The Berkeley Daily Planet

Wednesday
February 23, 2011






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Letters to the Editor


Sunday February 20, 2011


Global Warming; Book Vans: Mental Illness; The Role of Aladdin? In response to your op-ed re: the Berkeley Public Library; In Response to the Letters about the Libraries






The Role of Aladdin?

How does Gaddafi fit the role of Aladdin? Gaddafi himself was a poor little Arab boy born in a tent, the son of a nomadic camel trader who roamed the poverty-stricken desert throughout most of his childhood. Significantly enough, he did his early studies by the light of an old Arab oil lamp. In his early teens, he became active in political demonstrations in favour of Egypt's Nasser, procuring the necessary materials for his flags, banners and slogans by personally provisioning them from different merchants, and was often harassed by his enemies

At the youthful age of only 27 in 1969, He led a successful revolution of the poor as a young army officer, ousted Libya's corrupt monarchy and became her new head of state. He also promptly ousted the foreign scientific magicians, who had helped discover Libya's lamp of oil far beneath the sands of her desert, and began rubbing that lamp vigorously to produce its black gold and force its powerful genie of foreign oil companies to pay him more than double their former prices, from one billion dollars in his first year of 1969 to over two billion in 1971 and approximately three billion in '73, amassing the largest gold reserves in the Arab world, and giving him a distinct place of leadership amongst its one hundred million Arabs, second only to that of Egypt!

He used the Magic Genie of its power to accrue more wealth and power for both Libya and himself, although the Western magicians would certainly like to bury him alive if they could! But he himself seems to wear some uncanny ring of spiritual authority which causes him to lead a nearly charmed life in opposition to his enemies. To their disgruntled and frustrated chagrin, he keeps gleefully rubbing his new magic lamp and producing its black genie of oil which has now brought him so much wealth and power.

Ted Rudow III, MA