"T" is for "Tolerance"

       It's a given: as attention-arrestors go, pet behavior is a slam-dunk.  The video clip which accompanies this entry is instructive, albeit in an admittedly simplistic and child-like fashion.  If only what is seen could be applied in the world of adult-like contention!  The interplay between puppy and cat does provide us with a teaching moment or two about the virtue of tolerance.  Who knows how much of the following litany of lament could have been erased, were principle offenders compelled to watch it, and watch yet again:
               A former Oregon State engineering student who happens to be muslim, failed in his attempts to detonate a bomb during a tree-lighting ceremony in a jam-packed Pioneer Square, a.k.a. "Portland's living room".  Short days following, an inmate in a local correctional facility was severely beaten; ostensibly because he happened to be muslim.  At about the same time, a mosque in Corvallis was fire-bombed.  (Whether either of the latter two incidents came as a consequence of the former is moot, and for the sake of this argument, frankly beside the point.)
                The Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kansas routinely sends out "emissaries" to attend soldiers' funerals nation-wide, in protest.  Their claim is that war deaths are God's punishment for immorality in our society.
                Outside a Multnomah County tavern, patronized by gays, two customers are mugged.  The only "justification" provided was the victims' alternative life-style.  This is an all too frequent occurrence, according to sheriff's deputies.
               The forgoing is a small sampling of the most recent, local news items which underline the flagrant disregard for the freedom, and personal space of others.  Like weeds, swastikas and racist epithets blight the urban landscape.  Bombings of abortion clinics and murders of its practitioners continue.  So do trash-talk, arrests, and deportation of illegal immigrants who come to this country only in hopes of etching out a less meager existence in a world shadowed by fiscal ruin.
                 To those who pull constantly against the forces of greed, jealousy and hate, while pushing for humane treatment of others, you are to be commended.  As the poet/musician, Leonard Cohen, wrote, "There is a crack in everything.  That's how the light gets in."  Thank you for continuing to seek it out.
               To the light-challenged we encounter, isn't it about time that we extend a calm, but assertive "paw" while admonishing with but one word...."ENOUGH!"?
               There is much to be learned from our pets.

(ed. note: The additional videos you may have noticed came as "part of the package", could not be separated or divorced from the intended, and do not represent the political views of this writer.  Asking him if the inclusion was really worth it, is a fair question.)