 |
 |
Dear Frederick ----- Original Message ----- From: "Frederick Pollack" <[log in to unmask]> To: <[log in to unmask]> Sent: 17 December 2001 17:15 Subject: Re: (no subject) | I'm glad to hear from you again, for there's something I've wanted to | ask you. If that were true, youcould have asked me any time It's about this business about everybody's life being equally | important - not just in the eyes of God, or Universal Values, but yours | or mine. If a friend or family member or even a neighbor of yours were | brutally killed, don't you think you might be slightly more perturbed by | this than by the death of a statistic somewhere? Yes, I think I would be upset; but it is quite irrelevant to my position This is an old red herring. Taking it atface value however - Personal response is one reason we need to be policed and not take matters into our own hands; and why we shouldn't respond personally to attacks which is why, to bring it back from the hypothetical personal to the global, the US should not set itself any higher than first among equals, why we need a world court, why we shouldn't be undermining the UN Acknowledging irrationality does not in anyway sanction it; and to be claiming irrationality as a justification 3 months on is daft | I agree, by the way, that the US - largely by inattention after '89 - | helped to "put the Taliban there." But now they're gone, The US helped put them there and caused a lot of suffering The US has helped get them out and caused a lot of suffering I don't see credit in either action Given it's track record about time the US (and UK) left things alone and with very | little - here it comes - collateral damage. But that's not true. Terrible damage has been done. (& as if quantity were the issue) All that weepy rhetoric on | this list about bombs bombs bombs dropped by us "nutters" - but the | truth is that most of them fell precisely where they should have. I doubt that's true; but given the number of bombs dropped "most of them is not enough" OK, | I've walked right into it - now you have a chance to portray Al-Qaeda as | victims and indulge in yet more transcendent moralism. No, you're doing fine putting words into my mouth L