Red October

On silent feet it came
Breathing a sheet of flame, it came
Closing it on its rightful prey
Burning a hundred years away
The Morning of the Dragon
Truth lit up the street
The tiger we were stalking
Walked on paper feet
And in the clear white heat of dawn
Was gone
-- "Morning of the Dragon" from "Miss Saigon"

The anniversaries of the founding of the pre-eminent Communist regimes, Russia and China, are in October (of course, the Russians actually had theirs in November, since their calendar at the time was about 11-12 days behind ours). Now their great revolutions are likely to disappear - the Soviet Union of Greater Russia has dissolved into constituent republics, while the People's Republic of China is being challenged by the success of its semi-feudal capitalist system now in place.

But even so, the Chinese Community Party is still going strong. Congratulations, comrades. May you get your just deserts for the blood you shed in the name of the Party.

The real question now is whether the capitalist/materialist/humanist paradigm that is currently ruling the roost is the one which will be the most sustainable. On the one hand, we've seen capitalist economies turn to socialism and the welfare state to protect their "dispossessed." With Evil (with a capital E) falling to the wonders of science, it is no wonder that many of our people today lack a moral compass - and thus lacking the middle ground with which to deal with the activist sects in Islam and Christianity.

Somehow I'm not convinced in this brave new world that there is no room for the ideal of dedicating oneself to the STATE --- whether an earthly one as envisioned by the communists, or the heavenly one. However, I fear that extremism, and the lack of understanding, will continue to tear our world apart.

May all our children learn
The tide of right will turn
Giants fall, tigers burn
Someday with the dawn
They're gone.