Quote Time

"Well, the trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so."

-Ronald Reagan

There's so much that I feel like saying about the Obama administration right now. About all the ridiculous moves they've been making, including flying an airplane through Manhattan's restricted airspace, scaring the wits out of people whose last memory of such an event was on 9/11, but I'm not going to waste my energy on whining.

This quote from Reagan, however, seems to sum my feelings up very nicely. I'd like to say that the Obama administration is just plain stupid, because sometimes when I read or hear the news these days that's exactly what I think, but doing so would show my own ignorance. Obama is not stupid, and neither are the people in his administration. But what they do know and the conclusions that they come to based on that knowledge are looking like supremely bad moves to me.

Stop crying about water boarding terrorists. Think before you send a plane that looks just like (and is used as a secondary) Air Force One into Manhattan airspace. Stop giving money away like it grows on trees.

Anyone have any other "dumb moves" that they'd like to add to the list?

Human Trafficking

Speaking of slavery, (as I did in my last post,) I have a comment\retraction that I'd like to make about my previous post, "Slavery Today." 

In that post I wrote about celebrities trying to build awareness of modern-day slavery, and I demonstrated my ignorance by saying, (ironically - or, perhaps egotistically,) "Call me ignorant but, well, I'm really not - and still I'm not sure what they're referring to."

I guessed, in that post, that the celebrities were referring to slavery in Sudan or Rwanda, and didn't take much notice of the comment from aztecqueen2000 that, "In the United States, human beings are the third most trafficked commodity behind drugs and weapons. They are used for domestic service, sweatshop labor and prositution." 

I should have taken notice, because that's a seriously frightening statistic, but it was just words to me... Until I got a view of it for myself. So to speak. It was while babysitting last week, with the child asleep, that I was doing what babysitters tend to do - watching television. (Oy gevalt! A frum girl watching television! What is the world coming to? Yada yada yada. Get over it.) 

And the movie that I wound up watching was about human trafficking. Googling it now, in fact, it turns out that the title of the movie is, "Human Trafficking." 

"It follows the fictional cases of young women around the world, lured or abducted, sometimes right off the street, into a world of unspeakable brutality--which the filmmakers show in almost overwhelming detail at times.[...]  And while sometimes almost unbearably harsh, the film serves as a reminder this terrible situation still exists and thrives; and told through the characters, is also a well-paced thriller." (-A.T. Hurley, Amazon.com Review)

I believe in divine providence to the extent that I believe that everything that happens to me happens because G-d wants it to. I believe that there is no such thing as coincidence, and that if I see something, I saw it for a reason. That's why I believe that G-d wanted me to see this movie. 

It's scandalous to say so in the frum community, where movies are considered evil, but I think that this movie needs to be seen. I imagine that it was censored for television, and am glad of that, but it nevertheless showed the pain and horror of human trafficking in a way that just talking about it doesn't. 

That's why I'm posting the trailer for the movie here. But when I say, VIEWER DISCRESSION ADVISED, I really mean it. Don't watch this if you will be bothered by images of, "Young women around the world being lured and abducted" into horrible situations. When I say that this movie needs to be seen, I'm not saying that everyone needs to see it. If you're under 18, or are very frum and haven't been exposed to such things, DO NOT watch this. 

Having said that, I still believe that people need to see this. People need to know that this is going on. In the world of politics in this country, nothing gets done unless the People desire for it to get done: publicizing this issue until we refuse to ignore it anymore is the only way that we can end it. And in the spirit of Pesach, (Passover) the holiday where we celebrate our freedom from captivity, we should remember those who are not so fortunate.