Category: Culture

He was despised and we esteemed him not

After the Chilcot report, we’ll hear the New Testament – the gospel according to Saint Tony By Robert Fisk, Friday 3 June 2016 08:25 BST   So, Sir John Chilcot’s report is going to be “four times as long as War and Peace”, is it? My weariness comes not with the cliché, credited to the …

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Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2016/06/03/he-was-despised-and-we-esteemed-him-not/

Ritual shows of deference

On (Not) Loving Henry Kissinger By Richard Falk, 21 May 2016   There is an irony that would be amusing if it was not depressing about news that Donald Trump has been courting the 92-year old foreign policy sorcerer Henry Kissinger. Of course, the irony is that earlier in the presidential campaign Hilary Clinton proudly …

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Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2016/05/21/ritual-shows-of-deference/

A holy harangue

    Dear editor, In my last letter (April 10), I encouraged everyone who is genuinely concerned about the future welfare of our nation to please attend the prayer rally led by the Rev. Franklin Graham, who is visiting all 50 states with his most important message. I’m happy to report that it was estimated …

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Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2016/04/24/a-holy-harangue/

Seriously

When religious liberty demands cease to be legitimate By Amy Butler, April 19, 2016   I think most Americans, even non-religious Americans, are on board with the idea of religious liberty — in the abstract. But like so many of the things we hold dear, what sounds great in theory becomes deeply complicated when the …

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Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2016/04/20/seriously-2/

Trump is wrong and Jeb was right

    Complicit in terror   Dear editor: Twenty-five years or so ago, we didn’t have a Muslim terrorist problem in this country because, frankly, we didn’t have hardly any Muslims here. I remember driving on the interstate past Perrysburg, Ohio, a suburb of Toledo, in the mid 1990s and seeing a large blue dome …

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Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2016/03/03/trump-is-wrong-and-jeb-was-right/

Religious ideology is a tool

Why the Arabs Don’t Want Us in Syria By Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., February 22, 2016   In part because my father was murdered by an Arab, I’ve made an effort to understand the impact of U.S. policy in the Mideast and particularly the factors that sometimes motivate bloodthirsty responses from the Islamic world against …

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Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2016/03/01/religious-ideology-is-a-tool/

We humans hang on to our symbols

Meditation on My Home in Lebanon By Frances Fuller, 21st February 2016   I made a mistake in my book. Let’s just say that I was wrong. In the epilogue of In Borrowed Houses I said that the little stone house around which my whole story revolves would outlive all of us. My actual words were: …

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Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2016/02/21/we-humans-hang-on-to-our-symbols/