Tuesday, November 3, 2009
“If someone would just give Osama bin Laden a hug, all terrorism would end” is apparently the conservatives’ view on liberal international philosophy.
Modern terrorism didn’t start in 2001, 1993 or 1972. It started when America decided to protect the world from itself by constructing and maintaining more than 700 military bases in more than 50 countries (including in Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Bahrain, Israel and Qatar). Blaming individual presidents since WWII is ludicrous, as they have all directly or indirectly contributed to a continuing struggle with terrorism.
If Sept. 11 should have taught our country anything, it’s that morality is subjective. The Sept. 11 attacks were based on al-Qaida’s moral beliefs, not a struggle for national resources or independence. A word such as “evil” is not objective, rational or helpful in understanding the basic global problems.
At what point did people twist survival to equal revenge? Is revenge a conservative notion now and anything less is appeasement — or surrender? We Americans were never completely safe and never will be. We live in an incredibly free society and for that I’m grateful. But the inherent risk to living in a free society is increased danger. If America was a police state, foreign terrorism would not be an issue. But America’s not, so terrorism is.
And finally, if Fox News doesn’t want to be criticized for one-sided tendencies, it shouldn’t have covered the story of its criticism so one-sidedly.
These and other cultural issues aren’t even cases of liberalism versus conservatism; they’re reason versus xenophobia.
— — Nick Adams is a junior from Manhattan.
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Comments
Letter to the Editor: Understanding modern terrorism
Fox News = one sided coverage conservatism =xenophobia
That is the gist of your letter and that is all there is to it. Too bad neither is true. Fox News had been rated in polls and by such people as Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama (in the campaign) as the fairest of the news organizations. So go argue with them. Yes, the U.S. has base around the world and if a government asks to leave then we leave. Ask the Philippines. We are there because the governments still want us there to be the cop on the beat. If the police are attacked in a neighborhood would you make the case that a street gang feels stifled because of their presence? Would you have the police abandon a populace because YOU feel that it is the right thing to do? That is what you advocate. Is defending yourself from a cowardly sucker punch xenophobia is your handbook? I have relatives in Iraq helping to train their police and military to fight terrorism and not to be houseboys. Your view of the world is about 100 years out of date and a little bit tinged with racism. Get modern...
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