Posted on 04/03/2014 2:20:23 AM PDT by kingattax
As the nation hurtles toward bankruptcy, our rulers aren’t wasting money just to waste it; they are wasting it to poke a finger in our eye. Otherwise, explain this:
The State Department is planning to spend $400,000 in taxpayer funds to buy a sculpture for the new American embassy being built in Islamabad, Pakistan, according to contracting records.
The work, by noted American artist John Baldessari, depicts a life-size white camel made of fiberglass staring in puzzlement at the eye of an oversize shiny needle — a not-so-subtle play on the New Testament phrase about the difficulty the wealthy have in entering the kingdom of heaven.
Don’t worry, they aren’t being Christian or anything so politically incorrect. Most everything of any value in the Koran was recycled from the Bible; this includes the metaphor of the camel and the needle.
A document explaining why our money should be wasted in this particular manner specifically states that “Public art which will be presented in the new embassy should reflect the values of a predominantly Islamist country.”
(Excerpt) Read more at rightwingnews.com ...
Who the hell authorized THAT spending? Are those people in Washington all out of their minds?
difficulty the wealthy have in entering the kingdom of heaven>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Definitely a Hillery style overture, it takes a village.
Any bets on this camel art surviving more than 2 years? Its begging for an IED up its arse, with plenty of Paki jihadis available. Its amazing to watch the lefty Democrats invite the destruction of its own US diplodink facility.
Hope it’s a Trojan Camel.
To ask your second question is pretty well to answer it.
I guess King Barry wants all of us to get into Heaven by making sure that none of us are rich.
Of course, Barry has his place in eternity already reserved, and you can be sure it isn’t Heaven.
Doesn’t the Koran forbid representative art? This is an ‘offense’ waiting to happen.
“...should reflect the values of a predominantly Islamist country.”
Will it be fitted with an explosive vest?
This's a friggin' R Crumb cartoon !
1) Fiberglas? Entire Islamabad Embassy needs to be made from ssbestos.
2) How about we “re-imagine this work” as a cigarette machine so we can make it pay?
Why are we building sex toys for moslems anyway?
Spending like this is a by-product of the liberal Welfare State. The state spends, period. Its a behemoth that keeps going in the same direction and can't be stopped. It mindlessly spends and spends and spends for the sake of spending. If it wasn't $400,000 for a statute of a camel in Pakistan, it would be $400,000 for a Cowboy museum or for a study of whether you can tell someone is gay by looking at them. If you have a Welfare State, you will always have this nonsense as a by-product. Its one reason the Welfare State is so destructive and ultimately will doom us.
Camel is an Islamic symbol, really? I do know per Sahih Hadieths camel urine cures aliments before you are murdered. Now, from the wacky Islamic science world this: “Saudi Science Discovers Cancer Cure in Camel Urine Nano-Particles”
Many/possibly most Sunni Muslims, practice aniconism. That means that they don’t allow any realistic deception of living creation. So, not only no people or humanized religious imagery, but no animals, either.
When you see Oriental rugs from the Middle East, you notice that they usually don’t have depictions of anything living. The geometric tiles seen in Muslim countries are at least partly a response to the prohibition on living images.
The vast majority of people in Pakistan are Sunni Muslims who may very well find this insulting or worse.
One hump, or two?
The much-quoted metaphor of the camel and the needle is probably based on a mistranslation, anyway. First, it is an uncharacteristically poor parallel; for a camel has nothing to do with a needle. Second, the Aramaic words for camel and rope are so similar that open must stare at the words for some time to tell the difference. You can see this in the introduction to Gregor Lamsa’s translation “The Authorized Bible of the Church of the East.” Next, if we read the phrase as a rope through the eye of a needle, it becomes an obvious hyperbole: an exaggeration for effect. It makes sense, whereas a camel going through the eye of a needle is just nonsense.
It is somewhat amazing that even modern translations of the New Testament have seldom caught onto this. If you do not understand hyperbole and paradox, you can hardly be expected to understand the parables and sayings of the New Testament.
I thought “the needle” was an entrance to a town that was small enough to keep camels out, no?
First time I saw this I thought it must be joke.
Checked the calendar, April 3.
FMCDH(BITS)
Hillary Clinton on State Dept. budget for FY 2012.
FY 2012 Budget Request March 10, 2011The second part of our request funds the extraordinary, temporary portion of our war effort the same way the Pentagon’s request is funded: in a separate Overseas Contingency Operations account known as OCO. Instead of covering war expenses through supplemental appropriations, we are now taking a more transparent approach that fully reflects the integrated civilian-military efforts. Our share of the President’s $126 billion request for exceptional wartime costs is $8.7 billion. So all told, we have a $47 billion operational account and an $8.7 billion Overseas Contingency Operations account.
(snip)
But let me just quickly walk you through this, because on this issue of our $8.7 billion Overseas Contingency Operations, we have the strongest support from Secretary Gates, from Admiral Mullen. And next week – I was speaking with General Petraeus last night. He will be here on the Hill strongly supporting the civilian effort that goes hand-in-hand with what he is doing so heroically in Afghanistan. So we are funding vital civilian missions in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iraq with this $8.7 billion.
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