U.S. or UN Airlifts Could Save the Gazans

   If the Gazans can be rescued, they should be. Could an airlift bring in power generators to serve the hospitals, saving newborns and other suffering patients? Could the displaced Gazans be airlifted out, not to be returned until the conflict is over?
   It could be the U.S. or it could the UN that conducts the airlifts. How many hundreds or thousands of people could be saved if such an effort were undertaken.

Free the Gazans

   Gazans should be granted self-determination. They should be allowed to vote for whether they want to remain under Hamas control, become an independent state, or become part of the state of Israel.

Is Israel's goal to make Gaza a democratic part of the state of Israel? If so, Israel should be doing all it can to win the hearts of the Gazans. Such things as starving them do not fall in that category. Cutting off electricity, thus turning hospitals into morgues, does not fall into that category. Bombing the civilians who have went south does not fall into that category. If Israel does not curry the favor of the Gazans, they won't vote to become part of Israel.

Democatic states such as the U.S. commonly seek to free the people of other nations. Israel should follow suit.

  The Israeli-Hamas war is a complex affair, with many different things going on. We must isolate each thing and look at it on its own merits as we try to determine which side is commiting more war crimes. Can the northern-most Gazans move southward? Is Israel starving the populace? Is Israel justified in preventing electricity to the hospitals, in essense turning them into morgues? Should the populace be allowed to escape into Egypt and wouldn't that allow Hamas to also escape? What of today's report that U.S. Intel did receive warnings? Did it pass them on to Israel? What of the surprise (to me) announcement that Israel is conducting a drone attack on Hezbollah locations? Has the U.S. (through President Biden and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin) warned Israel against commiting its own atrocities? Has Israel responded to those pleas? Were the wounded babies targeted or were the wounds inflicted from shrapnel? Some things, though, are not in question. Most nations recognize Gaza as the legitimate government, but was the 2006 election that made it so meant to be permanent. Were the Gazans dupped into supporting Hamas? Israel is to be commended for the leaflet drops warning the Gazans. Hamas is using the Gazans as a human shield. Hamas targeted civilians, including those at the music festival, and it hunted down the survivors.

We Need Our Lipstick, We need Our Crayons

 Make the shift, America. Quit importing oil altogether and switch to green energy. But, don't get out of the oil industry altogether. Utilize your own oil, but not for energy.
   Waxes, plastic, synthetic rubber, lipstick, perfume, makeup, eyeglasses, contact lenses, crayons, heart valves, car tires, and would you believe even aspirin. Those are among the items derived from petroleum. We need them.
   But, instead of importing petroleum from these products, stick to using American oil. There is a war in the Middle East, in Israel to be exact, and it has revealed the danger of relying on petroleum from our enemies.

(Index -- Climate change info)

War Crimes are War Crimes, Even When It is Israel Committing Them

    There are grave concerns that Isreal is responding to Hamas's atrocities with atrocities of its own. We should be just as concerned. We should condemn Israel's atrocities as quickly as we condemn those of Hamas.
   Israel has ordered the starvation of those in Gaza. Reportedly, food, water and essentials necessary for survival are not to be allowed in. Starvation of civilians is a war crime. It also violates Israeli Defense Forces' code of conduct, which says Israel's soldiers shall "above all, preserve human life." Israel is using the logic that since Hamas are "savages" all restraints against them must be removed.
   Israel's harsh and inhumane tactics are reminiscent of the beliefs of Donald Trump. When it comes to terrorists, he said while president, "you have to take out their families."
   President Joe Biden has countered such conduct, telling Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that democracies "are stronger when we act according to rule of law. Terrorists purposely target civilians, and kill them. We uphold the rule of law. It matters. There's a difference."
   Biden's is the voice of reason. We should listen to it.

It Doesn't Need to be the Speaker of the House

   Since Kevin McCarthy was removed from the speakership, the House of Representatives has become disfunctional, inoperative.
   It need not be that way.
  The Constitution says the speaker shall be chosen by the House members, but it does not say it is he who must call the House to order, allow members to deliver remarks, decide if there's a quorum so business can be conducted, decide which bills shall be voted on, and appoint the parliamentarian and historian.
  Yet we are acting as if the House speaker must be tthe conductor all those duties.
  It just isn't so.
  To return the House from its disfunctional, inoperative form, simply have the temporary speaker, the vice president or someone else conduct the duties. The Constitution doesn't say who can fill in, so just select someone to do it.

Tell Bill Gates and Nuclear, No, No, No

 I'd nix nuclear energy. I'd take Bill Gates and the others who want to build nuclear plants and tell them, no, no, no.
  1.) Too expensive.
  2.) The mining causes lung cancer in a high share of the miners.
  3.) Too high of emissions in the mining and emissions. 
  4.) It takes too long to put them up, 10-19 years compared to only 2-5 for wind and solar.
  I could change my mind. But it would require some of these things to turn out to be inaccurate. I'm not expecting that.

(Index -- Climate change info)