For a number of years, I have been stewing about why the Somali
Muslim terrorists have been called "pirates" instead of terrorists. It
has always seemed to me that the term "pirates" minimized the
seriousness of the crimes-("ohh, they are just pirates").
Anyway-I am delighted to report that I learned something new about pirates yesterday.
A little bit of background!
I
had the pleasure of having lunch with three distinguished members of
the US Navy yesterday! Of course, they didn't know they were going to
have lunch with me-but I invited myself to their table because they
looked interesting and I wanted to hear about what they do. I'm not
supposed to name names (you know the drill, I could tell you, but then
I'd have to kill you...), but one of the gentlemen was a very high
ranking officer.
WELL!!!
Did I ever
learn a lot-including the fact that the reason why the Somalis are
referred to as pirates is not just because they are committing crimes of
piracy (i.e on the seas)-but piracy laws are much more serious in
international law and they are also recognized as crimes against
humanity. This is one instance where the terminology used to describe
the crimes is actually not meant to trivialize or minimize (like calling
rape jihad "criminal" rather than "terror"), but to facilitate more
aggressive and serious punitive measures.
On another
American military note, I saw a fantastic Picasso exhibit (Blue Period)
at the Cleveland Museum of Art and the security guard saw me lunching
with the Navy fellows and asked me about them. It turned out that he was
a former Marine and I asked him where he had served and he was a
Vietnam vet.
I thanked him for his service to his country
and the cause of freedom and for fighting the communist barbarians. I
said that it was a disgrace that vets such as him were dumped on and
that so many people didn't understand that they were fighting pure evil.
He sighed and said yes-we were not well treated when we came home and
thank you.
I said, no-thank you, sir.
It was quite a day.
I
also saw on one of Picasso's sketches that he had written in hand
something about how he doubted that she loved him one night and couldn't
sleep since then. I will need to look it up-I should have written it
down. It was really moving. Something about it really touched me-it is
so human to need love and to reciprocate love.
