War

WAR

Thurs. Aug. 20th, 2014, Wed. Feb. 18th, 2015; posted Wed. July 8th, 2015

During peace, people learn life lessons very, very slowly.  During war, people learn life lessons very, very quickly, but on the other hand, a lot more people die young.

The reason I am in favor of peace is that I want to have time to think.

As a romantic liberal, which I am, I believe that even people who are not very good at thinking and don't care for thinking deserve a chance to think -- and the rest of us, a fortiori.

Have you ever thought to yourself, a military recruiter might look at a person and say, "That person evidently doesn't like to think, so there certainly wouldn't be any harm in asking them to agree to put themselves in harm's way, and in worse case scenario to die for their country" ?

Well, as I say, I believe that even people who don't like to think deserve a chance to think.

It is unrealistic to think that our species can eliminate war.  But on the other hand, it is not unrealistic to think that we can make wars less common if we put our minds and our hearts into the task.

There is usually no way to measure whether a war has been postponed by taking a particular course of action.  I walk by faith in this matter.  I can't prove to anybody's satisfaction that a certain course of political action has postponed the next war; but I believe that certain things the United States is doing, or could be doing, will postpone the next war.  That's a criterion which I bring into play, when I figure whether I'm in favor of a particular foreign policy.