Why am I more affected by 200-odd firefighters and 70-odd police losing their lives than by the almost inconceivable concept of 10,000-plus civilian deaths?<\/p>\n
I mean, those sorts of 10K numbers are the sorts of things that hit Third World countries after earthquakes or floods or monsoons. <\/p>\n
The numbers are boggling.<\/p>\n
I found myself, unexpectedly, looking forward to a speech by Dubya. This could have been a Presidency-maker or -breaker of a speech. For what it’s worth, I think he did a fine job — not enough to bring me to my feet cheering, or to my knees praying … but enough to be willing to accept him as the President. He gave a speech that a Clinton, or an Elder Bush, or a Carter or Ford would have given.<\/p>\n
The future will tell.<\/p>\n
That having been said, I disagree that this was all an “attack on freedom,” or because the US is the “brightest beacon of freedom in the world.” This was not an attack on freedom. It was a pursuit of an ideological goal to the exclusion of value of human life. It was an attack on life itself, on civilization. But “freedom” (or lack thereof) doesn’t seem to have had much to do with it.<\/p>\n
The other question that came up was that of Evil (with a capital E). Is there Evil in the world? Is there a personification of Evil, driving these sorts of tragic events? Were these Evil people? Or were they misguided people? Was it a matter of fanaticism? Is it just a drive of testosterone, of speech-possessing primates squabbling over their selfish, trivial concerns?<\/p>\n
I dunno. I think it was an Evil things. I am more inclined to attribute Evil to actions than to people (that way demonization of ones opponents lies). But I think there was something more meaningful to this than simple territorialism or primate squabbling or a random collection of organic compounds interacting in a destructive fashion.<\/p>\n
Believing in a personification of Evil is out of fashion these days, and sometimes I think it’s an easy way to scapegoat one’s actions — “The Devil Made Me Do It.” But I do think there is Evil.<\/p>\n
I think today’s efforts stand as proof of that.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Why am I more affected by 200-odd firefighters and 70-odd police losing their lives than by the almost inconceivable concept of 10,000-plus civilian deaths? I mean, those sorts of 10K…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[29,9,27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-610","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-9-11","category-politics-law","category-religion"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":49188,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/01\/07\/we-get-letters-and-numbers-oddly-combined.html","url_meta":{"origin":610,"position":0},"title":"We get letters. And numbers. Oddly combined","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 7-Jan-15 7:25pm","format":false,"excerpt":"These sorts of things pop up on Google+ mostly on the few posts I have that go viral in some fashion.Anyway, they're odd names and (ore often) incomprehensible messages, going beyond 1337speak abbreviations and poor grammar\/spelling to apparent gibberish.The best speculations I've seen are:1. Bots testing ways to beat spam\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3805,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2003\/03\/26\/blocked.html","url_meta":{"origin":610,"position":1},"title":"Blocked","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 26-Mar-03 8:47pm","format":false,"excerpt":"*Snort*. Perhaps the sorts who think that libraries (if not everywhere else) should be required to use site blocking software on their Internet connections don't mind that among the sites...","rel":"","context":"In "ZT & PC"","block_context":{"text":"ZT & PC","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/zt-pc"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12930,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2008\/09\/04\/liveblogging_the_mccain_r.html","url_meta":{"origin":610,"position":2},"title":"Liveblogging the McCain RNC Speech","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 4-Sep-08 9:24pm","format":false,"excerpt":"[I came in a few minutes late, but I think I caught most of it.]\u00a0 John's not a very good speaker. He does best when he's chatting. He does worse...","rel":"","context":"In "Elections 2008"","block_context":{"text":"Elections 2008","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law\/elections-2008"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":134016,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2017\/08\/01\/its-an-odd-day-when-jeff-sessions-counters-donald-trump.html","url_meta":{"origin":610,"position":3},"title":"It's an odd day when Jeff Sessions counters Donald Trump","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 1-Aug-17 11:25pm","format":false,"excerpt":"In speaking to a police conference, Jeff Sessions made a point of informing them that brutality and inappropriate use of force was not only wrong, but would lead to federal prosecution.The comments seemed a pointed response to the \"jokes\" that Donald Trump made a few days ago in a speech\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":30550,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/10\/08\/etch-a-sketch-diplomacy.html","url_meta":{"origin":610,"position":4},"title":"Etch-a-Sketch Diplomacy","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 8-Oct-12 1:23pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Romney takes three very odd (if not disingenuous) positions in his Big Foreign Policy Speech:1. He claims Obama has signed no free trade pacts during his presidency, when just a year ago he signed such pacts (approved bipartisanly in the Senate) with Columbia, Panama, and South Korea.2. He criticizes Obama\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":138073,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2019\/03\/04\/the-rambling-president.html","url_meta":{"origin":610,"position":5},"title":"The Rambling President","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 4-Mar-19 7:01pm","format":false,"excerpt":"A\u00a0few excerpts from Donald's\u00a0two hour long speech at CPAC over the weekend. \"We had -- think of this: We had the greatest election -- in all fairness, I used to hear Andrew Jackson. This was now greater than the election of Andrew Jackson. People say that. No, people say it.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Trump"","block_context":{"text":"Trump","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law\/trump"},"img":{"alt_text":"trump cpac 2019 flag","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/trump-cpac-2019-flag.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/trump-cpac-2019-flag.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/trump-cpac-2019-flag.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/trump-cpac-2019-flag.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/610","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=610"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/610\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=610"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=610"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=610"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}