Tag Archives: terrorism

Living in Fear

by

Selling fear is pathetic. Anyone who wants to frighten you into supporting something or who believes that the big stick of American power needs to be brandished regularly to make people afraid, is not worthy of your support. Our leaders should be judicious. Rulers and nations that lead through fear fail. That’s why you should support the closing of Guantanamo and the wisdom of former American military leaders who recognize, as President Obama does, that Guantanamo doesn’t keep America safe. It is a symbol of the degradation of our democracy, of fear, and of failed politicians.

Trying terrorists like criminals and imprisoning them in American prisons does them no favors.

Our National 9/11 Schizophrenia?

by

In his usual black/white arguments, Victor Davis Hanson imagines that safety from terrorism cannot be achieved unless our society ratifies the doctrines of the Bush administration and continues them. Our National 9/11 Schizophrenia by Victor Davis Hanson on National Review Online. The schizophrenia is his, not ours. One need not embrace all of George W. Bush’s policies or abandon them; one need not take them in their totality or abandon them altogether. One need not seethe world in black and white. We can have a world with shades of gray, policy complexity; we can have safety with values. We can disavow torture and preserve public safety. We can seek to work with Iran without abandoning Israel. We can confront terrorism without going to war and without deceiving the public.

None of these binaries–choose torture or insecurity; choose to with an enemy or abandon a friend; choose to fight terrorism or tell the the truth–are real. They are imagined by Victor Davis Hanson and those who want to politicize national security.

We can honor civil liberties and fight terrorism, and indeed we must do both, or we will have already been defeated by the terrorists.