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January 06, 2005
Moral depravity watch
It was one of those moments when you realize the person you are listening to ... the person who is mouthing words you recognize, in strings you take to be sentences, in a soothing, moderate tone that conveys soberness and reason ... is saying something so morally depraved you cease to recognize the person as a reasoning human being.
Yesterday I had been trying to get a handle on all the topics I wished to visit and write about over the next several days. An idea here, a few paragraphs there, I'd been engaged in a running interior commentary most of the day as I went about the more mundane chores of doing my job. Running errands at lunchtime I had the car radio tuned to the Michael Medved show (which runs locally for me on AM870 KRLA). His guests were David Horowitz (Unholy Alliance) and David Lazar* (identified as a contributor to The Nation). The discussion at first centered on Horowitz's new book and Lazar's objections to The Left being broad brushed by Horowitz as "anti-American" just because they criticized American foreign policy. Mr. Medved is not only a excellent interviewer, but he is a competent moderator, too. He allowed each man to speak, kept them on track and from time-to-time added his own questions in order to clarify a point. It was quick and lively, but I wasn't really hearing anything I haven't heard before -- Horowitz pointing out the extreme, radical Left bona fides of the movers and shakers of the so-called "peace" movement and Lazar poo-pooing the relevancy of such ties as modern McCarthy-style "red-baiting."
Then came a moment that almost had me driving off the road; a statement from Lazar that even took Medved by surprise. (**and I paraphrase as best I can since KRLA is not looping its broadcasts as it used to do). Lazar stated that he was fully behind the Fallujah "insurgents". In fact, he compared them to the French resistance against the Nazis.
Medved, up against a break, asked him if he really wanted to make that comparison and told Lazar that he'd give him the break to think about it. However, yes, after the break Lazar was adament.
**Those fighting against the American's in Fallujah are like the French resistence against the Nazis. Yes, they are different. The French resistance were Communists and the Iraqi's are Islamic, but they are both fighting against invaders. They have every right to fight against those that invade and occupy their country.""Occupation" is a morally neutral word, as is table, chair, push, pull, enter, exit. Context is what conveys the morality/immorality of an instance. To do, as Lazar attempts, to give a specific morality to an action devoid of context is to actually turn morality on its head. Morality demands judgment. It requires people to evaluate, to think. The absolutist reductionism of a list of things deemed moral or immoral is the abdication of reasoning.
This is akin to saying there is no moral distinction between love making and rape because both involve sexual intercourse (or pronouncing all sexual intercourse either evil or good, regardless of context).
However, Lazar's moral pronouncement on Fallujah is more insidious than just a fanatical view of morality. Not only did he equate the terrorists of Fallujah with the French resistance, but he draws the parallel between Nazis and the US military. It is the tired Bu$Hitler mantra of The LEft given new life. He posits "occupation = evil, resistance = good" and then falls to the favored example of an evil context to slam and denigrate any other instance of such activity regardless of context. Lazar uses the USA = Nazi comparison in order to excuse his moral support of the terrorists in Fallujah, while a better comparison of "occupations" would have been the instance of American occupation of Germany after Hitler's defeat. Thusly:
Occupation of France by Nazis was, indeed, evil.
Occupation of Germany by Americans was, indeed, good.
Resistance of French citizens towards Nazis, good.
Resistance of German citizens (see werewolves) towards Americans, evil.
Of course, the context of American occupation where a mass-murdering dictator is ousted and the reins of government are turned over to the citizens of the country that were disenfranchised by such dictator cannot be allowed to be deemed "good". America never intentionally does "good." Ever. "Yes, defeating Hitler/Hirohito/Saddam was good, but ..."
The Left is anti-American, anti-Israeli, and basically has a lot of problems with individual liberty granted to individuals who do not worship at its altar. This is why the American cultural abberation of Abu Gharib animates them while the Jihadist cultural norm of beheading civilians does not.
Far from Lazar's purpose for appearing on the Medved show to argue that Horowitz's tome about contemporary Leftists is nothing more than unsubstantiated hyperbole, Lazar convicts himself out of his own mouth of the basic moral depravity that dominates the Leftist worldview and its philosophical odds with Western Civilization and Western Civ's classical liberal foundations.
This is the challenge to sincere and dedicated American liberals and Democrats. The time is past to purge the Leftists (such as MoveOn, which declared they "owned" the Democratic Party) from your midst.
*re: David Lazar. I'm not sure I'm spelling his name correctly as I couldn't find a collection of his articles on the internet and KRLA has taken down their show loops. If someone is more familiar with this man's writings, please do email me and I will make the appropriate corrections and updates.
Posted by Darleen at January 6, 2005 12:15 PM