Homophilosophicus writing in his blog quoting the Prophet Amos. (Jeremiah is my favorite.) The first decades of the 21st century are truly the years of the Old Testament Prophets. All around us, uncertainty, stupidity and greed flourish.

“They do not know how to do right, says the Lord, those who store up violence and robbery in their strongholds (Amos 3:10).”

Those of whom the writer of Amos speaks are not merely petty criminals, for they live in strongholds. Amos is referring to those who rule from their unassailable citadels, who fill up their treasuries with the wealth they have taken from the powerless by violence and theft. It is evident that this relationship between the powerful and the powerless has not changed; in fact it has become enshrined within modern economic systems. There are those who, by virtue of their monopoly on power alone, assert the right to grow fat from the labour of the powerless. In Ireland we have seen that the government have stolen from the people. They have taken tax from the people and they have failed to provide for the welfare of the people from that revenue; this is nothing other than theft. Without proper consultation with the people the government has gambled and lost billions of euros from the community purse, and have successfully lined their own pockets. This also is theft. By maintaining systems of injustice they have demonstrated their violence against the vulnerable and the weak. Ignorance is not an excuse for what they have done, but it would seem to be the case that “they do not know how to do right.” Each and every member of the present government of Ireland comes from a privileged background, a background that has taken wealth for granted and considered the accumulation of money the highest virtue. It stands to reason then that these people have suffered from a severe form of political myopia in their regard of the poor. They have consistently failed to take the needs of the poor into account when they have made decisions ‘for the good of the nation.’ What ‘good’ in this context actually means is that which is ‘economically good for the wealthy.’

Doesn’t this sound like a Minister of God with brains? All we got around here is an editorial writer explaining that the Medal of Honor has become feminized!

James Pilant