Quote:
Originally posted by Sidd Finch
But the "guy beating up the little kid" analogy is more than a little strained. So you cross the street to stop the guy -- any decent person would. But then what? Do you keep the kid in your house, and prevent the guy from getting him back? Do you shoot the guy in the head and tell the kid to elect new parents?
|
Exactly what we're doing. Crazed beater is still trying to get at the kid. We've got troops there to stop him, and, if it comes down to it, they'll shoot him. His choice. - he can stop, or die.
Quote:
|
But I would still view it as a mistake, given the distance between the goal we have accomplished and the costs we have incurred. We had already stopped the guy from beating up the kid -- through no-fly zones and crippling of the military. But we went a whole lot further than that, deciding that we should in fact bring the kid over to our house to live with us, until he could choose new parents, while fighting off his relatives.
|
The no-fly zone and sanctions were a joke - thank the UN for that, I guess. The kid was still getting creamed. How far in stopping the beating is too far? Once it involves pain and effort on our part? And I think you overstate - the Baathist thugs are still the small minority, not the whole extended family. You make it sound like we're fighting the bulk of society to save one deviant kid. We're not - it was the Baathists who were, and are, the deviant minority.
Quote:
|
Maybe you feel this was worth it -- fine. But you seem not even to acknowledge the cost -- 2000 American lives and counting, how many thousands of innocent Iraqi lives we don't know, etc. And yes, maybe you can justify those deaths because of the benefits a democracy would bring Iraq, if we actually get to see one -- but isn't that simply taking the "the benefit to the many is more important that the costs to the one" view that you claim to hate so much?
|
No. It's serving my overall values that hold that convincing the world that being a dictator/thug/murderer is a dead end make life for all, and thus for me, much better in the long run. Walking away from murderers is easy for me right now - until later, when someone surmises that they can do such things with impunity. I want them to quiver with fear every time they contemplate genocide. Only then will I feel safe from it. It's all about ME!
