The lion and the lamb together
AND as it was prophesied so it happened: the lion and the lamb lay together. And behold, it was very good. Which the Lion, and which the Lamb? By this roundabout route I come to who will be Obama’s running mate in the US presidential race!
BY JOHN NAGENDA
AND as it was prophesied so it happened: the lion and the lamb lay together. And behold, it was very good. Which the Lion, and which the Lamb? By this roundabout route I come to who will be Obama’s running mate in the US presidential race!
The heading is a take on the Bible’s Isaiah 65: 25, as Biblical scholars will know; but which leads to perhaps the most often misquoted line in the entire Holy Book. The original, as in my late father’s Frank Charles Thompsons edition, (I am without my poetical King James) has it:
“The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, and the lion shall eat straw like the bullock.†Nothing about the lion and the lamb lying together! But then this column would not like to identify Barack Obama with a fox, and if the fox be Clinton then Obama is the lamb, which is not preferable to the lion for the job in hand; (although sheep can be very stubborn). Better to go for the misquote and see Obama as lion, Hillary Clinton as lamb, admittedly in her more retiring mode.
That settled, how will this lion and this lamb lie together? Probably at the start not very comfortably, and the lamb might be tremulous at the possibility of becoming supper. But the quote is clear that hostility shall not reign.
“They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain, saith the LORD.†Advice which the two present (but not for much longer) contestants would do well to follow, and the sooner the better!
Those around when Kennedy made Johnson his VP, (a more dissimilar pair couple you couldn’t imagine) saw each became an advantage to the other.
Losing contestant Clinton is supposed to bring the white blue collar workers and many women with her.
Great for the Democratic Party, which would see them added to all the rest who root for Obama.
Lest this is not understood quickly by Clinton, John Edwards, who gave up his own nomination battle in January, and who claimed the blue collar workers as his own, joined the rush to Obama on Wednesday. The implication is obvious.
I have had a soft spot for Edwards from the beginning, and who is to say he wouldn’t be a better bet for VP? Will this move galvanize the Coy Mistress?
Another point with The Lady is whether her combination (as the first lady to stand for President) and Obama (as first Black) might not be too chewy for the sometimes rather timid American electorate. In that case the suave Edwards has astutely chosen his moment. Mr McCain, here they come; either way!
*** By now I can guess that some of my myriad and loyal readers worldwide are becoming somewhat restive regarding the wide coverage this column has expended on US politics in recent weeks!
“Disgusted†of Nakulabye, or “Name-supplied†of Tororo will soon be on your humble columnist’s neck asking whether nothing is happening nearer home.
And they have a point. But reflect on this: the US is not exactly negligible in the affairs of the wider world, including ourselves.
Besides, think, for me, of the warm glow arising out of coming from a small place but positioning yourself to rub shoulders with US giants by giving your take on their affairs.
But all right, let’s get nearer to our backyard, via Zimbabwe! I had no idea until this week that the hugest number of dollar billionaires in the universe lived in that country.
To accommodate them Mugabe’s government has had manufactured a brand new note of $ 500 million (yes, half a billion! Zimbabwean of course). It follows if you have two of these you are a billionaire. And cheap at the price: this billion is worth US$ 4.
This is sick. I haven’t myself seen or handled these new notes so I don’t know whether they are crisp or soft. I hope the latter, for they would be useful in a latrine, cutting down on toilet roll paper, although still prohibitively expensive in that role.
Incidentally, why pick up where it has fallen, a note, say, worth Z$ 5,000,000; if, indeed it exists? It would be worth a fiftieth of an American dollar, 2 cents.
How does this grab President Mugabe when he looks at himself in the mirror? Is this his sense of Cosmic Comedy; even the thought of manufacturing a note of $500 million? Come on, Zimbabweans! By complete coincidence I want to end back in our own dear country.
As I have said before, I am genuinely confused by the remarkable, by any standards, growth number of our Districts.
I sense that my awe that we will one day reach 100 might prove small by the time we are through. Take Buganda with its four million inhabitants, might that on its own not provide 40, at an average of 100,000 each (some districts are only 10,000)? Why this proliferation?
Will each district make its own policies? Surely that will be confusion worse confounded. If not, why so many; based on what need? What about the bigger units we have all grown to expect and need?
And, crucially, who pays the expenses of this new spawn? Don’t expect a neutral answer from those newly “enabled†(ennobled?) to run the new structures; why should they spurn it?
Am I missing some important consideration? But I am truly terrified of these ever growing new districts gobbling us up before our very eyes. Help!!
AND as it was prophesied so it happened: the lion and the lamb lay together. And behold, it was very good. Which the Lion, and which the Lamb? By this roundabout route I come to who will be Obama’s running mate in the US presidential race!
The heading is a take on the Bible’s Isaiah 65: 25, as Biblical scholars will know; but which leads to perhaps the most often misquoted line in the entire Holy Book. The original, as in my late father’s Frank Charles Thompsons edition, (I am without my poetical King James) has it:
“The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, and the lion shall eat straw like the bullock.†Nothing about the lion and the lamb lying together! But then this column would not like to identify Barack Obama with a fox, and if the fox be Clinton then Obama is the lamb, which is not preferable to the lion for the job in hand; (although sheep can be very stubborn). Better to go for the misquote and see Obama as lion, Hillary Clinton as lamb, admittedly in her more retiring mode.
That settled, how will this lion and this lamb lie together? Probably at the start not very comfortably, and the lamb might be tremulous at the possibility of becoming supper. But the quote is clear that hostility shall not reign.
“They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain, saith the LORD.†Advice which the two present (but not for much longer) contestants would do well to follow, and the sooner the better!
Those around when Kennedy made Johnson his VP, (a more dissimilar pair couple you couldn’t imagine) saw each became an advantage to the other.
Losing contestant Clinton is supposed to bring the white blue collar workers and many women with her.
Great for the Democratic Party, which would see them added to all the rest who root for Obama.
Lest this is not understood quickly by Clinton, John Edwards, who gave up his own nomination battle in January, and who claimed the blue collar workers as his own, joined the rush to Obama on Wednesday. The implication is obvious.
I have had a soft spot for Edwards from the beginning, and who is to say he wouldn’t be a better bet for VP? Will this move galvanize the Coy Mistress?
Another point with The Lady is whether her combination (as the first lady to stand for President) and Obama (as first Black) might not be too chewy for the sometimes rather timid American electorate. In that case the suave Edwards has astutely chosen his moment. Mr McCain, here they come; either way!
*** By now I can guess that some of my myriad and loyal readers worldwide are becoming somewhat restive regarding the wide coverage this column has expended on US politics in recent weeks!
“Disgusted†of Nakulabye, or “Name-supplied†of Tororo will soon be on your humble columnist’s neck asking whether nothing is happening nearer home.
And they have a point. But reflect on this: the US is not exactly negligible in the affairs of the wider world, including ourselves.
Besides, think, for me, of the warm glow arising out of coming from a small place but positioning yourself to rub shoulders with US giants by giving your take on their affairs.
But all right, let’s get nearer to our backyard, via Zimbabwe! I had no idea until this week that the hugest number of dollar billionaires in the universe lived in that country.
To accommodate them Mugabe’s government has had manufactured a brand new note of $ 500 million (yes, half a billion! Zimbabwean of course). It follows if you have two of these you are a billionaire. And cheap at the price: this billion is worth US$ 4.
This is sick. I haven’t myself seen or handled these new notes so I don’t know whether they are crisp or soft. I hope the latter, for they would be useful in a latrine, cutting down on toilet roll paper, although still prohibitively expensive in that role.
Incidentally, why pick up where it has fallen, a note, say, worth Z$ 5,000,000; if, indeed it exists? It would be worth a fiftieth of an American dollar, 2 cents.
How does this grab President Mugabe when he looks at himself in the mirror? Is this his sense of Cosmic Comedy; even the thought of manufacturing a note of $500 million? Come on, Zimbabweans! By complete coincidence I want to end back in our own dear country.
As I have said before, I am genuinely confused by the remarkable, by any standards, growth number of our Districts.
I sense that my awe that we will one day reach 100 might prove small by the time we are through. Take Buganda with its four million inhabitants, might that on its own not provide 40, at an average of 100,000 each (some districts are only 10,000)? Why this proliferation?
Will each district make its own policies? Surely that will be confusion worse confounded. If not, why so many; based on what need? What about the bigger units we have all grown to expect and need?
And, crucially, who pays the expenses of this new spawn? Don’t expect a neutral answer from those newly “enabled†(ennobled?) to run the new structures; why should they spurn it?
Am I missing some important consideration? But I am truly terrified of these ever growing new districts gobbling us up before our very eyes. Help!!