The word used in that verse is "namogu" (or in Hebrew, נמגו or נמוגו). It means to vanish as in fear - not just to melt away.

The idiomatic expression for a coward is "moug lev" or having a vanishing heart.

The mandate from the bible could be perceived as a mandate to scare away the residents of Canaan. A campaign of terror.

You've got to hand it to our government - they sure are conducting one of those in Canaan...

It is truly disturbing to see a US Senator who's allegiance is so thoroughly to another nation, not the United States. I'd thought Lieberman's critics were exaggerating his devotion to Israel, but that speech is frightening.

How would we feel if some other Senator gave a similar speech about, say, Belgium? Declaring it divinely inspired, and implying that the highest duty of the United States was defending it, "picking up the torch that was lit in God's promise to Abraham 4,000 years ago, and carrying it forward to spread that light"?

I can't help but notice that nowhere in the founding principles of our nation contained in Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, or the Federalist Papers is 'sustaining the people of Israel in their divinely Promised Land' much less an obligation to support the Olmert administration.

Beyond my concern that Lieberman has a greater loyalty to Israel than he does to the United States is my concern about his relationship with Hagee. Lieberman does realize that Hagee's theology isn't about the people of Israel living happily ever after in the Mideast, doesn't he? That Hagee expectantly awaits Armageddon, a time of unspeakable horror when all of Lieberman's faith will either have to convert to Christ or suffer eternal damnation? Is Lieberman's desire for political allies in defense of Israel so great that he will make common cause with men who, at heart, would have him damned to eternal hellfire?

..left me speechless. Really speechless.

I'd chalk up this transcendent madness to something in the water...but it's probably more complicated than that.

Too many people. This old Earth of ours is way overpopulated with humans. We are a plague species, and I can't help but wonder if this savage whackiness is a response to subconscious knowledge that we're in deep, deep shit.

A global financial system that could implode at any time, for any number of reasons.

Some serious, not to say mortal, problems facing us as a species: water shortages. Fossil-fuel decline. Environmental pollution. Climate change.

Those who believe in the supernatural are probably getting more and more desperate as reality begins to bite down a little harder every day. They long for the Deus ex Machina to save them. It will never come. And the longer and tighter that string becomes, the weirder and weirder the believers-in-the-supernatural will become.

I heard Hagee on Fresh Air. He is a madman, plain and simple. In a more enlightened society, he would be institutionalized for mental illness...but, then, that's true of most believers-in-the-supernatural. From where I sit, they're ALL mentally-ill.

Mentally-ill people are dangerous. It's not ever a good idea to give them power, of any kind.

Lieberman is nothing more than a contemptible opportunist, he flies wherever the wind blows. I suspect that man has no convictions at all...or, if he has any, they involve the absolute moral rightness of a certain narrow segment of the Israeli power-structure... and a conviction that he wants to keep what he has, and get more..money, power, the usual.

I'm still speechless. This was just a bit of pointless rumination. Thanks for a great piece.

http://thechrismatthewsshow.com/html/transcript/index.php?id=69

July 22, 2007

Mr. GREGORY: I think Hillary Clinton -- her [Sister Souljah] moment is going to be telling the left that they have to sort of move beyond their hatred over Iraq, for Bush, and think about how they're going to engage the war on terror in a very serious and tough way.

- - David Gregory on "The Chris Matthews Show"

The "difference between Israel and the other nations" is, at least ostensibly, a religious reference rather than a geopolitical one. I am no expert on the Jewish faith, but there is an old, widely recited Jewish prayer that says something like this to God: "Blessed are You who has made a distinction between between light and darkness, between sacred and profane, between Israel and the other nations, between the Sabbath and the six working days..."

I may be corrected by a more devoted Jew than myself (that would be most of them), but I believe that in this context, the "nation of Israel" refers to the Jewish people, and not to the nation-state established in 1948, which the phrase pre-dates. The difference between Israel and the other nations is that the Jews are, of course, the Chosen People, selected by the Lord as the earthly recipients of His Truth, and all the other peoples (nations) are not. If you buy into that stuff.

In this instance, however, because the person saying it is Joe Lieberman, it probably means Nuke Iran. Sigh...

on the irony of Mr. Hagee's views being aired on a program called, "Fresh Air"?

If you watched the video- It's a shame Blumenthal wasted his question on that quote from the Bible via Hagee's book. Jews themselves acknowledge and accept this scripture as part of their elevated status as God's People. In trying to trap Hagee into saying something he thought was 'radical', Blumenthal merely exposed himself as a heckler and an outsider. He could have asked him about who in American politics deserves the groups support, or who deserves its ire, or any number of other less obvious things.

Still a good piece, though.

Seriously Serious Business. Lieberman is an American Clown that only wears his red makeup when he is putting on a dog and pony show. The rest of the time he only prefers blue and white.

When Lieberman lost in the 06 primary, all the Dems had to do was announce that, despite being an old friend and comrade, Joe would be stripped of his seniority if he was re-elected as an independent. If the Dems became the majority party, Joe would not hold any chairmanships, nor enjoy voting privileges inside the Democratic caucus room. He would become an outsider to us Dems.

If Dems had followed this simple, honest approach, then Ned Lamont would have won and we wouldn't be begging Lieberman please, oh please, don't become a Republican. Even if Joe did somehow get re-elected, his only leverage to switch (or threaten to switch) to the Republican party would happen during the campaign. After the election there would be no dispute whatsoever that Connecticut voters wanted Joe more than a Dem controlled Senate. That being the case, for Joe to go to the Repubs would merely be fulfilling the will of his constituents.

I follow politics 24/7 but I still don't understand.