Whatever happened to right and wrong?

Whatever happened to those old fashioned ideas of right and wrong? I realize there are times when there are legitimate differences of opinion about what is right and what is wrong. Abortion, for example. While I do not believe abortion is wrong I recognize there are those who do, and they have arguments that are at least worthy of consideration. Then there are questions like, should Michael Jordan have attempted to play major league baseball, or should the Green Bay Packers play Brett Favre for another year or not, and so on. Issues that are not at all easy to decide on the basis of right and wrong. But now we are confronted with a situation in which it appears virtually most everyone acknowledges that something is wrong, but some people defend it anyway. I am speaking of John McCain’s recent ads attacking Barack Obama. In one, for example, he accuses Obama of being responsible for the price of gasoline. Everyone, or at least most everyone, knows this is totally wrong. Now there is another attack ad which claims that Obama passed up visiting the troops in a hospital in order to go to the gym. Again, we all know this is completely false. Yet some are arguing that so what if it is wrong, it works. That is, the truth or falsity is irrelevant as long as the ad works. Watching the program, Road to the White House today, with David Gregory and his panel, I was amazed to hear at least one member of that panel argue that it didn’t matter if the ads were honest because they worked. Interestingly enough, he allowed as to how they wouldn’t work on himself or the rest of the panel, but they would work on dumb people. His definition of dumb people seems to have been white male voters who lack college educations. Ignore for the moment just how insulting this is to a large groups of people (who are by no means all dumb), and consider what is at stake here. It’s perfectly fine to lie as long as it might bring about votes, no matter how stupid the voters may be. What does this tell you about a democracy that supposedly can only be viable with an educated and enlightened electorate? What it tells me is that members of a certain party have nothing but contempt both for the voters and for democracy. This is just another case of the ends justifying the means. I desperately want to believe that our political system involves two or more people and/or parties that want to do the best for our country, although they may disagree over which is the right way to do it. But this is not now what we have in our political system, at least it is not what both parties are about. I am willing to give Barack Obama and his followers the benefit of the doubt, and believe they do, in fact, have the best interest of our nation and people at heart. But after the past few years of the Bush/Cheney administration, now to be continued by McCain, I can give no such benefit of the doubt. I know what they are up to, and it has nothing to do with the welfare of our people or country, outside of those who now already control the vast majority of all wealth and incessantly demand more and more. McCain, who claimed he would not run a negative campaign, is now running a completely negative campaign. This is because he is losing, and those who support him think that gives him an excuse for what he is doing. It doesn’t. It is wrong, and there is no argument about it being wrong. So I guess right and wrong no longer apply to our current situation. McCain seems to have adopted the Lyndon Johnson approach: “I don’t care if it’s wrong, I just want to see him squirm trying to explain it.” While you might think this is funny, it’s one miserable way to conduct a nation’s affairs. Does no one believe in the concepts of right and wrong anymore?

I rarely agree with Pat Buchanan on anything but I do agree with his assessment of the situation in Afghanistan and the folly of Obama’s insistence on sending in more troops. Ten thousand more troops is not going to make a significant difference in Afghanistan. So what will come next, another ten thousand troops, and then another and another, as in Vietnam. Short of a one or two million man military effort we will never be able to control Afghanistan. And why do we need to anyway? Is it just to perpetuate the fantasy that someday we might have a pipeline through that difficult country? Do we really need more and more troops just to capture Osama bin Laden (if, indeed, that might even be possible). Pursuing this fake “war” in Afghanistan is our human equivalent of chasing our tails. Let’s face reality for a change and give it up before it becomes worse.

I don’t suppose anyone in the U.S. would even entertain the possibility that Ahmadinejad might actually be right when he says nuclear bombs are passé. Tell me what good are all of our nuclear bombs? We don’t dare to use them. No one else who has them dares to use them. Everyone knows the world would be far better off without them. Ahmadinejad says Iran doesn’t aspire to having them. He may well be telling the truth (but no on here is prepared to believe him). He claims Iran’s nuclear program is purely for energy and they are enriching uranium for only that purpose. They have every legal right to do so. We insist they stop doing something they have a legal right to do or we won’t even talk with them. Now that’s real diplomacy! Furthermore, contrary to what the neocons and the Israelis want us to believe, the Iranians are not stupid. Even if they had nuclear bombs they would not rush out and use them on anyone, even Israel. To think otherwise is pure racist bullshit. Quite frankly, I think a case could be made that the world might become safer if Iran did have nuclear weapons. At least they wouldn’t have to live in constant fear that the paranoid Israelis might attack them at any minute, and drag the U.S. into it as well. Obviously, as long as no nation on earth is entitled to have any national interests that are not also in the best interest of the U.S., we are not going to get along. And contrary to what we want to believe, we are not all powerful and will not be able to impose our will militarily on the rest of the world. Might does not make right. In fact, it more often than not makes wrong.

LKBIQ:
That you may retain your self-respect, it is better to displease the people by doing what you know is right, than to temporarily please them by doing what you know is wrong.
William J. H. Boetcker