ck: In Eric's terms, though, the war is justified
as retalitation for 9/11--"blood lust," or, to
recall a familiar, stupid refrain from that time,
"We've got to do SOMETHING!" No, we did not.
Disagree. We did have to do something...years
before 9/11. It didn't have to be Iraq.
Retaliation doesn't merely mean punishment. Not
merely blind brute punishment. Threat of
retaliation serves as a coercive means to maintain
order. Effective retaliation eliminates an enemy's
potential for future attacks. That we didn't
effectively counter Bin Laden much earlier...made
the 9/11 attacks possible.
But forget retaliation. If Clinton and Sandy
Berger had even realized Bin Laden's significance
in 1996, the Sudanese would have allowed us to
extradite him. Again, we did have to do
something...and our current situation derives from
Clinton's prior failure to act combined with the
Bushistas' various mistakes.
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