The Age of Empires

I stumbled across the election results from Iran over the wire as I had just finished digesting this on the symposium on the Holocaust brought upon the Jewish population of Europe under Fascist rule during the 1930s and 1940s, hosted by Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, most beknownst to us Western folk for harbouring contempt for the State of Israel. Many of the major players of the International Community are crying foul, that he is encouraging hostility towards the Jewish people.

First, on the election - yes, "they" do have elections; much like with most of us, it's religion that remains unquestioned - it pleases me to see some semblance of rationality in the parties elected to the various ecclesiastic and tribal councils, as I hopeful they will be helpful in holding Mr. Ahmadinejad's power in check. Then again, you know how I feel about how much our "democracy" has accomplished.

On the conference itself, regardless of how you feel about this fellow, you cannot deny, at the very least, that, for whatever reason you feel, the Holocaust triggered a chain of events shaping the current geopolitical landscape. A professor of political science at St. Francis Xavier University in Nova Scotia, one Dr. Shiraz Dossa, received a verbal flogging for attending the conference that played host to the likes of David Duke, a conference at which he had hoped to discuss the very point I raised at the beginning of this paragraph. So what if David Duke happened to be there as well? He's a rich old Republican bigot. He, too, had hopes for this shindig, I'll bet.

If it is not already obvious to you, I wish to make perfectly clear Mr. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, if he really enjoys being President, will not dare launch any assault on Israel, the likes of which were seen over the summer in Beirut. If you have an issue with his playing arms dealer to Hamas and Hezbollah, welcome to your high-artillery reality, where all the big players, regardless of flag pattern, supply weapons to the rest of the world. Who would want to disrupt an already good thing, save for a party already on the aggressive?

Getting down to brass tacks, one would argue that the wanton slaughter of European Jews provided the catalyst for the region's current geopolitical landscape. Some might say much of elite Europe was granted its wish in 1948, given the history of persecution seen by said people in the years leading up to World War I - coincidentally enough, the White Man had redrawn the region's borders after its victory over the Ottoman.

It seems the State of Israel, comprised of militaristic opportunists and wealthy American-bred Nationalists, enjoys using the Holocaust as a playing card in the grand game of Risk whenever faced with criticism over its foreign policy. It is a shame that the State is allowed to speak for the Jewish people, who are being killed along with the Muslims. It is a shame that criticism of the State of Israel constitues slander against the Jewish people, that politics and other forms of fear-mongering are preventing Christian and Jew and Muslim from coexisting in the region, that a mere whisper of the word "Holocaust" in a manner unapproving of Israel is akin to denial of its occurrence. What about the Holocaust brought upon the indigenous peoples of the world? You can't turn your head without finding an apologist for the oppressors. These crimes aren't even worthy of a fucking nod from the U.N.!

Welcome to the Age of Empires, where history is written by the conqueror, which is why you are not likely to read or hear of Nixon installing Pinochet as Leader of Chile, or of the high praise for Mussolini during the prosperous 1920s by America's major media, business elite and KKK-led Government. Mr. Ahmadinejad is but another player at the high-stakes table. It's too bad we always have to be the chips.