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Very well put. Thank you. I have noted in recent years how the liberal/left is professing to be "shocked and appalled" by more and more of public life and public debate, much like old Victorian spinsters. Victorian spinsters weren't big on democracy either.
I think you got all that just about right Paul. The equanimity with which he received the affirmative action decision is disappointing to point of making me dispirited. And if he screamed in protest at Laurence vs. Texas, I missed it.
Egad, what gutter talk. I'm shocked ! Shocked !
Seriously fellas, can you honestly say you would support a President Clinton saying "bring em on" in this contect ?
But Clinton didn't say -- nor would he ever say something like it. He was a different man and a different president. A counterfactual like that hardly illuminates anything for us, I don't think.
You're right, it's too much of a stretch. How about Howard Dean ? That's not so out there.
I'm accusing you of playing favorites.
My point is that there is a threshold of esteem in the speaker required to accept a statement like this. You have it in Bush due to a general ideological agreement (though I get he is too much a commie for this crowd), I don't, and he offers precious few other reasons for respect (Unlike say his father, who served in combat and had a long record of public service).
I also have a problem with your (Paul) acribing of "Honor" and peripherally "godly"ness to a schoolboy's taunt. You are right that it's speaking the language of the "Arab street" which is often the antithesis of Honor, it's flesh, it's lust, it's revenge. Call it human, call it manly but calling it "godly" ain't right.
The honor element lies in the instinct or inclination to speak out defiantly about those under one's command; to take a certain offense at teh suggestion, however vague, that they are ill-prepared, etc.
A police officer is murdered by a local street gang or mob to send a message about too-aggressive policemen; the captain goes on air and snarls "bring it on." Is this a "schoolboy's" taunt? Maybe, but only in the sense that a child reflects human things too.
You're right. "Godly" is not the right word; honor can unquestionably be a profoundly unchristian thing. I removed that word from the TechCentralStation version of this essay
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