The New Road

What is wrong with that? What is wrong with shifting the focus from military to civilian humanitarian efforts? Especially when the military presence is what ires the activists in those particular Muslim countries? Indonesia required us to move our battleships further away from their coast - they don't want military there. We're not discontinuing the aid by any stretch - just the military aid.

Wasn't it nice when we could actually have troops in Muslim countries long term? When our troops were actually respected by all sides? When was that? Oh, yeah, in the Clinton era and before. In places like Yugoslavia which has three different large religious factions, including Islam, and somehow we managed to pacify it. I wonder with that was. Perhaps it was because Clinton was fair and honest with every side.

They say that tone is set at the top and it certainly is with the Commander-in-Chief. Now we have a fascist dictator who believes he is the right hand of God, is on a Christian crusade, and who's supporters believe that they are "morally superior to a huge sect in that part of the world".

Now we have forces that use torture routinely. The House even ratified W's consent by removing the torture ban before they signed the bill.

Yeah, I can see why our forces are unwelcome now. Because the entire anti-Islam focus of the administration threatens them directly.

We even have religious leaders in this country who have said that the Tsunami was a good thing. It was God's wrath against the Islamic heathen.

It's probably better that the military is pulling out. With a rational government the relief effort could have used their help. But with the extremist policies of W staining the military and our government with the blood of innocent Muslims from around the world we will have trouble operating anywhere but the most Christian of countries.

No big deal though. We can take those troops and put them into Iraq and get ready for the next big push into Iran or Syria.

Am I wrong about being morally superior to Zarqawi?

I don't know if your statement applies to Zarqawi. Your statement was "morally superior to a huge sect in that part of the world". Would you like to clarify which "huge sect" you are talking about, and in which "part of the world". And in particular what it means to you to be "morally superior".

For a statement that sounds very strong it is extremely vague.

My statement, if I remember correctly, was shortly after the first beheading. I was intentionally vague so that when an example presented himself, I could throw him into the group.

Anyone who believes that decapitation is a good form of protest is part of the sect. Anyone who bands together to hold hostages in a movie theater or a public school (Beslan) belongs to the sect. Anyone who believes the answer to his problem is the destruction of the entire state of Israel and will martyr himself, killing innocent men, women, children along with military targets belongs to the sect I'm referring to. Anyone who, as part of a larger group or movement, believes that the right thing to do is to smuggle box cutters onto major airliners and kill passengers with them and then fly those hijacked airliners into skyscrapers to make their point (which resonated through the rest of the sect) belongs to the group I was talking about. Anyone who rejoices when the above examples happen also belongs to the sect.

There is also a radical Islamic movement inside Saudi Arabia that teaches children from the time they are tiny to hate the west. Those kids, as they grow up, could become part of the sect.

It is not country-specific. And to blanket all of Islam with a label would be as wrong as labeling all Christians as David Koresh followers. However, extremist Islamic radicals are the ones making these moves. Whatever motivation they have, and they differ, they are using barbaric tactics to try to make effective points. The thoughts themselves aren't the crime. The movement isn't the crime. The action is.

By saying that I feel I am morally superior to them, I am saying that human beings are not equivalent to cockroaches to be exterminated. Those people don't value human life. Part of their souls are gone. To be that far-removed from God, to not be able to equate themselves with other human beings and their suffering, they are morally deficient. That specific part of my morality is intact.

In the past you stated:

I think they should be destroyed, not just to make an example for the rest of them, but because they have no right to exist and their ideas should be crushed.

In regards to a similar group of people. A hypothetical question for you. Is your belief in your statements so strong that were you to have a hypothetical switch to kill all of these people in an instant. Would you throw the switch and kill all of the people that you include in your 'sect'?

Only in self defense.

So the 9/11 hijackers were on the list. We were hit and now we are at war. Aren't we on both defense and offense right now? And if so, would you press the button right now?

If you could postively id the 9/11 hijackers (if they were still alive), Zarqawi, the four or five hooded men standing next to him in those awful videos, and every member of the hijacking team that went into the Beslan school, yes, I could push that button.

I put a lot of thought and tears into this issue after our friend Andrew was killed in Miami. I could be the executioner in his murderer's case, too, if he hadn't gotten life in prison.

As to the current war, it is the military's job to fight it. No one has asked me to fight it. And I have never volunteered to. I admire and respect those who do.

It seems that as we get closer your your tough rhetoric:

morally superior to a huge sect in that part of the world

Anyone who rejoices when the above examples happen also belongs to the sect.

I think they should be destroyed, not just to make an example for the rest of them, but because they have no right to exist and their ideas should be crushed.

Actually being implemented. These people being destroyed. Your interest in acting on that rhetoric seems to be limited.

As we get closer to you yourself pulling the trigger the group of people keeps getting smaller and smaller.

What does the rhetoric mean if you aren't willing to stand behind it?

Ok. What I should say at this point is that I agree the substantive portions of your last statement. Which is to say that the people responsible for 9/11 and Zarqawi, the headcutters, and the Beslan killers, should be prosecuted to the maximum extent of our law. Where that means death penalties in some places and life imprisonment in others. I agree with that. You and I have found a place where we agree on something.

The reason I push you about the other stuff, the:

...morally superior to a huge sect in that part of the world...

I think they should be destroyed, not just to make an example for the rest of them, but because they have no right to exist and their ideas should be crushed.

Is that this isn't the Jacqueline I know. These are words of genocide. The willful intention to kill millions, guilty of crimes or innocent, men, women and children. Frankly, they scare me, and that's not posturing.

I just want you to know that. That at the core we agree. These acts are wrong, evil, and they people who commit them should be punished harshly. But these other genocidal things you say outside of that scare me, and others.