Farewell to the Middle East – Back in the U.S.A.!

…or so the song goes. And how happy we are to be back in the good ol’ USA. Where we complain about how bad it is, over coffee, at the supermarket, in our boardrooms, the public square, in our newspapers and on our T.V. waves.

And that’s the point! We can complain, without looking over our shoulders, or winding up in the town square minus our heads or our hands. We are accused of being arrogant and imposing our views on others (we had that voiced to us often). We can be arrogant and we do impose our views, sometimes wrongly. We’re going to ask you to stay tuned because we will be telling you more about our Middle East journey. Because folks, “at the end of the day,” based on what we heard, saw and experienced, we feel humbled by it all, not the least bit arrogant. And grateful for the country we live in, where we can say what’s on our mind, follow our values, and the dictates of our conscience. You can’t do that in many of the areas we went to.

It’s ironic that with the security checkpoints we went through, we still managed to catch our connections most of the time. Phil had major delays in Tel Aviv, was quizzed by several people, all of his luggage, cameras, papers checked, and during this a bomb scare came in and Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv was evacuated. He did catch his flight to London; caught his London to Chicago flight and would you believe missed his Chicago to Dallas connection because he could not transfer all of his equipment from customs through to Dallas.

Dennis (who left 6 days before me [Niki]) had a walk in the park. Nothing checked, no questions, on you go.

I left from Istanbul (Turkish Airlines was 75 minutes late), arrived at JFK, New York, got through customs, ran for my Dallas connection with little time to spare and smack into a security checkpoint!

Deja vu all over again. New York security checked and rechecked my carry-on, pulled me out of line, asked some questions, patted me down, and you guessed it – I missed my Dallas connection by minutes. American Airlines left the gate early. Turkish Airlines was obligated to put me up at a hotel. They did, a one star, near La Guardia Airport – where I was leaving from the next morning. So, we started the trip at the Hotel Palestine in Baghdad – protected by American forces, in a one star hotel (Phil’s rating) and it ended with one of us in a one star hotel, in a tough, tough neighborhood in Corona Queens, New York, feeling more unsafe than ever, (with no American forces in sight).

Still glad to be back “on the ground”. What we have learned we’re going to share. Our thinking has changed somewhat; and we are all changed more than somewhat by our experiences, the incredible people we met and their stories.

There are many people to thank for making this learning adventure happen.

First and foremost for the funding and the moral support and sense of purpose they gave us: The Hatton W. Sumners Foundation for the Study & Teaching of Self Government, Inc., its trustees and executive director Hugh Akin. Their support will shape this project into the programs and documentaries and stories where you’ll meet who we talked to and who impacted our thinking and challenged us to look below the obvious.

• Phil Smith of Phil Smith Productions, our cameraman, confidante and sidekick.
  Mark Head (F.R.T. Chairman’s Council member) quarterbacked the web site, www.frtv.org.
• Kevin Carr of Internet Strategies (and his able staff) designed the site and put our ramblings from the Middle East on it.
• Mary Handley and Liz Austin for holding down the fort.
• Our F.R.T. board: Cary Clayborn, Ralph Cousins, H. Martin Gibson, William Gordon and
• Lynn Vogt who backed us and the project; and wished us Godspeed.
• F.R.T. Chairman’s Council members who are helping us with continued research and reading: Kathleen Berry, Jim Falk, Paul Pederson, Dr. Rhonda Porterfield and Dick Sartain.
• Brenda Pejovich, who hosted our bon voyage reception.
• Darab Ganji of Petro-Hunt who helped us with Saudi Arabia.
• Congressman Jeb Hensarling and his assistant Barbara Johnson who opened Iraq for us.
• Joel Brooks with the American Jewish Congress in Dallas, who introduced us to his Israeli counterpart, Danny Grossman.
• Danny Grossman for his extraordinary help in Israel and Leila Deeb from Jordan and
• Mohammad Najib – Palestine for opening doors in Palestine.
• Ahmad Sbaiti (F.R.T. Chairman’s Council member) whose nephew, Tarek, helped us in Lebanon. Ahmad has challenged us on these issues for years. He asked us to keep an open mind. We did.
• Jim Falk with the World Affairs Council-Dallas, and Dr. Jerry Leach, World Affairs Council-Washington, DC who gave us contacts and encouragement.
• Leslie Oschmann opened the doors in Turkey.
• Ambassador James Oberwetter (Dallas’ own) U.S. Ambassador to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and his capable staff who were invaluable in Saudi.
• Mark Schooler (our Dallas friend and great insurance agent) who put us in touch with Sam Whitfield at CPA in Iraq.
• In Iraq, Don Ritchie of Custer’s Battle Security challenged us with “Maybe we want it more for them than they do (for themselves).” He kept us out of harm’s way during Baghdad’s “fireworks”, the 1st anniversary of the fall of Baghdad.

The list goes on. We’ve missed some. You’ll hear more about those we missed thanking. It’s not intentional, just overload. We’re deeply grateful for everyone who has helped us, supported us and prayed for us – you know who you are.

You’ll hear and see more from us. Thank you for being here …”As always, we’ve been talking about things that matter, with people who care.”

Dennis and Niki

P.S. If you’ve missed any reports and photos you can always go back to The Roots of War website.