At this moment, I would be truly remiss if I didn’t say a few words about Paris.
Paris is a place I love, a place the world loves. It is the cultural, artistic and intellectual capital of the civilized world. It is a place to see the world’s greatest art, opera and dance. It is a place to sit for hours and talk. It is a place to read and learn, to wrestle with serious ideas, to meet people of widely varying cultures and philosophies. That’s one side of the city.
Paris is also a place to eat, drink and be merry. Coffee and croissant at a sidewalk cafe. Red wine and conversation with a lover. Cassoulet at a small neighborhood place filled with people speaking all the languages of all the peoples of the earth.
I knew about Paris long before I ever visited; it felt excitingly familiar the second I landed. Comfortable yet challenging. Classical yet avant garde. Friendly yet thrilling.
I don’t understand the cowards who would want to destroy Paris and I don’t want to. I loathe the people who did this; I despise them. They are beneath my effort to understand them; as I would not expend one ounce of energy in trying to understand the thoughts of an ass.
My hope today: may the infantile, insignificant and ignorant asses who make up the ranks of ISIS die in the vile agony of their own making.
They have accomplished nothing by killing people in Paris, the world’s city of light. Unlike their petty and juvenile “movement”, the beauty of Paris will live on forever.
Speaking Plainly 