A Blogger's Lament About Blogging and Stuff

This blogging hasn't worked out quite the way I intended. I planned on doing three or four a week, a light load of writing. But then other things intruded. The book on the Normandy Campaign was published, another is in the process of being published, I'm at work on two more, a short story was accepted, two more submitted, three in progress. Then there are two web sites to keep up to date. To sum it up, I'm usually too damn busy to blog.
I try to keep up on the news, too, although not the way I would like. I also like to read books. There are a couple of TV shows I enjoy. If the days were thirty hours long instead of twenty-four there might be time for everything.
I read where a law was passed making it easier for the government to engage in wiretapping. And another permitting the arrest of people opposed to the government. A camp was set up to accomodate them.
No, I'm not talking about the latest news from Wolf Blitzer. I'm talking about the Enabling Act of 1933. It did a lot of enabling. It enabled Hitler, Himmler and the rest of that bunch to listen in on telephone calls. It enabled them to arrest dissidents, and that included anyone less than thrilled by the regime in power. It enabled them to take an old industrial complex and turn it into a camp for all those bad guys. The camp was on the outskirts of Dachau. It soon became overcrowded so other camps had to be built. Time marches on.
Some bright boys who ducked out of taking part in a shooting war are dead set on clarifying the rules laid down by the Geneva Convention. They are clear as a bell to any intelligent sixth grader, of course. But apparently not clear enough to allow for torturing prisoners.
Having at times been so close to enemy soldiers that only a dirt hedgerow stood between us I kind of like the Geneva Convention just as it is written. There was always the possibility of finding yourself in an untenable position that left you with only one option: surrender. We treated them pretty well when they surrendered and they returned the favor.
I would not have liked to have found myself surrounded by enemies and having to say, "Hey, we may not treat our prisoners too kindly but you have to be nice to me." They might not have thought that was a fair and equitable way of doing business.
No, I don't like some of the things being done by the people in Washington. Their way of doing things are not the old American way of doing them. If they get their way about everything it will place the men and women in uniform in grave danger. By that I mean danger that can lead them to the grave.
And one by one the rest of us are finding the freedoms we enjoyed slipping away. It will make us safer, they say. Will it? I doubt it. And it poses a question: Would you rather be safe or would you rather be free? And doesn't surrendering freedoms mean the terrorist have won?
But some people contend that those fellows in Washington, those that made sure they never were in danger of being shot at or captured themselves, aren't bad men. I agree. They're evil men.

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www.dickstodghill.com
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