At least 129 killed, a theater and soccer game were targeted , a man caught in Brussels with lots of ordinance and connections to the Paris attacks. ISIS is making a robust claim on  the incidents. The French have called this an act of war.   Conceived , in earnest, in 1979 at the fall of the Shaw of Iran and the installation of  Ayatollah Khomeini  at the head of Irans present neo-theocratic government. Now the news is hot, fresh, and subject to change.

French Pres Hollende, says it is an act of war. Pres. ‘bama says “We bring those responsible to justice!” like it was a crime perped by regular criminals. Tin ear? Nothing between ears?

ISIS SAYS THIS IS WAR, Obama is dialing 911, Hollende is closing the borders. 77% of the ‘immigrants are young men! Feel the rumble? See the tremor in the wine glasses of Paris, London, Rome et. al. There is an army on the move. It comes from the crucible of Syria, (a Syrian passport found at  the stadium site) and other parts of the caldron of the middle east.

It percolated from Iranian revolution throughout the middle east, it’s bloom and blossom is the Caliphate ISIS. The present mass incursion of fighting-age Muslims into Europe signals the cultural death of Europe. Our oft times imbecilic but always cherished, cradle mates across the pond  are under a tidal wave of dependent DP’s (displaced persons) soon to be Welfare recipients of the host countries. As is always, (at least always has been)  the case the immigrants gather together in closed communities insulated to the culture at large. In various venues throughout Europe  these ghettos become No-Go zones for police. Sharia law is infiltrating as an auxiliary to the host judiciary of many European countries. These enclaves become dark zones that are like a dark smudge on a lung ex-ray. Bad news from the most violent religion since the Thugee’s prowled India, swilling sugar and strangling travelers.

Last summer Deb and I stood at the base of the coliseum, ( the big one, in Rome), the evening was warm and it was a long, slow, late-summer sunset. A light breeze seemed kind after the pounding heat of a late august afternoon. Of course there was the broken grandeur of the Colliseum. My eyes traced every line, crack, snag, of the ruin. And it was grand. I was filled with a sense of….. NOSTALGIA! 

My history was everywhere. I felt  familiarity in the gaze of  of each marble visage. I felt some kind of completion. I felt as if I just got home. It is disheartening to think that the whole of western history    will fall into the gentle hands of ISIS, pictured here, destroying  ancient antiquities at the Nimrud site in northern Iraq.

      I saw the handwriting on the wall for Greece in a hostel in Athens. It was a age worn place, a walk up with  primitive frescos of Zeus and his clan and a host of Greek deities and monsters from the Hellenic period festooned each landing of each floor. 

Leonidas the desk man, sported the blue black curls and swarthy good looks that found it’s deadliest reputation in late fifties with such films as “Three Coins in the Fountain” or “Boy on a Dolphin”. One day as I passed the time with him at his desk I mentioned his namesake, Leonidas, the Spartan King who fought the Persians at Thermopylae 480 B.C. He shook his head with a sad smile and said “Yeah, but they have invaded anyway.” He nodded toward the open door to the sidewalk outside…..

The beggars of Athens are very dramatic. They sit, both male and female in little piles on the sidewalk, imploring, loudly and long. With hand gesticulations!  (Imploring outstretched palms etc). There are deeeeep potholes on the sidewalks downtown. Racks of abandoned Vespa’s covered in cob webs and sitting unclaimed for years at a stretch. The despair of a depressed economy was expressed by the number of helpless and hapless on Athens streets. “”The migrants, Leonidas complained, “come here and the government pays them so much just to live. They do nothing… ”

Only a miracle can save Europe now. This concerns me…