What Does It Really Mean To Make Peace?

The New York Times reported last year a group of Christians leaders met with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran. Their goal was to have a warm, friendly exchange to demonstrate the only way to prevent war is through dialogue.


In their meeting held across the street from the UN Building in NY, the Iranian president spoke about the commonality of the messages of Judaism, Islam and Christianity. In light of his desire to destroy Israel, I find his religious commonality approach to be ridiculous.

The panel from the Christian perspective included a Quaker, a Catholic, an Anglican, a Baptist and a representative of the interfaith World Council of Churches.

The gathering was organized by the Quakers and Mennonites, especially in light of their commitment to dialogue and pacifism as a way to resolve conflict.

No Jewish leader was willing to attend the meeting.

The constituents tried to prod the Iranian president about his position on the denial of the Holocaust, human rights abuses, Israel and Iran's nuclear weapon build up. Ahmadinejad conceded nothing and often deflected questions by putting the focus on Israel and US policies.

A year later the president of Iran still makes his daily threats against Israel and spews his hatred for America. The only thing the Iranian president took from the meeting was the respect shown to him by the Christian clerics - a respect he does not deserve.

Is negotiation with a despotic ruler the way to achieve peace or merely a display of naivete when it comes to the evil lurking within a religious/political ruler?

I think when two people disagree on an issue, there is always room for negotiation and discussion to reach a resolve. Husbands and wives do it all the time and so do friends.

However, on a worldwide scale, when an individual is so committed to his stance of hatred against a country or a people, the evil in his heart overpowers any attempt to make peace.

For example, in 2000 at the Camp David Summit, President Bill Clinton, Ehud Barak and Yasser Arafat met to discuss the Israeli/Palestinian issue. In a total surprise act of peacemaking, Barak offered Arafat and his people more land that was ever offered by Israel in exchange for peace and the cessation of Palestinian terrorism against innocent Israeli citizens. Arafat did not take the deal. Clinton was shocked and so were Arafat's aides. Why?

Arafat's hatred for Israel and desire to destroy the Jewish state was stronger than his desire for peace.

Can you carry on diplomatic discussions with a person resolved to see your demise?

Our country is naive to think the next president of the US will be able to solve the war on terrorism using words as weapons or as a healing balm. I'd rather have a Commander -in-Chief in the White House - John McCain - who understands firsthand the evil of war and knows the deep hostility of those who perpetrate the slaughter of innocent lives.

For your information, the day after the Camp David Summit in 2000, Palestinian terrorist sent several suicide bombers across the border into Israel.

I cannot cast my vote for a man -Barak Obama - who has no war experience, does not understand the darkness of the heart of a terrorist and would use diplomacy as a substitute for direct confrontation and military threat to show that the US will not tolerate terrorism.

My fear is that while a man like Barak Obama speaks peacefully to individuals like Ahmadinejad, behind the scenes he and his henchmen are plotting to obliterate Israel and do irreparable harm to the US using nuclear weapons. It is my opinion that a vote for Obama is a vote for naivete and ignorance of the real danger that lurks among terrorist groups and nations.

What do you think?

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What Does It Really Mean To Make Peace?

Where Have All Our Heroes Gone?

We are at a loss for true heroes. Our diminishing of heroes is especially prevalent in the sports world. Barry Bonds breaks the all time Home Run record amidst the hovering stench of accusations of steroid usage. Political figures are accused of financial improprieties. Entertainment divas are succumbing to drug and alcohol addictions left and right.

A few years back NBA Hall of Famer Charles Barclay claimed he was not a role model. Does that go for Barry Bonds or Michael Vick or Brittney Spears? Does anybody want to take responsibility for their actions?

In a World Net Daily article Star Parker addressed Barclay’s shrugging off responsibility as a role model: "If Charles Barkley, with all the blessings this country has cast his way, took a humble moment to look at reality, there is no way he could flippantly dismiss his responsibilities as a public figure."

Parker continues, "His {Barclay's] claim that responsibility for children's behavior should reside exclusively within the family shows he hasn't bothered in any way to look at his own black community. Very sadly, in most cases, black children have no intact family toward which to turn. Children will look somewhere for guidance. Where does Charles Barkley think these kids are getting their values – and where does he think they are formulating their views about what life is about?"

So where do we go for values? Where are the heroes of our society?

Let me pick a present day hero for you: Marine Lance Corporal Rogelio A. Ramirez.

When Ramirez was a young man, he became fascinated with the Marines. He saw ads to join the Marines on billboard. He felt a sense of power from the Marines, especially the uniforms with the crossed swords.

Soon after the U.S. went into Iraq he announced to his family he was going to enlist in the Marine Corp. He was only 16. His mother prayed the war would be over before he was old enough. He finally joined the Corp Infantry when he was 19. It was all he thought about. His father, a veteran of a local militia during the Salvadorian civil war, tried to talk him out of it. Young Ramirez felt his father was interfering with his needing to grow up.

After overcoming the protests of his parents, Marine recruiters formed the next obstacle for Rogelio. They told him he needed to pass a GED-general equivalency diploma-exam and complete 15 credits.

His mother felt relieved since she assumed her son would not want to go back to school. Over the next year Rogelio showed the discipline necessary as he had never shown before. He was determined to become a Marine. He went to night school and earned a GED. Then he entered Pasadena City College taking Spanish, Italian and math.

After finishing school and poised to enter the Corp, Ramirez discovered he still owed $1200 in truancy fines from his days of ditching high school. This dampened his chances to enter the Marines since the Corp doesn't take recruits with lending legal problems.

One other obstacle for Rogelio was about to be scaled. He found a night job at McDonald's while attending college during the day. It took a year . . . but he paid off his fines.

One other thing . . . Marines also don't accept recruits with certain tattoos. Ramirez had a tattoo on his left hand which showed he was a member of a gang. He never was a member of a gang but he got the tattoo a number of years before as a prank. With a scissors he painfully removed the tattoo himself.

Ramirez passed the Marine entrance exam and left for induction right before his birthday June 30, 2006. A year later in July he was sent to Iraq. He became a machine gunner on an armored vehicle.

On one occasion, the night of August 25, Ramirez had gone out on patrol. When his convoy was attacked, he was able silence several insurgent machine gun positions, providing cover that allowed Marines to evacuate the wounded. The next day officers asked for volunteers to go out again the night of August 26th. Rogelio volunteered to go out a second night when most soldiers would have passed.

On patrol that night an explosive device hit his vehicle and Marine Lance Corporal Rogelio A. Ramirez was killed instantly.

Ramirez had left behind a child he had with his girlfriend Carla Lopez.

Four days before he left for the war, he had these words by English philosopher John Stuart Mill tattooed on his right side:

War is an ugly thing but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself." That's my hero. A man with purpose. Determination. A role model. Who needs Charles Barclay when we have Marine Lance Corporal Rogelio A. Ramirez.

The heart and sacrifice of this young man demonstrate to me that we still have heroes.

Where Have All Our Heroes Gone?