And How About That Grand Old Ancient Civilization, the Sometimes Dormant, 'Sleeping' Chinese Dragon? Does That Reference in the Book of Revelation - the Apocalypse - to An Almost Inconceivable Army of 200 Million Fighting 'Men' (One Day Crossing the Euphrates River, the 'Border Crossing' if you will Between East & West) - Have Any Bearing Whatsoever Upon Events On the Not Too Distant Horizon? Like Hal Lindsay Et Al, Yours Truly Admittedly Has Always Wondered Just a Tad

And, Doubtless Even More Concerning/Relevant to Folks Worldwide, I Do Believe that Those - Such as Hal Lindsay of 'The Late Great Planet Earth' Fame, the Worldwide Church of God (In Its Earlier, Decalogue-Upholding 'Tradition', Anyhow) ET AL - Were/Have Been Unerringly & Sadly 100% Accurate in Pinpointing the Identity of Ezekiel's Prophetic Depiction of Gog & Magog: the Chief Prince of the Uttermost North Etc...Can You Guess Which Nation (to the North of Israel) Meets All the Criteria/Specifications for Fulfilling This Last Days' Scenario, A Nation Like No Other 'Serving' as the Bringer of Armageddon to Pass?

I will leave you and yours to piece the puzzle together, but believe you me, between the dude running this world power and the one to soon again lead out in the US of A...

...we're all in deep doggy doo-doo, and descending deeper therein from here on in...

As I've often said to casual acquaintances, the only way out for any of us is to look up, there's help nowhere else...

Or as one wag once put it, 

look inside and be depressed...look around and be discouraged...look up and be delivered...

Admittedly that's not quite right, but you (hopefully) get the gist of the thought...

The 'Last Trump' Is On Its {I.E. His} Way, I'm Sad to (Have to) Say...

The penny finally dropped, just the other day...

Having previously written extensively vis-a-vis my (?inspired?) insight concerning the mysterious import of two disparate phrases in my good 'ole King James Bible...

i.e.

'the last trump'...'the trump of God'...

I finally 'clicked' only a day or two ago...

...that 'the last trump' is - admittedly, only arguably; prophecy's fulfilment is really only seen clearly and unmistakably with the age-old benefit of hindsight; but nevertheless - the return of Donald J Trump in 2024 to finish the job he began in 2016 - and our world with it? -

the term signifying some sort of rupture/interregnum/interlude/intermission (if you will) between his first and second/subsequent impactings upon our world...

...as I say, to finish the job he began, and quite possibly/probably our 'lil 'ole world alongside it...

Though I neither have the time now nor the facility to easily locate a flurry of previous blogposts upon selfsame subject - without this additional 'insight' - I suggest you scroll down the (rather limited) number of my previous blogposts herein (especially back to the one entitled (I believe) 'Having the Last Laugh' a couple of years back) and various others upon my second (original) blogsite, david edwinisms, i.e. http://davidedwinisms.blogspot.co.nz/ (or .com/) over the same last 5-6 years or so...

...if you value some (arguably) up-to-date info upon some rather major happenings in our world in the not too distant...

Postscript:

Though ever since the very night of (or perhaps the day or so following) Presidential Election 2020 I pretty well immediately surmised that 'the Donald' will be back - and with a vengeance - in 2024; however it was only just the other day that the 'theological rationale' for that stance is now readily apparent...

'Not In It To Win It: Why Choosing Sides Sidelines the Church': Has This Fellow (American Andy Stanley, Pastor of North Point Community Church) Hit the Bullseye With This Tome Capturing Today's Zeitgeist, Or What!

It's hard to imagine a more relevant and desperately needed addition to contemporary literature upon the relative rights and wrongs of the church's involvement in politics, especially in the West...

Thankfully - Praise God - May the 9th Has Now Come and Gone...Without Further Ado - But Exposing Vladimir Putin As the Nearest Thing to a Nazi (Aside from Sissii Internationale & Its Fellow-Travellers Les Kebabs & Hocus Bedlam) That Our World Has Had the Misfortune to Witness in Recent Times

Medvedev, Russia's One-Time (Like Putin, On-Again, Off-Again, On-Again) President/Prime Minister, & Sometime 'Good Guy' to Putin's 'Bad Guy' Persona...Has Sadly/Regretfully/Regrettably But All Too Predictably Now Fully Given Himself Over to the Evil Side...

Yet he cannot avoid or evade the ultimate consequences for his treachery (to all principles of human decency), and so - like his leader - will one day (all too soon) reap precisely what he has sown...

 

Pray All You Like to the Virgin Mary, (Good Catholic) Folks...It Won't Bring Ukraine Back Together Again...Anytime Soon

And likewise for your superstitious rosary beads...

But praying (intensely and fervently, passionately and perseveringly) - with fasting - to the Lord Jesus just may accomplish what you're seeking...

It's certainly worth a try.

For Once, Let's Hear it for a Bit of Honesty on the Global Stage, For Actually Telling it Like it is For a Change, For Effectively Wearing One's Heart Upon One's Sleeve...

Yes, it's quite unkosher, a real 'no-go' area these days - which of course is perfectly understandable in a day and age of deep-seated duplicity and double-dealing... 

Putin Deserved EVERY BIT Of President Biden's Heartfelt Remarks the Other Day - the Usual Growing Senility Observations of the Western/World's Media Notwithstanding - And Indeed MUCH, MUCH Worse...However (Which Admittedly Contradicts What I've Just Posted Upon DavidEdwinisms) Some Things One/You Simply Cannot - Or, Rather, Oughtn't - Say In Global Geo-Politics...Unless You Wish to Be 'Remembered'/To Go Down in (Admittedly, To Be Non-Existent History) As One of the Chief Causes of World War 111

"Is It Nothing To You, All Ye That Pass By? Behold, And See If There Be Any Sorrow Like Unto My Sorrow..."

Sometimes it's pretty well impossible to go beyond, to improve upon the language of the sacred writer...

Today's the Ides of March - Hey, Who'd Have Guessed?

 Ask not for whom the bell tolls, Vladimir, it tolls for you (and your ilk), Mr Putin...

Though A Lifetime/Lifelong Pacifist, How Can ANYONE Reasonably Fault Ukrainians One & All For Rising Up As One WO/MAN & Defending Themselves, Their Nation, Their Cherished Freedoms & All They Hold Dear...From the Barbarians At (& Beyond) Their Very Doors...MAY GOD ON HIGH GRANT THEM DELIVERANCE & VICTORY

Yes, It's David Versus Goliath All Over Again...But Methinks the Russkies (Or More Accurately, Putin & Minions) Have This Time Bitten Off A Little More Than They Can Reasonably Regurgitate...

Calling in the Hellhounds - Putin to Isis: Hey, They'll Respond - Look at Syria (from 2015 on)...& Don't Forget What Putin's Government Did to Grozny, Chechnya (from 1999)...& to Georgia (in 2008)

Birds of a feather (ever) flock together (or some such metaphor)...

No, that's grossly insulting to your average bird...

Infinitely more apt would doubtless be the biblical reference to the very last days of Earth's history, at/after which point of time there are corpses galore...

And the gospel writer simply adds:

...wheresoever the carcase is, there will the eagles be gathered together...

Or maybe even the vultures, for that matter...  

Vladimir Putin - Perfecting Machiavelli to a Fault: Putin Bided His Time, Patiently Awaited The Perfect Moment, Saw His Ideal Opportunity, Then - At Length - Quickly Moved In, When the Way Was Clear: When the West/U S of A Had Effectively, Uncategorically Given the All-Clear...Realizing There'd Be No Repercussions For So Doing - Following the Publicly Given Verbal Assurance to People Worldwide That, In Any Event, They Wished to Avoid Nuclear War, Having No Intention to Initiate Such - and Accordingly, Inevitably, WW111 - If Russia Invaded Ukraine (As It Was Then Looking Increasingly Likely to Do)...

But what else could - any - American  government conceivably, responsibly do? 

'Good Faith Negotiations' Between Putin & Ukraine (Or Any Sovereign Nation, For That Matter)? Yeah, Right (As A Common New Zealand Billboard Well Declares)!

Or as the Dad's Army team might have expressed matters: "[Just] who do you think you're kidding/fooling, Mr Putin?"

Forget About Nostradamus, One Person - An Ancient European, No Less (Or, Perhaps, As Some Suggest, A Composite of So Many (& Various) 'Wise (Wo)men' Throughout the World, Down the Centuries, Even Millennia) - Had Vladimir Putin 'Down Pat' (In 'Clairvoyant' Vision, As it Were): Aesop of the Timeless 'Aesop's Fables'...

Indeed, of the 40-odd fables in our (my and my four siblings') beloved edition of the same (1965 edition), thus far I have found - and made reference to 9-11 (of these) in various related blogposts - fully 20 (half) have some bearing upon the present situation...

'Wisdom Is Better Than Weapons of War; But One Sinner Destroyeth Much Good."

It goes without saying, I suppose, that Solomon clearly foresaw our day (among others).

In a Tragic Twist of Historical Irony, Russian President Boris Yeltsin's Incredible & Unsurpassed Act of Courage Helped Bring Soviet Tyranny and the Soviet Empire Itself to an End...Whilst His Unfortunate Naivete and Gullibility As Per His Successor Has Helped to Inadvertently Resurrect & Reinvigorate - & Ultimately, By Force, Re-Unite - It

Two Images That Will Ever Remain a Study in Contrasts: Boris Yeltsin Standing Alone Before a Russian Tank Singlehandedly Opposing the Might of the Soviet Empire (In the Midst of the Infamous 1990/1991 Colonels' Coup); 3 Decades Later Those Selfsame Tanks Surrounding the Brave 'Wee' Nation-State of Ukraine As It Singlehandedly Seeks to Resist That Selfsame Russian Might - Russian Tanks & Might, Ironically (and Tragically) Enough, Ultimately Authorized and Commandeered by THE VERY MAN Whom Then President Yeltsin 'Inadvertently' - 'Ignorantly' - 'Unknowingly' Helped Install In That Very Role!

Make no mistake: If it were possible, Yeltsin today would be turning cartwheels in his grave and forever ruing his ghastly mistake...

But sadly one cannot undo history.

Yes, Boris Yeltsin's ONE Mistake - And It Was a Whopper - His (Inadvertent) Gift to Russia and the World-at-Large that Keeps on Giving...Was His Anointing of His Successor, An All Too Successful KGB Agent

A failing which gregarious folk with a sanguine nature like Yeltsin have an unfortunate tendency towards...a tendency all too ably assisted by the demon drink...in Russian parlance good 'ole vodka! 

The Redoubtable Boris Yeltsin, One of Russia's Great(est) Leaders of All Time - Disparaging 'Trendy Leftie' Western Pundits and Commentators Notwithstanding - Bequeathed to Our Present World a Frankenstein(ian) Monster of a 'Gift' in His Anointing of Vladimir Putin as His Successor (to Subsequently Reign Over the Russian People)...

But this great defender of freedom and liberty, whose courage knew no bounds and saw him face down the barrel of a Soviet tank in a show of 'blinkmanship' that saw him lionized throughout the world (and doubtless Russia and the USSR's then 15 component republics prior to their wholesale splintering off), was evidently also naive to a fault (or more likely taken in a by an all too adept and cunning, subtle and sophisticated master of intrigue and dissimulation)...

...and the rest is history, as they say...

Putin Playing the World For a Bunch of Suckers...& It Appears He'll Get Away Handily With His Little Strategem...Though America Comes Away with No Glory

 Where the people of the Ukraine - and all the (15) former Soviet Republic nation-states - are mere pawns in his sordid, tawdry game of baltic chess...

He has y'all checkmated before he even begins...so better to give up folks while you're ahead - and at least save your lives...

Or, 'Be wise, and let him who can(,) be clever'.

See 'the Hungry Lion and the Wise Fox' (in Aesop's Fables, 1965). 

Boris, I'd Blithely, Ignorantly Supposed You'd 'Transgressed' Once or At Most Twice: Potentially *14 Times Is Not Only Bad Luck - With An Extra One Thrown In For Good Measure - But Would Appear To Prove That You've Now Truly Channeled That Trans-Atlantic 'Lookalike' (Not Only 'Hairwise'), But Are Now Trying to Emulate Him (the Donald, That Is) In Defending the Utterly Indefensible...If That Works For You - And My Confidence In Your Esteemed Political Party Convinces Me IT ULTIMATELY WON'T - Then (Assuming Trump Can Do the Selfsame & Return, Triumphantly, in 2024, As I Well Suspect & Have Long Since Maintained On Numerous Occasions Since Election 2020), What Can Any Reasonable Person Say? That Pigs Can Fly, Yes, Even Peppa Herself!

*The number of such occasions that the authorities are apparently investigating to establish whether anyone, and specifically who, might have breached the Government's well-signposted covid rules. (According to the New Statesman's online report of the other day, though this morning BBC world radio mentioned the number at 12.) Accordingly, since '13' is halfway between the two, perhaps it is bitter irony that that number has ever been seen as signifying bad luck...

And how's the following to put the icing on Boris' birthday cake: I realized yesterday that that day (here in New Zealand-time) - the 2nd day of the 2nd month in the year 2022...

could well be seen as signifying the following: since 2 + 2 + 2 + 2 +2 = 10...

May I respectfully suggest - to both Prime Minister Johnson and his venerable colleagues (both new and old) - that all roads now seem to lead to 10 Downing Street...

Or should I rather put it this way: all fingers of accusation (and 'leads' the police are following up) point unerringly in that particular direction...

No kidding!

For All Those Dumbfounded/Flummoxed/Flabbergasted/Bamboozled & Otherwise Mystified & Plain Perplexed By the Ongoing Rise & Fall & Rise (Like Reginald Perrin) - As a Phoenix from the Ashes of Defeat & Dishonour & Inglorious Ignominy - of Donald J Trump...Witnessed Again Yesterday (New Zealand Time) on Newshub's 6 p.m. Bulletin (As He Addressed A Stadiumful of Diehard Supporters), DON'T BE, Folks: Sadly But Perfectly Predictably - As In The Republicans Polled (In This Instance) Who Supported Him With 49% As Against Potential Rivals Rick De Santis (On 14%) and Mike Pence (On 13%): People Want 'The Real Deal' Not Some Sham Imitation...It's Really THAT SIMPLE. And As For That 'Margin of Error' 1% (45% to 44%) Lead of President Joe Biden Upon Him Among the Electorate-at-Large? Unfortunately, Folks, That Means That Election 2024 Is Already Too Close to Call, Or, As Aotearoa New Zealand's New Opposition (National Party) Leader Christopher Luxon Might Have Expressed Matters: "It's Game On!"

Equally sadly, however, it's the rest of us on Planet Earth who stand to be the collateral damage fallout...

Though I Could Frankly Care Less About the Matter in Question/ Contention, I Agree With the Fellow (Canadian Music Columnist Dale Eatamon?) Who Noted This Very Morning on RNZ National Radio's Morning Show The Irony That Those (Such as Joni Mitchell, Creator/Composer Extraordinaire of My Blogsite's Signature Song '(From) Both Sides Now') "Who Come From That (1960s') Era of Freedom and Free(dom of) Expression...[Apparently] Now Support Censorship"

Speaking of Unpartisan Decision-Making (in the Political, or at least Governmental, Arena): Hands-Off to the Much-Maligned U S Supreme Court for Recently (Just the Other Day or Two) Determining that DONALD J TRUMP Does, Indeed, Have a Very Real Case to Answer at the Bar of American Justice, That He Does Verily Warrant/Justify Being Investigated for His Own (Extremely Dubious & Problematic) Role in the Events of America's (Literal) Epiphany January 6th Last...

Go the Donald...not!

Or, rather: May he go directly to jail...not pass 'Go', and not collect $200 on the way.

Isn't It - More Than Just a Tad - Interesting, However, How So-Called 'Right-Wingers'/Parties of 'the Right' - In the West, Anyhow - Seem to Have a Culture of Outspoken Nonconformity...

However, 'in the cold light of [twilight]', when I stop for a moment (or several) to consider this matter in more detail, two - contrasting - examples, the first 'proving' (or at least verifying) my maxim, the second completely disproving it, come to mind/recollection...

Yes, British *'Tories' do have a long and honourable tradition of 'bucking the ...........' and occasionally, and in considerable numbers even at times, directly opposing their own (governing) party, 'crossing the floor' of the Commons and voting against, and from time to time, 'down', Governmental proposals...

But so do Labourites - and **'conservatives' - in Australia.

*The name/monicker long given to members of the U K Conservative Party. But 'upon third thoughts' so too - though seemingly much less often - do 'Labourites' there...

**Such going under the Liberal/National (parties) 'Coalition'monicker.

"You Have Sat There Too Long For The Good You Have [NOT] Done; In The Name of God, GO!" So Spoke the David (Davis) Who Ought to Have Succeeded Labour PM Gordon Brown as Great Britain's Conservative (Party) Prime Minister Back in 2010, But, As History Records, Another David (Cameron) - The Second Such David I Believe in UK History; the First Being David Lloyd George in the Later Nineteen-Tens & Early Nineteen-Twenties - Was Chosen, 'And The Rest (As They Say) Is History'

Boris, I('ve) Ever Like(d) the 'Cut of Yer Jib', So to Speak - Even Your Tousled, Unkempt Hairdo (Eerily Reminiscent of Mine Own, & - I Hate to Admit - 'That' of a Certain Former American President, So Soon to Return - to Finish the Job and the World Alongside It); But I Hate to Inform You (Though Doubtless You're Only Too Well Aware: As Your Appropriately Chastened Demeanour & 'Verbals' in the British House of Commons Show Only Too Clearly): What Transpired At Christmastime A Year Ago (As I Originally Understood, &/Or At Two 'Parties' Maximum; But Indeed (As Of 2/2/2022) I Discover There Were 14! (And Four of These Include the Birthdays of Four of My Own Family: My Own, My Younger Sister's, My Mum's and My Great-Nephew's! - & Bear in Mind That Boris Was Born Upon My Mum's Birthdate and In My Own Year of Birth) (As Is Only Too Evident From the Super-Abundance of Visual Evidence Leaking Out Left, Right and Especially Centre (Stage) Over Recent Days, Weeks and Months)...Simply Won't Cut It, Let Alone the (English) Mustard, Whichever Way One Happens to Slice or Dice - or Even Scramble - It (I'm Sorry to Have to Inform You)

Yep, blatant hypocrisy and undeniable lying (and the ongoing hubris and arrogance in the matter) is something yer average voter simply won't abide...for very long...

But your party and the British public nevertheless owes you an undying debt of gratitude for (*greatly assisting in) getting the Brexit over the line, but more significantly as it so transpired, for securing the most thumping landslide electoral result and seismic, historic rout of the (then Jeremy Corbyn-led) Labourites in many generations...

...without which the Brexit would simply have been dead in the water, 'up the creek without a paddle' to mix my metaphors somewhat terribly!

*The individual deserving the most credit would surely have to be the much-used and -abused Nigel Farage, without whose long-running and courageous efforts below and above the radar when electorally 'a voice in the wilderness' ought to be more often and better acknowledged than they generally are...

Though One 'Shadowy' (as in quite literally behind-the-scenes and even under the radar) 'Figure' Who seems to ever evade and avoid receiving His due share of credit for delivering the Brexit is Someone Who shares His glory with no-one (as Strider/**Aragorn might have put it, as he bowed upon assuming kingship over Middle Earth to the hobbits and world-savers Samwise Gamgee and Frodo Baggins)... 

**My email address is based upon the dunedain, signifying hope...which surely, as the classic Ed Ames song puts so articulately and powerfully vis-a-vis love, is equally what the world needs  right now...

(A Rather - But Necessarily - Belated) 'Tribute' (Of Sorts) to America's 'EPIPHANY' - i.e. January 6th, 2020 - One Year On..."Good Night, America, How ARE You, Don't Ya Know Me, I'm [Update: I Once WAS] Your Native Son?"

Curious afterthought:

My (now long-deceased) American Grandmother would've turned 120 on that day...

TO BE CONTINUED (as, pretty much, word-for-word, my simultaneous (same day) latest posting upon *davidedwinisms; it's that important)...

Acknowledgment:

FULL CREDIT to the (introduction to the) final stanza of/in Arlo Guthrie's timeless classic 'City of New Orleans'...

*I.e http://davidedwinisms.blogspot.co.nz/ (or .com/) 

RNZ National's & BBC's Long-Term American Correspondent John Sopel Is On the Money 100% Vis-a-Vis He of the Donald J Trump Variety...Which Should Make Us All Very, Very Afraid (For Our/The Future/s)...

To Be Continued (following sufficient shuteye)...

Friday the 8th/15th/22nd/29th January (A number of days - and nights - on): Sad to say I'm even more seriously sleep-deprived than previously, and the sacred hours of God's Sabbath are shortly to begin...

...but 'all things being equal' (which is itself increasingly questionable these days!), it won't be long till I redeem the above commitment/undertaking...

...although other more (immediately) pressing topics are still, as you can see, engaging my due attention...

Another Noble G.O.P. Warrior Falls Asleep: Bob Dole, An Example/Exemplar to His 'Republican' (So-Called) Successors

Whilst Trump et al scramble every which way to bend the rules in their own favour, to pragmatically secure patronage and position and power with little regard to principle, to pervert every noble impulse and precedent that the once lauded 'land of the free' ever set afoot to enshrine and defend and uphold...

...another Republican of a previous generation sacrificed his own highly esteemed political position (as then Majority leader in the U S Senate) to unseat a (similarly immoral, nay amoral) Commander-in-Chief, and ultimately failed in his noble quest...

But at least he 'died' trying...

P.S. Weirdly, only (2) months earlier Colin Powell, another would-be challenger to then President Clinton, also kicked the bucket...

Post-postscript:

Apparently my 999th (or, more likely, 1,000th) blogpost over my eight blogsites (since starting blogging back in mid-2012).

In Our URGENT AS Mad-Dash Scramble To Rid the Earth of the Coronavirus...Have We EVER SO IMPERCEPTIBLY Gravitated to the Polar Opposite 'Stance', Where We're - in Full-Fledged Fight (If Not Flight) Mode - Succumbing to That Deadliest of Chronic, Incurable Diseases: GROUPTHINK, A State in Which We've Become Like So Many Machine-Produced Automatons, Even Clones...All Too Ready - to Garishly Change the Metaphor - to Rush Like Lemmings Into the Deep Blue Yonder...?

Oh Covid, Covid, Covid: Art Thou Setting the Scene/Setting Us All Up...For Trouble Down the Line?

As folk across the land (God's Own/Godzone: Aotearoa-New Zealand, that is) grow increasingly restive and hostile, even at times 'positively' vitriolic towards ANTI-VACCERS, isn't it about time for us all to take a step back and breathe in deeply - without a mask - and ask ourselves some searching questions, realizing that this all may well not end well...

For demonizing those we passionately and even oh so legitimately may well disagree with sets a rather sorry trend for future public discourse and debate, let alone interaction on an ongoing basis...

...however misguided such views may well be...

For my thruppence worth I feel that my Lord is preparing people worldwide - knowing they are (as often as otherwise) not only well-intentioned but quite sincere in their convictions vis-a-vis covid vaccination/s - for a fast-hastening *day wherein/in which folk will be called upon to stand apart from the (well-beaten) crowds and masses, to stand alone if need be against the (vast) majority, for a cause far greater than themselves or the health and wellbeing alone... 

*But spiritual night!

176-odd years ago, a fellow named James Russell Lowell shared his eerily prophetic sense of Planet Earth's crisis of the ages, a scenario nevertheless repeated throughout each and every generation...

Once to every man and nation Comes the moment to decide,

In the strife of truth with falsehood, For the good or evil side;

Some great cause, God's new Messiah, Offering each the bloom or blight,

And the choice goes by forever 'Twixt that darkness and that light.

Then to side with truth is noble When we share her wretched crust,

Ere her cause bring fame and profit, And 'tis prosperous to be just;

Then it is the brave man chooses, While the coward stands aside,

Till the multitude make virtue Of the faith they had denied.

By the light of burning martyrs, Christ, Thy bleeding feet we track,

Toiling up new Calvaries ever With the cross that turns not back;

New occasions teach new duties, Time makes ancient good uncouth;

They must upward still and onward, Who would keep abreast of truth.

Though the cause of evil prosper, Yet 'tis truth alone is strong;

Though her portion be the scaffold, And upon the throne be wrong;

Yet that scaffold sways the future, And, behind the dim unknown,

Standeth God within the shadow, Keeping watch above His own.

(From 'Once to Every Man and Nation', written in 1845.)

Cop26: "Twiddling Our [Collective] Thumbs and Wishing for the Best": D'Ya Reckon Greenpeace (or was it Friends of the Earth?) - Co-'Attendies' at This (Supposedly) Momentous Climate Conference - Summed It All Up in a Nutshell?!?!

It's Completely Counterintuitive, I Well Realize, But in Modern-Day Rome - None Other Than the United States of America [i.e. the Latter-Day Equivalent of the Iron(clad) Civilization of Rome, the Older Testament Prophet Daniel's 4th Prophetic Empire] - Some of Its Very Best Political Leaders Have Been Former Military MEN [As Has Usually Been the Case, No Gender Bias Intended]...The Likes of Dwight David Eisenhower (in the 1950s), Colin Powell (in recent times), and None Other Than Ullyses S Grant (back in the 1860s and 1870s; Near Successor to the Great Man (i.e. Abraham Lincoln) Himself)...

Postscript: And, incidentally, such an idea occurred to me a short while (as in a day or several) prior to seeing an item on General-cum-President Grant upon the (13/10/2021, NZ time edition of the) 700 Club; in which said former general's "consequential leadership" "holding the Union together, fending off a second civil war", was cited, something highlighted in a new book: 

To Deeply Rescue the Republic...the Fragile Unveiling...

Ullyses S Grant's brave and successful attempts to singlehandedly fight and fend off the KKK and rescue/free a slave he once 'possessed' were especially impressive...  

Post-Postscript:

Incidentally, I recently recalled the ideological predecessors to the current cancel culture movement, and how they even had the temerity, the sheer gall to likewise seek to malign the *great Abe himself, the sort of thing I suppose those of the arty-farty academic set with plenty of time on their hands and nothing better to do have ever shown a similar penchant for doing for any **'tall poppies' they wish to bring down to size or back to earth (from their stratospheric heights of greatness)...

*As in Abraham Lincoln, though naturally 'Father' Abraham of biblical history was another great Abraham...

**A 'New Zealanderism' denoting kiwis' own tendency to ***'cut down to size' our own heroes and heroines...

***(Postscript):

Something once again engaged in wholeheartedly and mercilessly, shamelessly - and moreover ever so shamefully - by Newshub (TV3) News's Jenna Lynch and Tova O'Brien in relation to NZ National's new leader Chris Luxon the other day within mere hours of his gaining the much-coveted position...

Vis-a-Vis the Sad Plight of Those (Such as Translators and Interpreters) Who (Effectively, Essentially, if in An Admittedly Roundabout Fashion) Helped the West Fight Their Pointless War (On Terror) in Afghanistan: It's The Very Depths of Shameful Shamelessness to Get Folks to 'Do Your Dirty Work', So to Speak, and Then to Leave 'Em In the Lurch in Their Moments of Direst Need and Desperation...

*Not to mention the multitudinous masses of innocent Afghanis who came to naively rely upon Western forces to help to permanently improve conditions in their nation and make life thenceforth better...

...and have now been left to fend for themselves against those whose PR machine is top-notch - worthy of emulation by Western public relations companies - but whose actual, real-life practice is everything as evil as their compatriots have come to expect over recent years and decades...

Imran Khan, Former Pakistani Cricket Captain & Present Prime Minister of Pakistan: No, I Wouldn't Put it Past Him to Play A Significant Role in the Unfolding of Future Events Vis-a-Vis the Middle East & the West (& the End of All Things As We Know It)...

To Put One's Own National Sports-Players FIRST & FOREMOST, Giving Due Cognizance to their Mental & Emotional Well-being, Taking Due Note of SPECIFIC & CREDIBLE Threats to their Safety...IS NOT, HAS NOT BEEN, & NEVER WILL BE 'Muslim-Baiting'/'Hating' (or ANY OF THE OTHER Ridiculous Things Claimed by the Usual Suspects): It's Simply Called Taking Proper Care of One's Citizens, Especially Those Privileged & Responsible for Representing One's Nation in an Official Capacity Overseas...WHAT ELSE (or Other Choice) Would or Could ANY REASONABLE GOVERNMENT POSSIBLY MAKE If It Gave EVEN A RAT'S ARSE/BRASS RAZOO About Its Citizenry, SURELY ANY GOVERNMENT'S #1 PRIORITY AT ANY TIME...

Let such armchair critics and self-appointed 'champions' rant 'n rave all they well may...

Hey, better still, let them put their own lives on the line, in potential jeopardy...if they so wish...

But please, oh please spare us all the pious piffle and disingenuous grandstanding they so typically and predictably engage in whenever they have the gall, the temerity to criticize others (whether governmental officials or sportspeople) for employing wisdom, reason and sheer commonsense in realizing a little discretion is worth an oodle-load of foolhardy valour...

Yes, the human survival instinct is one that no-one with any real sense of reality would ever choose to deny, gainsay or belittle...

I mean, really! 

Sadly, Afghanistan's Woes Have Come in Unrelenting Waves Ever Since It/Its People Pretty Well - If Not Irrevocably - Rejected Jesus Christ & His Gospel of Grace & Mercy & Pardon Way Back When

...as cited by Patrick Johns(t)on in one of his original editions of his excellent Operation World (in the late seventies/mid-later eighties). 

Vis-a Vis the Rapidly Unfolding - Impending - Humanitarian (Refugee Et Al) Crisis in the Long- & Much-Abused Land of Afghanistan: Yes, 'the West'(ern Nations that Have Long been Actively/Militarily Engaged in Afghanistan Post 9/11) Do(es) Indeed Have A Moral Duty/Responsibility To Act - & Forthwith - to Somehow Seek to Stem the Looming Human Disaster Unfolding There...BUT SO TOO DO ITS IMMEDIATE NEXT-DOOR NEIGHBOURS Iran & Pakistan (Islamic/Islamist States Which've Helped Foment So Much of the Trouble in That Particular Place & Environs); And So Does Russia - But Not In the (All Too Predictable) Way in Which It & China Have So Far Done So (I.e. In Their Own Self-Interest NOT In the Interest of Innocent, Suffering Afghanis)

Meanwhile, Yet Another Global Report Upon Climate Change Does the Rounds - With Special (BBC) 'Segments' Upon 'How YOU Can Reduce YOUR Carbon Footprint': No, I'm Denying Nothing, Folks, Only Alerting 'Y'all' to the Inescapable Reality that the (American-Initiated, Globally Instituted) Sunday Law Comes On Apace...Get Yer Seat-Belts Into Place, Folks, Ready for the Crisis of the Ages...

Ditto Afghanistan: Foreign Military 'Adventures'/Excursions Don't Really Achieve An Awful Lot, Do They? Except Seemingly Endless Bloodshed and Suffering for All Involved, Especially the Locals...But Hey, Didn't Anybody Ever Learn A Single Thing From Vietnam/the Vietnam War? (Sorry For Asking.)

But Thank the Lord that Girls/Women Such as Malala Youssef Still Grace Our Planet...

Canada's Churches Are Apparently Burning, Burning, Burning (No, Apparently This Ain't Fake News) c/o Retaliatory Reprisals Following Hard Upon the Recent Revelations of Historic Abuse (& Uncovered Gravesites) in Religious and Governmental Institutions Across the Land: But Were it Not for the Likes of CNN/the 700 Club We'd Be None the Wiser (Over Here in 'Lil 'Ole New Zealand, Anyhow)...& Unprecedented Persecution of Christians (Across South-Eastern & Central Africa & India/Pakistan/China) - a Middle East(ern) Genocide of Historic Proportions, According to Our Own Renowned Religious Studies Professor, Philip Lineham - But Where Are Those Courageous Voices of Outrage and Protest So Very Active Whenever Other Religious Groups are Targetted? You Tell Me...

And While We're At It, What's With This Shameful Negligence On the Part of (Doubtless Pope Frances-Adoring) Media - Here in God's Own, Anyhow - To (If Only Occasionally, I'll Concede) OPENLY NAME & SHAME the Roman Catholic Church And/Or Papacy/Vatican Over THIS (& Similar 'Stuff' in Poland), In View of the (Seemingly) Countless Instances of the Like That Have Been Increasingly Brought to Light (and World Attention) And Extensively Documented in All Their Gory Detail Over Recent Decades?

Hey, it couldn't be some sort of soft spot for the (admittedly eloquent words of) the present occupant of the papal see, by any chance? 

Just speculating, folks...

So What Does - CAN - Canada's Catholic Prime Minister POSSIBLY MEAN When He Just the Other Day Implored ALL His Fellow Canadians to "Take Responsibility" For the Shameful 'Stuff' Recently Exposed As Having Occurred at Canada's Roman Catholic Church Boarding Colleges for Indigenous People Over the Past Century Or So?

Or does he somehow fail to understand - or even deliberately pretend to not do so - that it's the perpetrator of ill that is entirely response-able  for taking response-ability...? *Or damn well oughta be!

Yes, I for one absolutely refuse to buy into the commonly peddled myth these days that we're all somehow responsible for the sins of our fathers...and mothers (for that matter)...

Folks, it simply ain't so.

Fullstop. End of story.

*Though namby-pamby judges seek to deflect such onto wider society and make excuse after excuse for what is simply bad behaviour, and used to be simply taken for such.

Hey, FOR ONCE Good On the UNITED NATIONS' 'Independent Human Rights Experts': For Calling Out & Calling Time Upon the Vatican Vis-a-Vis Its "Active Stalling"/"Active Thwarting"/"Foot-Dragging"/"Cover-Up" & "DELAY-DELAY-DELAY" In Regards to Its UTTER INACTION in Dealing To/Stopping the Sexual Exploitation of Minors in its Midst (and the Paying Compensation Thereto): As I've Said (Reworking John Tamihere's Inimitable Words) In Regards to Any Number of Things Over the Years: A Little Less Hui and a Whole Lot More Do-ey": LIKE YESTERDAY...Already!

And Apparently 'the Donald' Does As Well, Evidently Not Having the Staying Power/Fortitude To Endure A Month (29-Day Spell, To Be Precise) of Low-Hits Upon His Newfangled Blogsite...

So, incredible as it might well seem - to yours truly, anyhow - I've herein 'bested' the great one by a magnitude of a hundred (times), having now blogged for well over 2,900 days (upon this, my other regular blogsite davidedwinisms, and my six newbie blogsites)... 

Hey, Mr Trump, ya can't win 'em all...

Nick Smith, A Real Trooper, Calls It A Day...

Despite much negative press by Radio Stalingrad and the like, and endless, unsparing ridicule and belittling by Smith's parliamentary 'colleagues' in the NZ Labour and Green parties...

I'd contend, on the contrary, that Dr Smith has left an enviable record of actual (legislative) achievement in addition to being an unforgettable presence and feisty, energetic, intelligent and cogent, coherent debater in the House...

...moreover one with a sensitive and percipient conscience and acuity of insight upon many a piece of legislation - particularly those involving conscience votes - especially whilst in Opposition anyway...

To Be Continued (following some much-needed shuteye)...

Personally I applaud his willingness to stand alone as it were and champion unpopular social causes such as the rights of the unborn child and of the vulnerable aged...

...and for ever being a passionate advocate of whichever causes he was happening to promote or argue against at any particular time...-sure, the 'job description', you could say, of any and every member of Parliament per se, only that he - sadly amongst too few - was not only adept at such, but seemed to always wear his heart upon his sleeve and throw the entirety thereof into it whenever this punter chanced to see him debating...

Also for making a determined stand upon such (conveniently media-ignored) issues as the (then NZ First-supported coalition Government's) 'Electoral Integrity Amendment Act' (i.e. the gerrymandered rorting of the electoral scrum law)...

However this one-time member of National's 1990s' 'Brat Pack' (comprising Bill English, Tony Ryall, Roger Sowry and himself) was resoundingly defeated at the polls last time round - amidst a number of major electoral upsets as the newly-minted Jacinda Ardern-led Labour majority Government wiped out National in some of its safest seats nationwide (including in such true-blue diehard National electorates as Rangitata, scene of the recent devastating, one-in-a-hundred-year flooding, and formerly arguably its safest seat anywhere!)...

...as was fellow long-serving Ilam M.P. and Key Government Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee (also, like Smith, a one-time/*sometime deputy leader of his party)...

...and accordingly he wrongly in my view (and that of several/most commentators) deemed it right/okay to stay on after Election 2020 - if only as a list M.P. - thus tending as so many previously to give list MPs a bad name with the general populace...

...since the unambiguous and decisive verdict of the people in his/their own once fortress-safe electorate/s had been to give 'im/'em the clear and obvious heave-ho...

But though he thus misjudged the precise timing of when to go - again, like Mr Brownlee - 'for the **bestist of reasons: i.e. to keep some longterm institutional knowledge and experience amongst a class of many newfangled Opposition backbenchers - he is now stepping down before Election 2023; yes, to fend off in advance the obvious mini-scandal of some (doubtless) minor altercation with a staffer: a ***big deal to today's wet behind the ears woke-era junkie journalists'...

he is doing so ****before someone else - to wit, present Speaker Trevor Mallard - who has himself long passed his own use-by date, for the reason that he owes it to the nation - especially the former parliamentary staffer he so unfairly maligned as a rapist - to follow suit: ipso pronto, as in yesterday (if not lunch time!) 

*Brownlee serving as such (for reasonable periods, at least latterly) at least twice, whilst Smith did so under then newly-selected leader Don Brash for the briefest of times.

**Yes, my own edwinism, let's just say...

***I'd hate to think of what they'd make of Rob Muldoon's biffing Chris Laidlaw or serving it to someone else as he skedaddled into his limo post-a Dunedin election rally in the day!

****But rumour has it that Mallard will conveniently be shuffled off the scene pre-Election 2023, or at least announce his decision to retire then (as both Labour list M.P. and consequently speaker as well), thus giving way/place to one of the various present assistant speakers who are generally performing more than adequately but need a little more experience in the meantime...

'Breaking News': Biden Administration Now Also Keen To Investigate the Very Real Possibility That Covid-19 Originated in a Chinese Lab...I.e. The Origins of the Globe-Devastating Coronavirus Were Very likely Every Bit as Suspect as First Suspected...And, MOREOVER, I - Among Doubtless Numerous Others - Was Quite Possibly RIGHT ALL ALONG...