If Only Our Leaders Had Better Subjects to Work With

Obama said this in Northern Ireland during this year's G7 plus 1:“If towns remain divided—if Catholics have their schools and buildings and Protestants have theirs, if we can’t see ourselves in one another and fear or resentment are allowed to harden—that too encourages division and discourages cooperation.”

Obama seems to be opposed to parochial education because it is divisive. On first blush this appears to be just another example of Obama assuming authority and pronouncing as international messiah on questions he has not been asked. What it means to the areas where he has actual influence, like the United States and its educational system, we poor working folks can only muse and wonder. Unless....

Unless you include this:
The European Commission has ordered Slovakia to remove the halos from Cyril and Methodius on a commemorative coin. The NYT comments on this as follows: "Yet at a time when Europe needs solidarity and a unified sense of purpose to grapple with its seemingly endless economic crisis, religion has instead become yet another source of discord".

In the shadows of militant Islam, militant Israel and militant Iran the powers-that-be have recognized a source of conflict among us, something they can help. Our problems are domestic! They fear uncooperative Amish, disagreeable Catholics and the subtle power of halos. Perhaps these serve as a proxy for suicide bombers and religious nuclear powers. Perhaps they hope to influence them by attacking softer, more pliant targets. Or, perhaps, they are fearful of a serious and committed danger and symbolically attack those on the periphery for their own therapy.

But what is certain is our leaders do not like our own behavior much. Our religion is unhealthy; it is bad for "cooperation" and a "unified sense of purpose." What they would substitute, they do not say.

So beneath the choppy waters of our lives, where lunatics, inflation and disease buffet us,--deep below--large and menacing forces meet and chat and swim.