Lesser Evils

The chief ethical challenge of a war on terror is relatively simple -- to discharge duties to those who have violated their duties to us. Even terrorists, unfortunately, have human rights. We have to respect these because we are fighting a war whose essential prize is preserving the identity of democratic society and preventing it from becoming what terrorists believe it to be. Terrorists seek to provoke us into stripping off the mask of law in order to reveal the black heart of coercion that they believe lurks behind our promises of freedom. We have to show ourselves and the populations whose loyalties we seek that the rule of law is not a mask or an illusion. It is our true nature.
posted by y2karl on May 2, 2004 - 41 comments

Do us all a favor and shut up. You're for the war? Wrote an essay about it? Good, good. Good for you. Guess what? Shut up about it. Thanks. Oh, you're against the war? Fantastic. Wrote a poem about it? Find the nearest closet and tell it to the coats. Yea, that's right. Shut it.
posted by raaka on Feb 19, 2003 - 88 comments

A refreshing read With all the bad news and fear in the air lately, I found this article to be hopeful. I hope that merits a post.
posted by sparky on Feb 18, 2003 - 34 comments

Sprawl is Good Defense "It's a pretty good rule of military thumb that the greater the concentration of value, the more attractive the target... To keep things safe, you need to spread things out." The Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Smithsonian should begin moving their collections out of NYC and Washington,D.C. Now. Talented, intelligent people and people with irreplaceable skills should go next. Re-locate to the Great Plains.
posted by Faze on Dec 14, 2001 - 11 comments

Michel Chossudovsky, Professor of Economics, University of Ottawa: "The main justification for waging this war has been totally fabricated. The American people have been deliberately and consciously misled by their government into supporting a major military adventure which affects our collective future."
posted by arf on Oct 9, 2001 - 29 comments