Faith, friendship and public priorities

Your old columnist finds it hard to see the why of resistance to Jewish believers in our beloved USofA. Southwest Nebraska has only a small Jewish population, a reflection of settlement patterns rather than sentiment. The presence or absence of Jewish neighbors has never been a point of concern here, and it would not be one. Therefore, it is hard to understand why all the Jewish hatred that we see is demonstrated on the nightly TV news.

During my twenty-five years of military service, I worked alongside many Jewish colleagues whose professionalism I valued, and several of those relationships have endured into our years as veterans.

In one KC-97 squadron, my aircraft commander was a practicing Jew, and we were always impressed that he volunteered to replace other young Christian dads on alert whenever Christmas rolled around. Alert at that time meant living in an underground facility, 24 hours a day for a week at a time. Next to the alert facility (we called it the “mole hole”) were our parked air-refueling tankers, which our crews were expected to start engines and take off within ten minutes when an alert was sounded, actual or practice, from SAC headquarters. Anyhow, letting those Christian pilots be at home with their families was a thoughtful gesture by friend Shelly Abrams.

This United States of America was founded on Judeo-Christian principles and has become the most prosperous most successful nation that this world has ever seen. Why then is such Jew hatred being practiced in our large cities and especially in the prestigious universities in the more populous blue states? Is it a symptom of Trump Derangement Syndrome due to President Trump’s solid friendship with the nation of Israel? Sadly, I’m watching and listening and will respond further as things develop.

For a long time, I have been a student of the Bible. The Hebrew nation had long predicted the coming of a messiah who would take over their nation and their world, which was then ruled by the Romans. At Christmas, we celebrate the arrival of the infant Jesus, who in his 33 years on earth would be the long-awaited messiah. Jesus was crucified and died, but three days later came back from the grave and ascended to heaven to sit at the right hand of God. Yes, we Christians believe Jesus Christ was the long-awaited Messiah, but personally, I think that the ruling Hebrew aristocracy, the Hebrew ruling government under the Romans, suffered from bureaucracy.

[Bureaucracy definition: government by specialization of and a hierarchy of rules, also: an unwieldy administrative system burdened with excessive complexity and lack of flexibility.]

Yes, the Sanhedrin, the Hebrew government in the temple, was provided with sacrifices by the regular population, so they did not have to earn a living; they just had to enforce the rules and live comfortably. They did not want the people to be able to confess to Christ, the Messiah, have their sins forgiven and continue to live a good life. They missed the boat by not becoming Christians and living the life we know today. Still, it is important that by maintaining their Jewishness, our Judeo religion has survived to this day.

In this old guy’s opinion, bureaucracy is also what is hampering the government of our fair City. Obviously, our local airport is a sad mess with no FBO or aircraft mechanic stationed here. Contract employees are doing a good job of servicing the few transit aircraft that now land here with fuel, but we have no airport manager, as the total operation is overseen by the City Manager and Public Works Director.

When a bond issue was advanced that bundled a swimming pool replacement with an ambitious new ballpark, many residents concluded the overall price tag was too high. That perception lingered, and a later bond to address the cracked and inadequate junior high building was defeated.

Inadequate housing numbers are being met by building new, overseen by bureaucrats, while a large number of vacant homes exist throughout our City. The list goes on, but you, dear readers, can look around and see for yourselves.

A group has been raising a fuss over Key Lime, a large aviation company that primarily hauls freight but also provides Essential Air Service to McCook Airport under the name Denver Air Connection. The group’s gripe is that Key Lime is possibly getting set up to also haul ICE detainees. Big deal. Keep it up, and we’ll lose the splendid service between McCook and Denver that Denver Air Connection has provided for our community. Just sayin’.

That is how I saw it.