Ukrainian Pipeline to Europe is outside of Putin's Control!

I listened carefully to the news-analysts summaries of the Putin-Biden talk today.

I came away with a sort-of-confirmation of my opinion: Putin wants control of that pipeline running through Ukraine.  He could have raised vociferously before the point he now makes that Ukraine is within the Russian sphere of influence.  Why raise the obvious now?  Because he's hiding, in my opinion, his feeling of desparation: he wants control of that pipeline.

Maybe, he is also distrustful, now that Merkel's stepped down, that he has little control of the oil he destines for Germany!

   

It's Just Another Adventure: Lord, Lead On!

Think of life as a continuum of adventures.  That is to say, your life's experiences can be led by God, if you want Him to!

The communion service is the taking of the bread and the wine.  It's a symbol that God is giving us the strength to carry on with the next sequence of adventures.  It's a reminder that God is with us as we go on life's journey.

There's one feature of our life in Christ, as a member of His Kingdom, that is usually downplayed in most churches: God's physical presence in the Church.  In typical cathedrals and churches in South America, the priest may symbolize the physical presence of God among their parishioners.  Truly, a Priest, to my way of thinking, can display a facial glow of the eternal presence.  So, You, the parishioner,  may look at him, the cleric, and come upon the Spirit of God within the church!

I had forgotten this marvelous revelation I experienced while in South America--in the Catholic churches I attended some years ago.  Truly, I felt that I had come upon a group of  clerics who conveyed the Christian message of hope in their facial expressions!  But now, I'm attending a little recognized Episcopal Church in Georgetown, where its interim Pastor, Rev. Rick, displays that religious fervor for adventure in life and the facial mien I attributed to some typical Priests I ran across in churches in South America.   Such clerics seemed to know they were chosen for the part of being ministers so as to symbolize God's physical being within the church's walls!  And, convey to us that we are walking throughout our life in Christ's footsteps.

           

Ukrainian courage: A Wondrous Sight to Behold

President Putin has wanted to assert Russian prowess, but against Russians?

Eastern Ukraine is primarily populated by Russians, but I think they're not wanting to be annexed to Russia.  On the hand, Crimea has not traditionally been Ukrainian territory.  Russians there may want Russian citizenship.

The various schemes--like hacking corporation and business datafiles and programs, helping friendly leaders stay in power, e.g., in Syria and in Venezuela---have done little to increase Putin's international reputation.  He, along with his political ruling friends have bogged down in the mire of few tangible changes and disturbances that increase mean to him greater power and prestige worldwide.

I think he's looking for a big score over Ukraine, what he regards as his Ukraine.  I think he wants to retain that pipeline to Europe through Ukraine!

My opinion.

     

Abortion discussion again: my comments

They want the woman who's pregnant to carry to term the baby--not a child, just a physical thing.

Traditionally in Christianity, a human being is composed of body, mind and spirit.  There is no human being in just the physical, living body-tissue: except according to some right wing groups of various religions.

While some groups in the Southern states oppose the pregnant woman's right to abort the fetus, be it noted no such restriction is being placed on the medical profession acting on behalf of the state and society, should it be determined the pregnancy would give birth to a "seriously deformed" or "inhuman" baby etc.

 No provision or promise is being offered to the pregnant female that an unwanted pregnancy would be accepted in her community, its needs being met from state funding.  Nor is the Catholic Church making promise to educate a child from an unwanted pregnancy.   The only responsibility being incurred by law is that of the mother--to carry the fetus to term.

Note that for millennia, pregnant women and mothers of babies did have the right to abort or terminate the human growth at that primordial stage of its existence.

I sense there's a hidden injustice in making the woman a scapegoat for an act that society fails to accept

its own participation in, viz., an unwanted birth.    

Brookings: Conversation with Secretary-General, African Free Trade Agreement

 The Hon. Wamkele Mene, Secretary-General of the African Continental Free Tree Area, was the welcomed speaker at a Brookings Institution online event, November 29, 2021 10 AM, last Monday.

Questioners and discussants were H.E. Landry Signe, Brookings and the moderator, Aloysius U. Ordu, also of Brookings on the topic "The State of African free trade agreement and strategies for greater integration."

 As each contributed to the discussion, I felt the rush of enthusiasm emanating from the monitor!  This new organization bringing together as many African nations that wish to participate in a free trade arrangement of its members for African states only!  Of course there are many organizations around the globe that espouse reduced or free trade: notably, the World Trade Organization, the TPP organization of Asian countries, and NAFTA for North American countries under its new name.  But this one is for African nations to benefit from and among themselves.

Off to one side is China's current incursion into the African Continent, bringing much needed investment and loan money, and technical expertise onto its shores.  And there's yet the European nations who have spread their cultures onto African soil and made trading partners of the African nations they had colonized in previous centuries but now have become significant equals in trade and commerce with their European "progenies."  

But now there's a coming of a business enterprise geared to bring together the whole Continent of nations whose rules and regulations are established ways trading partners are to act.  Its rules may be  extended to nations each trades with abroad.  Mr. Mene noted that nearly all the countries that are to participate in this trade organization have agreed upon the multitude of rules they have formulated among themselves.  

Hopefully, there will be many benefits that accrue to its participants.  1)  improved governance procedures at home; 2) reduced or no tariffs upon goods in trade; 3) gradually, bring citizenries out of poverty;

4) prevent undue, perhaps unwelcome, foreign influences; and 5) establish a groundwork for subsequent projects among these cooperating African nations.  But each will lose tax money generated by the several tariffs the countries will no longer collect.

Ultimately, the free trade organization should reduce the costs of doing business and engaging in commerce wherever.  Be it noted, many countries are woefully in debt, which makes the Chinese partnership model beyond the realm of practicality for some African nations suffering already from poor GDP numbers.

Good luck!

           

In a democracy, it's good that our leaders are from business!

Because they go back from whence they came!  The founding fathers of the country could thereby avoid turning the country into an autocracy.

Right now, Congressional legislators are deciding whether to go for another term in office or return to private life--typically, in some business venture or in an educational institution.

But where would President Putin go should he return to a former position?  Clearly with the Russian intelligence, known then as the KGB.  As President of Russia, he is promoting the interests of government among the citizenry simply because that's what he's been trained to do--as any autocrat is bound to continue to do.

The problem with the lack of training in a business or training is that the leader is not promoting the affairs of the people but of a particular group that would control and direct the people for their own ends.  Little wonder, that President Putin has several palaces--or, so it has been reported--scattered throughout the country.  And he is said to have a coterie of plutocrats hanging on his coattails.   

The Chinese President Xi looks forward to further honors and accolades in his quest to make the Chinese people his people, following his direction given his expanse of knowledge and training and social standing.

 The career leader in government without distinction in business or some other social enterprise cannot simply have a gripe, then enter politics, make his contribution to society's largesse, and afterwards return to a life of productivity of goods and services--upon which his society is dependent for its growth and development as a people for centuries to come.

Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has said it: "Now is the Time for Martyrdom!"

The international community has put up with the bloodshed initiated by the violence sweeping Ethiopia caused by the antics of its current Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed.  Such ruthlessness imposed, first in secret and now flagrantly open to the very city limits of the capital city, can only have its source in an attempt to control a country's resources in the hands of the country's central government.  For Ethiopia is a developing nation whose source of hydroelectric power, the largest power plant in Africa, is the prize that will lure business and industry even as Egypt to its north is benefitting from the Suez.

The current central administration must not be allowed to plunder the country's potential toward growth and prosperity so to use electricity for its own ends and those of neighboring marauders, possibly from Eritrea, in on Abiy's scheme.

To pursue peace, why does not the international powers insist on shared power, a compromise between the traditional government of Tigray and the current regime?   

The bloodshed must be stopped; and peace become the reigning shout of those who seek it.  Not to condone with the attempts of the central government to starve the entire province of Tigray.