Elie Wiesel, after his visit with Obama to the Buchenwald concentration camp, had this to say: "I think he (Obama) has a sense of humor but I'm not so sure he has a sense of justice yet." Early concepts of justice could be understood to be inside or outside the bounds of the law. Hamlet is rife with the most primitive and elemental concepts of justice and only in later years could you say that in Western civilization to find justice solely within the law is the only way to go, that vigilante justice is immoral. This blog takes that position as it is Mr. Wiesel's position but his comment is very very interesting, somewhat enigmatic regarding President Obama. What does he mean? what was he trying to say? it's pregnant with Meaning.
How many times are we counseled to just look the other way re various injustices, to let it go, is it really worth pursuing? and such, to be careful etc. Stephen Pagones pursuing a civil case against the Rev. Al Sharpton over the Tawany Brawley hoax apparently destroyed his marriage. He was the Assistant in the District Attorney's office up there in Dutchess County NY who was falsely accused with others of raping the young black girl Tawana Brawley in Wappingers Falls and Sharpton, the lawyers Alton Maddox and C. Vernon Mason led the charge. Some would say why did he pursue it so many years after the fact? everyone knows it was a big-time hoax, it embarrassed Cosby and the case is so old, so yesterday but I agree with him. In many cases to not pursue Justice, to listen to the pragmatic counselers of indifference, well it might be unfair to call it a kind of liberalism but it ain't conservative. Justice is right up there with freedom and personal responsibility and lower taxes and smaller government in the conservative View of the Universe. Even on a much smaller scale justice is important. As I blogged the other day about the misfortune that my cat met last Sunday morning, basically her skull was crushed in and she was left in a puddle of her own blood on the side of the road, that is also an issue of justice on a personal scale and I'm sure there are legions who would disagree. Inside the parameters of the law yes, of course but when you're a true conservative whether the issue is big or small you don't question for a moment the value of justice, any other way tends towards liberalism.
There is also the civil and criminal case against a group of Yonkers firefighters coming up. Basically it is alleged that a few of them would dose some of their fellow firefighters with acid or LSD and in one particularly vicious case while their victim began to hallucinate they screamed obscenities at the top of their lungs in his ears. It is also charged that they have harassed some of their victims for having decided to pursue the case against them. There is also the alleged coverup of the bloodwork by the City. These incidents all go back ten years at least but there has been a culture of corruption in City government for quite some time or so it's been said. Now again I'm sure there are many many people who would say why pursue such a case? it happened so long ago, the chemicals have long since passed everyone's brains and it's so dangerous to go up against a group of alleged psychos, don't you watch the movies? Ah yes but this is NOT the conservative position, not the true one anyway, and to not pursue justice in certain cases sets a very bad precedent indeed, it's defining deviancy down to quote the famous phrase from the late NY Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan.
Justice is also cathartic, it serves a basic emotional human need for closure. Justice is so many things to so many people but I am bothered about Elie Wiesel's observation, have we lost a sense of justice in our culture? That liberals seem overly concerned with the rights of criminals and these days terrorists, there's more than a grain of truth to that. Their concerns are not unimportant but I too get the sense that Obama would rather just talk it out with the bad guys rather than do the right thing. To be taken to task by a noted Nobel Peace Prize winner however politely worded, that's a hell of alot of blogworthy material right there!
The sitemeter has it that at 5:10PM I've had 27 visitors today and my average per day has recently gone down to 19 again. Studying the sitemeter over time the visitors per day has always gone up when certain themes are discussed which is interesting. At times my average daily total went way up to around 37 visitors per day when discussing psychedelics, apparently a very interesting subject to a great many people which should help me get on those google search engines and provide some much needed balance. Gotta study this more in depth.
ReplyDeleteI am unable to locate the source of
ReplyDelete"I think he (Obama) has a sense of humor but I'm not so sure he has a sense of justice yet." despite reading all the Buchenwald speeches, etc. Just attempting to
understand the context before making any observations. It sounds like you need a three-dimensional plot of site hits vs subject matter vs phase of the moon, there..
They say that justice is blind, but that is not to say that we should turn a blind eye to justice.
ReplyDeleteGood post, Z.
It wasn't in an official speech per se BB. I was watching the late news the other night and Wiesel was walking with a reporter when he said that kind of off-the-cuff remark and those type comments are always the most interesting. I also have the closed-captioning on (shows my age) and so there it was right up there on the screen and it sounds like vintage Wiesel as justice has been the theme of his whole life. Now if it was the aftereffects of the bad water I drank some time ago it STILL makes sense, LOL.
ReplyDeleteIMO, if one survived Buchenwald, they have the right to pronounce on justice and humanity. Old Wiesel suffered the ultimate insult a few years back when he was assaulted by a holocaust denier. Intriguing, folks' opinions...
ReplyDeleteI got no problem with that BB. Had alot of thoughts last night, the cat probably brought them to the fore but I remember a conversation I once had with my mother about evil in general. She said to me evil is stronger than good, more powerful basically because we let it be. Evil is intimidating, it strikes fear into the hearts of good people because evil people act outside the bounds of law and morality. In other words WE, us good folks often give it the upper hand. Put another way if evil causes you to not pursue justice then the evil people have won. Yes, thank God for Elie Wiesel's witness and others like him. Friend of mine made another point once, said about people who've served in the war, say a granddad or the retiree down the block, the rest of their life is gravy, they paid their dues, they're entitled and as you say they can pronounce on whatever. You're gonna tell them they can't have a drink or have a cigar? Get out of here!
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