Israel enters Lebanon

[Preechr]

Ziggy, I understand your frustration with having this discussion in this format. If you truly want to feel better about what's happening, since you are resigned to it being while hoping for the best, I can help you with that. Abcxxx and Kevin could probably help as well in that regard if they chose to.

I feel that sort of willingness to compromise on personal if not political lines is tragically missing in American discussion these days, at least or maybe especially on message boards. I'm not sure it ever existed on message boards, actually...

In our personal lives, we can peacefully co-exist among those we might entirely disagree with, never crossing polite borders. Maybe the basic nature of the internet, or at least our slow progress in instilling normal society's polite borders on it, precludes that civility among those that disagree which leads to peace.

I'd love to try to help you feel better about the war on all it's fronts. First, I'd like to establish where you are in that process already. You mentioned feeling that those that were in favor of the war were either fighting it personally or cheering for those that are. You also seem to believe the warrior spirit driving the soldiers of the more developed nations in the conflict roots from some sort of primitive bloodlust and unwillingness to seek means that don't involve carpet-bombing.

I'm a fan of the War on Terror itself. I am neither a soldier nor a military fanboy. I respect the military for it's proven integrity and I love our soldiers for the risks they take knowingly in honor of that integrity. I almost signed up twice, but I'm not a person that will kill someone, so I'm not good soldier material. The author of that book I suggested to Geggy and Courage believes our military force will soon split into two distinct forces with very different missions: one to kill things and break stuff and one to do what UN troops and NATO troops have so unfailingly always failed at: restore, build and keep peace.

I might be the type of guy to join up for that second force, but I'm a thirty-something now...

Either way, you want to feel better about the war? Start with trying to understand it on the largest level and abandon your studies of who the people are that are for it. Think of the war as a machine, with input and a product. Where do you hope this is going? To what end is all this mess? Try to imagine that you and everyone else in the modern world has desires for one of two possible products from this machine's work, yet among the individual's comprising either faction there is merely some disagreement on the layout of the various gears and levers and whatnot.

You exist among we of the modern world, and we all comprise about 2/3's of the population of the Earth. The other third of the population that is not counted among us in 2006 lives in a version of our 1806, or so. There are two similar factions among those people, just as in our group, that desire one or the other of the same two possible products of our machine for different reasons than our own, and the individuals comprising those factions also disagree among themselves on methodology and strategy.

One of the possible products of this war machine is a world united in the modern world's notion of freedom to live one's life however one chooses. In our modern world, we have established a society that universally condemns violence as a means to an end. Our common goal is to reach that golden plateau where peaceful means are all anyone ever uses to achieve her goals, whatever they may be. Right?

The only other possible product of this war machine is the world we have now or one where peaceful means are on the decline.

In both the modern world and the smaller, disconnected one there are those that want one or the other. "Terrorists" are included among the latter, where we all exist among the former. None of us here wish for a more violent world or a world where violent means are acceptable. All of us live in that violent world, however. Some of us are trying to change that. Some don't understand what's going on. Some are trying to do the right things for the wrong reasons. Some are actively resisting that change for whatever reason... some good and some bad.

Think of the War on Terror as a War on Violent Means. It is a "kinder, gentler war." I believe we stand a fantastic chance of winning it. Whose side do you believe the American government is on? How about the French? Tony Blair? Kevin? You? I know I am all for a war that promises an end to war, and I believe this is it.

I believe the enemy in this war is comprised of those that wish to keep one-third of our world's population in the dark for their own selfish benefit. These are the dictators. The Slave Lords. That they have co-opted Theocracy as their means to their end is just a tactic. That they have seated Muhammed at their throne just a matter of convenience, for their motivations are, by my moral standards, the furthest thing from holy.

I have no problem with Islam, nor any other religion. I personally do not subscribe to any faith, but I support the practice as a generally healthy excercise for people who wish to partake. I am spiritual myself, and I find it valuable. I think it's a good thing for me and anybody else to believe as they see fit, as long as it's a positive thing.

I just don't believe that violence is acceptable, even for religious reasons. As long as it is useful, however, it must always be met with at least the credible threat of a greater violence, if not it's force, as a deterrent or a means of punishment. As long as there are humans, I believe, sadly, there will be violent tendancies. If the threat of a greater violence can be made to overwhelm those tendancies, I suppose I would be happy to live under that threat as long as everyone else does and violence ceases to exist as a functional reality brought to bear intentionally by one human being upon another for whatever reason.

They say good fences make good neighbors, and the entire world is currently involved in a dispute over the global property line. This dispute will not be settled in a good way by pretending there is anything less at stake than World Peace and Global Freedom. We were born free, and we have always lived free. We have no idea of what it is like to live in any other state of being. To be un-free is to be subject to violence at the whim of another with no remedy.

No human being, in my mind, deserves to live like that unless as part of an appropriate punishment for violating the moral precepts that support our modern, free society. There are many that, whether they frame the war in this context or not, will agree with me on this. There are a number of people on this planet, at this time, that disagree with me in this regard. They are seeking to rope off the portion of the world not currently connected to our modern, free civilization, hoping to keep their third of the world enslaved by whatever means necessary. We call those people terrorists, dictators, despots and most commonly: enemies.

I'll ask you to consider again: Which side of this war is Israel on? How about America? Iran? Saddam Hussein? George Bush? Rummy? How about Michael Moore? Ben Afleck?

Ok... maybe that's taking this a bit too far for now...

Hope I've a helped at least a little...