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This Month's Scripture Verse:

For the love of money is a root of all sorts of evil, and some by longing for it have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.
I Timothy 6:10

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Tuesday, May 12, 2026

Views From The Outside For May 12, 2026

 Views From The Outside

The purpose of this page is to list news stories and reports from mostly Western sources outside of the U.S. You can use Google Translate to translate articles that are printed in another language. 

So far, news sources include:

International

From Canada

From England

From France

From Germany

From Russian Source 

From Spain

From Switzerland

From Ukraine


<< Previous Views                                                        Next Views >>


Friday, May 8, 2026

The 2nd Amendment And The Middle East

American conservatives are fond of, and even zealous for, proclaiming peopleˋs right to bear arms. But much of their enthusiasm loses its luster when applying that right to those outside of our borders.

Take Israel and the Occupied Territories for example. Many conservative Americans will mindlessly repeat the claim that Israel has a right to defend itself. But how many of those same conservative Americans will also say that Palestinians have a right to defend themselves. And guess which group is most threatened by the other.

If we look at Israelˋs neighbors, very few are allowed to acquire enough arms to have a deterence against aggression from a neighbor. Palestinians have been forbidden from such acquisitions. But so to has Lebanon, Iraq, and Syria. One has to wonder when Saudi Arabia and Egypt will have reached their quota for weapons. And yet, Israelˋs regional policies strongly suggest that its immediate neighbors should insist on acquiring as many weapons as possible in case of future military actions practiced by Israel.

Itˋs not true that there are no Palestinians who are allowed to be armed. And certainly, Lebanon has an army. But despite the constant attacks by Israel on Lebanon prior to  the recent war against Iran, Lebanon is not allowed to acquire any force that could deter Israel from its military actions. And so this is where we need to admit to the privilege Americans have to bear arms rather than claiming that it is a right. That is because regardless of whether one is talking about freedom, liberty, or rights, when equality is absent, what we are really. talking about is privilege.

Why don't Israel's neighbors have the same right to bear arms like some Americans believe that they themselves are entitled to? That has to do with America's Security Strategy. In that work, the U.S. government's goal is to prohibit any non American-friendly Middle Eastern nation from gaining a strategic advantage over the area. That boils down to only granting Israel the "right" to acquire as many arms as its heart's desire.

And so the short of it is that America limits the acquisition of weapons to those nations that it deems to be an actual or possible threat to its interests. Therefore, we need to ask if our government can limit the weapons that a foreign nation can have depending whether our government feels threatened by them, why can't our government limit the weapons that its citizens can have when others feel threatened,  or even worse, by those weapons?


Tuesday, May 5, 2026

Views From The Outside For May 5, 2026

 Views From The Outside

The purpose of this page is to list news stories and reports from mostly Western sources outside of the U.S. You can use Google Translate to translate articles that are printed in another language. 

So far, news sources include:

International

From Canada

From England

From France

From Germany

From Russian Source 

From Spain

From Switzerland

From Ukraine

<< Previous Views                                                        Next Views >>


Friday, May 1, 2026

What Does The Iran War Tell l Us About Which Religion Is The Religion Of Peace

 Many of my fellow Christian friends often tell me that Christianity is the religion of peace while Islam is not. Of course, such claims are made with a selective use of both history and the present. And so I thought that we could compare the religions of the countries involved in the Iran War to see which religion is the religion of peace. 

We have 3 horse race here to determine the winner. We have Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. Christianity will be represented by the U.S. Judaism will be represented by Israel. Islam will be represented by Iran, Pakistan, and the Gulf Coast Countries. Answers to the following questions will determine the winner(s). We should note that the answers are obvious.

What is the religion of the country that is currently engaged in ethnic cleansing of indigenous people from the land that it is trying to annex? 

What is the religion of the country that practices/sponsors a significant amount of terrorism? 

What is the religion of the country that has provided the most help in getting the current ceasefire talks started? 

What is the religion of the country or countries that have not retaliated after being attacked multiple times? 

What is the religion of the country that threatened the Pope?

What is the religion of the country/countries that has/have caused thousands of deaths and millions of displaced people in the recent war?

What is the religion of the nation that has broken multiple ceasefires?

What is the religion of the nation that has threatened a whole civilization?

What is the religion of the country/countries that has/have exercised the harshest suppression of its citizens?

In this 3 horse race, we have neither winners nor religions that even show. What we have is a religion that places. That religion is Islam. And so while many Americans brag about the Judeo-Christian values of America's founding, the current Iran War implies that such boasting is empty and, instead, should be a lament. And I am writing this as a religiously conservative Christian. I should add that though in this case, the nation that represents Christianity is hurting the reputation of Christianity, there are too many times where I have done the same with some of the decisions I have made.

Still,  how the U.S. and Israel are representing their respective religions is going a long way to discredit those religions on a national level. In terms of Christianity, Christendom did much to discredit Christianity in the eyes of many which contributed much to the birth of Critical Theory and Post Modernism. Who knows what reactions that the current representatives of Judaism and Christianity, represented by Israel and the U.S. respectively in this article, will produce in the future or perhaps the near future in different parts of the world including the in Israel and the U.S.?

What we should note about America's past actions is that they were done covertly as to give the impression that the American government cared about exhibiting the appearance of being concerned for international law. And so what was done in the shadows is now not only being done in the open, it is done with much arrogance.




Tuesday, April 28, 2026

Views From The Outside For April 28, 2026

Views From The Outside

The purpose of this page is to list news stories and reports from mostly Western sources outside of the U.S. You can use Google Translate to translate articles that are printed in another language. 

So far, news sources include:

International

From Canada

From England

From France

From Germany

From Russian Source 

From Spain

From Switzerland

From Ukraine


<< Previous Views                                                        Next Views >>





Friday, April 24, 2026

Is Iran Doing Trump's Dirty Work?

 Back during the initial tariff war days, Trump presented one of his visions for America. Using tariffs, Trump wanted to build an America that was nearly self-sufficient in terms of manufactured goods while seeing the world clamor for its products. That would guarantee the positive trade balances that Trump falsely believes our nation needs. 

Fast forward to now. Because of the Iran War, the U.S. has sold more LNG (Liquified Natural Gas) and oil than what was sold before the war. How? Factor in the Iranian attacks on facilities the Gulf Coast Countries along with the closure of the Straight of Hormuz and we see why some nations are starting to look to the U.S. to make up for the loss of supply in those commodities. These increases in sales are benefiting Trump's friends who own those related businesses. Here, we should note something about Iran's attacks on its neighbors. Iran used those attacks to do unto others what was being done to it in order to get the world to care about what was happening to them. Morally it was wrong, but such an approach is understandable.

The above leads to the following question, is Trump receiving more incentive to keep the conflict with Iran going or to find an exit strategy? In terms of valuable fuels, both Russia, which is led by Trumpˋs geopolitical partner, and the U.S. have both profited more and grown more important in terms of providing the world with those resources.

Here we should remember what was repeated in last weekˋs article and stated in an earlier article. It was said here that Trumpˋs criteria for success are domination and acquisition. And in the Iran War, Trump has boasted about Americaˋs military domination over Iran. In addition, Trump believes that he has currently put Iran in an economic stranglehold with his naval blockade in order to force Iran to accept his terms for peace. 

And so is Trump looking for an offramp to the war? I donˋt think that is the case. It seems to me that, as long as the Stock Market behaves, Trump is comfortable with or without an agreement with Iran at this time. At the same time, Trump has expressed little to no concern for the human costs of the war--that is especially true when he so flippantly threatens to wipe the Iranian civilization off the map. Has he shown any concern for  how the Iran war has caused great hardship to those in some Asian nations? If he has, I havenˋt seen it. And what about his concern for how this war caused inflation on the American public? Again, I havenˋt seen it. Trumpˋs rhetoric suggests, if not implies, that he doesnˋt care about what non oligarch Americans are suffering from this war. Instead, what Trump has continually bought up is Americaˋs military might, which is under his control, and how America is profiting from the war. And so it seems that those factors seem to have eased any discomfort Trump might experienced which would have caused him to look for an early exit from the war.

When we look at Trump's actions through the lens of his criteria for success, again which are domination and acquisition, Trump seems to be comfortable with saying "I'll stay." And the most disturbing part of this story is that Trump's criteria for success will remain the same in all of his future foreign and domestic policies. Here we should note what Trump recently said about social safety nets. He said that our nation cannot afford to pay for safety net programs like Medicare, Medicaid, and child assistance programs while paying for the kind of military that he wants. And so if Congress approves of his new defense/warmongering budget, Trump will become more powerful than any President ever has. And, in the true way of authoritarians, expect more wars in the future.





Tuesday, April 21, 2026

Views From The Outside For April 21, 2026

 Views From The Outside

The purpose of this page is to list news stories and reports from mostly Western sources outside of the U.S. You can use Google Translate to translate articles that are printed in another language. 

So far, news sources include:

International

From Canada

From England

From France

From Germany

From Russian Source 

From Spain

From Switzerland

From Ukraine


<< Previous Views                                                        Next Views >>