gal I stumbled upon about a year ago, so I tuned in. All was good until I noticed yesterday the moderate was gone. There were 2 liberal blogs and the one conservative. Then today there are two liberal blogs, one conservative and a new one. A blog by a Palestinean guy who was raised in Mississippi and Louisiana. He felt the need to go to Gaza and blog from there the "real" story of the people of Palestine. Yeah, thanks Houston Chronicle. That's just what we needed. How's that agenda thing working out for you? I understand subscriptions are down again.

I saw, via another blog I read, a rally held in support of Israel in NYC. In attendance were Elie Wiesel, the Pulitzer Prize winner for his book, "Night" about the Halocaust experience from his first person view, and also good old Hillary Clinton. She must have fought the urge to scream when Mr. Wiesel told the crowd he thanked God that George W. Bush is president. Hillary voiced her support of Israel to defend herself. Kiss the cheek of Sula Arafat one day, pledge support to Israel the next. The Clinton version of support. Ask Joe Lieberman about Hillary's loyality.

The glimmer of hope in the current middle eastern crisis is that Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt, and some Persian Gulf countries have voiced displeasure with Hezbollah. That's a start. The only way for any hope of peace is to eliminate Hezbollah and then Hamas.

The Americans are being evacuated now. I am sure we will continue to hear the griping about the perceived slowness of the evacuation. Wouldn't want the war going on to get in the way of anyone's vacation plans. Have you noticed all those complaining are visiting family there and are speaking with heavy accents? Are we to believe they were caught by complete surprise by the situation? They are expected to pay for their evacuation costs, pledging to pay later if they can't now, and I am waiting for the chorus of complaining about that next. The ones not complaining and simply waiting for time to come for exiting Lebanon are people like the students being interviewed. Their parents must be proud.

1 comment:

Jess said...

Great post, I am so sick of the Americans whining about the conditions there. They're lucky we're even bringing them home!!! They had NO business there!!