I had occasion to hire a locksmith this week, and as he went about his work he observed that this would be quite an election, this next presidential one. I agreed that was surely true. He said about the President's birth certificate, "Now if they can just prove it's true...."
I was confounded by that. I suggested (perhaps lamely) that if it IS true, what more can they do!?
The energy we expend to prevent reconciliation. Of course, it's not just here in America.
In my book Common Sense and Whiskey, I write about our trip through Tibet:
Just before Xegar stood an imbecilic checkpoint where we waited on the side of the road in the LandCruiser while the local three we’d accrued scampered off into a little squat building that sat, I mean, in the middle of absolutely slap-me-blind nowhere.
Now, man may do worse things to man than to restrict movement in a place so utterly barren, vast and empty, but hardly anything more stupid. So many rules in a place so empty.
That's Tibetans versus Han Chinese.
The Tibetans in exile have just elected a new Prime Minister who has never been to Tibet in an effort by the Dalai Lama to preempt Chinese control of succession after his death. Meanwhile the Chinese insist on vetting the next Dalai Lama.
•••••
As we stood in Armenia near at the Turkish/Armenian border, our guide Levon pointed out
A really big statue on a hill, Georg somebody, Armenian partisan, (who) stands and taunts the Turks still.
That's Armenians versus Turks.
This week Turkey has begun to tear down a Turkish/Armenian friendship statue in the eastern city of Kars, formerly home to a large Armenian population (and the setting for Orhan Pamuk's book Snow). American presidents try to reassure the Armenian diaspora on an 24 April anniversary important to Armenians. This week, President Obama appears to have pleased no one. The Armenians stand, and feel, alone, save for a dubious partner in Russia.
•••••
The Tibetans have clearly and obviously come under come under the Chinese iron hand. The killing of Armenians by Turks (whom I dearly love, and I will argue anywhere that Istanbul is one of the top five cities on the planet) is well established.
If it IS true, what more can they do?
- Photo of the Potala, Lhasa, Tibet from EarthPhotos.com.
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