Faith and Truth

Faith without basis is not faith at all. It's called capitulation to the dark forces of the distant, distinct past when Man barely learned about bipedalism. Faith must be based on sound facts and solid reasoning, not on wishful thinking. There are two types of people: one relies on soothing, unsubstantiated fairy tales as a crutch to cope with the terrors of living. The other, somehow always in the minority, makes full use of their faculty of ressoning, looks at life squarely and tackles all of its problems by their own efforts without going through the farce of prayers and invocations of a fictional being.

Recent postulation was made concerning the surviving communist regimes in China, Vietnam, North Korea, and Cuba that they are wily and stubborn and that they would not voluntarily institute reforms to head off the kind of revolts and uprisings which are raging across Norrh Africa and the Middle East. While this reasoning had some merit, it wasnot irrefutable because nothing is impossible and beyond reach as far as human affairs are concerned. That's the beauty of being human. We are not merely physical objects which are subject to immutable physical laws. We are beings with free will. Once we are determined to bring changes no matter what the costs are, changes will occur. Until 1989, nobody would imagine the Soviet Union would swiftly disintegrate and Eastern European states would become democratic societies in our life time. Humans are beings of momentum and imitation. Revolutionary winds of change are blowing across North Africa and the Middle East. If Saudi Arabia undergoes a regime change, after Bahrain and Yemen, the winds of change will reach China and Vietnam. The fates of Vietnam and China are intertwined. It is inconceivable that a regime change in Vietnam takes place without having a similar process in China, and vice versa. For the sake of our country, we prefer the change takes place in China first in order to minimize the loss of lives and properties in Vietnam. In the mean time, we must be ready for the change and use it to propel our country to much needed progress and modernity, and not for internal squabbling for the spoils of power. Vietnam and the Vietnamese people have to be above all parties and individuals.

Wissai