EDITORIAL

These days, the world seems to be full of inconsistencies and double standards. We’d like to share a few with our readers, who should have no trouble adding their own impressions.

• After nine years of war in Afghanistan against al Qaeda, the Taliban and Osama bin Laden, the United States and NATO have invited Taliban leaders to the table for talks of ending the war. Moreover, Iran has also been invited to join in peace talks.

Has everyone gone mad? The Taliban made Afghanistan very accessible to al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden as they plotted the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks and other terrorist plots around the world. Anyone who believes that members of the Taliban, which is a combination of erratic war lords and tribal kingpins, will honestly deal is extremely naïve. And let’s not forget how the Taliban regime treats women.

Will someone pose the question of what the Taliban will do with the opium fields that still operate under the noses of the U.S. and NATO forces? Will America give them small business loans to help them market their opium product more efficiently? They don’t need it.

And why in God’s name should Iran be at these peace talks? Isn’t this the same country whose leaders labeled America as the “Great Satan” and publicly announced that they would take great enjoyment in wiping the U.S. and Israel off the map? What kind of peace do they want?

The only thing that would make these talks more absurd is to have bin Laden as its moderator.

• Back in the U.S., a number of states are considering legalizing marijuana while at the same time outlawing the use of cigarettes. Proponents hail pot as being helpful in alleviating the pain of cancer victims. But when smoked, marijuana creates the same carcinogenic second-hand smoke emitted from burning tobacco.

Centuries ago, people thought tobacco had the same medicinal value that marijuana purportedly has. Modern science erased that perception in a New York minute. Despite the claims of marijuana’s benefits, there are very real dangers with the drug which makes its legalization a slippery slope.

• The federal court has decreed that the written test given for entrance into the Fire Department showed “overwhelming disparities” in the pass-fail rates betwen whites and minorities.

A group representing black firefighters whined that the test was discriminatory and managed to convince a judge to put a stop on all hiring until the city creates and administers a dumbed-down exam. It’s just another example of “don’t raise the bridge, just lower the water.”

• And Goldman Sachs, which received a $5.5 billion bailout from the government in 2008, has announced that each of the firm’s 35,400 employees will get an average of $370,706 for nine months’ work. That’s actually a decrease from their average salary of $527,192 a year ago.

Pass that word along the unemployment line. It should be a comfort to all those who have lost their jobs.