welcome back, gilad

and i will happily stand by my offer of beers on me, collect whenever you like. on behalf of a nation under the thumb of really stupid politicians, i apologize for not having done this sooner, or at the very least trying to bring you back by force. and i, like a large number of people that i know about, have not been and will not be watching your return on big brother media's "news" shows. you deserve your privacy. and hugs on demand.

...

i'm also glad that we got rid of those prisoners. mine is not a popular opinion by any stretch of the imagination, but the cost of feeding and educating them (a cost paid by a country that has trouble educating its own citizens) is marginal relative to the psychological cost of having them behind bars and heroes in the imaginations of their people.

they're not heroes, and the sooner they go home the quicker their people will realize that. i stand by a previous suggestion that our border police and soldiers run a catch and release program, preferably stripping and beating them before sending them home.

there is no justice in a war of world-views, only strength. quite frankly, their physical brutality and propaganda are solidly beating the crap out of our righteous conviction and theoretically ideal moral high ground. in historical terms, we're doomed to be the loser and the losers don't write the histories. the bully is the one using brute strength, not trying to talk his way to a peaceful resolution. to the entire western world: our moral values are worth defending. defending them requires "immoral" action. i wish us all the best of luck figuring that one out.