Posted by
JDComments on Tuesday, October 10, 2006 12:35:03 PM
In considering all the handwringing and analysis going on in the MainStream Media and, truth be told, both political parties, regarding the situations in Iran and North Korea, it behooves us to take a step back, catch our breath, and try to put things in perspective. As much as the Liberals would have us "see the world through the other man's eyes" [the entire philosophy of multiculturalism], what actually happens is that they project our beliefs onto them, and thus empathize with their views [which cannot be that different from ours, since they actually ARE ours], and thus we paralyze ourselves in trying to defuse an international situation. I see this as a kind of international Stockholm Syndrome, where our will to resist is overcome by a creeping identification with the Other caused by our failure to understand exactly what the Other represents. Sometimes it is as obvious as a Hitler, who very thoughtfully laid out his entire program in Mein Kampf which was written in the 1920's, and then the world stood by shocked as he implemented it, while refusing to abide by the conventions and niceties of Western civilization [to the utter amazement of Chamberlain, who really believed he could negotiate with Hitler]. What sane man, knowing what we know today, wouldn't put an end to Hitler in the 1920's? My fear is that the same thing will be said sometime in the future regarding the threats facing us, unless we act in a decisive, and perhaps military manner, soon. Let's take the Iranians and North Koreans at their words, which are ,and there is no better word for it, EVIL, and act upon that, and stop trying to project our reaonableness and regard for life onto two regimes which give no indication of caring about either. Jean-François Revel , the recently deceased French philosopher, wrote a book titled "Why Democracies Perish", and in truth it is not because we become weak in the face of danger, but rather because we fail to recognize danger because it is so alien to our principles and values. Sometimes the world really is drawn in black and white, and refusing to see that is indicative of a mental dysfunction which can only result in catastrophe. Nero may have fiddled while Rome burned, but we refuse to even see the flames.