My quote for today is, "There is so much good in the worst of us, and so much bad in the best of us, that it ill behooves any of us to find fault with the rest of us." - James Truslow Adams. I have a friend who is a Vietnam veteran, an infantryman. He refuses to discuss his experiences. His services was honorable, and he is often thanked for it, as he should be. Yet, he undoubtedly saw or did things about which he is not proud, nor feels he deserves thanks. That is the essence of war. War reflects life, only magnified to extreme. We ALL do things about which we are hardly proud. We all do things which are honorable. No one believes they fight for the wrong side, it is our restraint and compassion in the face of ugliness which defines us, not our willingness to be brutal "when needed." We all have the capacity for both. When we carve the world up into the "good" guys and "bad" guys, we fail to understand the fundamental humanity of each of us. We also fail to grasp that solutions which demonize our opponents are virtually certain to be unjust, and being unjust, fail.
No one is excusing the acts of the likes of members of Al Qaeda here by this comment, but that also suggests the following; if you are willing to kill and maim to "hold onto" your guns, or whatever extremism you favor, if that extremism is other than protecting your life and liberty, then you are hardly different than the "bad" guy you supposedly are going to "stand up to." A law-breaking thug once said, "Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice" to excuse his breaking into a political headquarters to steal details about the opposition. He was hardly protecting his personal liberty, at best his thinking was the actual slippery slope so many extremists fear, excusing anything at all in the name of "liberty", without judging the sanity of the act. In fact self-rationalization thinking which justifyies more and more viscious acts is inexorable, self-perpetuating, and it sure as hell is a vice.
