Dan, I agree with your post, and I appreciate the clarity with which you expressed yourself. I believe there are a lot of us on the Mudcat who approve of the current efforts to destroy bin Laden, al Qaeda and the Taliban, even as we recognize that we should question our own role with respect to trouble spots and less fortunate countries around the world, and redouble our efforts to alleviate the world's suffering where it is in our power to do so.

There is an organization allied with a more-or-less established government that has specficially, and repeatedly, pledged to destroy the US, and that has recently shown itself to have the willingness and capability to bring mass death and destruction to the US. They declared war against us, in a most unambiguous fashion, and we are responding as we must. One need does not negate the other -- we need to stop bin Laden and his partners in crime, AND we need to search for better ways to help foster justice and equality in the world. But if we don't do the former, we won't have the opportunity to do the latter.

Larry, in response to your statement ("One observation here: You are either willing to see yourself in another human being...or you are not. If you are not, then you can easily justify killing him, torturing him, executing him, and making war upon him."), I CAN see myself in other human beings, even those like bin Laden and his cohorts who have committed unspeakable acts against my country. I can see myself in the soldiers of Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, and other countries present and past; I'm not proud of it, but I recognize that we share a common humanity and that, in other circumstances, I might be driven to do what they are doing. And yet, I can easily justify going to war against them, and doing all the horrible things necessary to try to win. I believe that they are wrong and I am right in this struggle, and I believe that their stated intention and demonstrated capability) to kill me and my countrymen is all the justification I need. Going to war does not prevent me from thinking about root causes, and thinking about root causes does not prevent me from going to war. We do what we must, and we try to create a better world once the shooting stops.