The Blind and the Lame

President Barack Obama singled out executives from BP Plc, Transocean Ltd. and Halliburton Co. for blaming each other in a “ridiculous spectacle” at congressional hearings on the oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico.

There is a metaphor is the Torah which describes the connection between the head and body as two men hired by the owner of rare orchard to watch over his crop; to make sure the men would not steal he hired a blind man and a crippled man thinking their disabilities would keep the watchers themselves from partaking of the fruit.

The blind man could not see but the crippled man told him about the fruit and how precious it was and how good it must taste. Finally overcome by desire the two man hatched a plan. The blind man would carry the crippled man who would in turn would direct the blind man.

When the master returned to the orchard he saw that his crops had been tampered with; he asked the watchers–the crippled said, I could not have done it because I can not walk and the blind man said he could not have done it because he was blind. The master put cripple on top of the blind man and whipped them as one.

Not to covet your neighbors property is fundamental to the Torah. The human being of the earth and the earth is of us all.