On the eleventh of September, terrorists killed thousands of civilians and leveled the most prominent structure in New York’s majestic skyline, but they did not declare war on the United States that day.
They’d done that decades ago. In response, Americans have expressed outrage and the President has vowed to bring those responsible “to justice.” There’s just one small problem with this plan: he’s on the wrong side. Americans have been on the wrong side for decades.
Years ago university “intellectuals,” some bitter about America’s success as a nation and some simply confused about it, began preaching that no person is ever morally entitled to judge the ideas or actions of another person. They called this doctrine “tolerance.”
On the surface, this sounded okay: if most Americans took “tolerance” to mean that one shouldn’t beat someone over the head because they are of a different race or express opposing views, then who would argue against being tolerant? But that’s not what the intellectuals meant when they spoke of “tolerance,” and that’s not what they taught, either.
What they meant was: “We can’t seem to figure out the difference between right and wrong, so that must mean that there is no difference and everything is morally neutral…except for thinking that there is a difference between right and wrong– that is clearly wrong.” Obviously, there can be no valid argument to defend this gibberish. The intellectuals knew this, which is precisely why they named their doctrine “tolerance.” Who would argue with “tolerance?”
Argue or not, the vast majority of Americans grew up learning this perverted form of tolerance. Young idealists of almost every flavor were taught to discard their idealism, since idealism presupposes a system of values and a system of values presupposes the ability to pass moral judgment and moral judgment, as we all knew, was the only bad thing in the Universe. Go try and find an idealist on the streets of America today–a real one, not one who’s ideal is to be “tolerant.” It won’t be easy. What’s left of the United States is a nation of pragmatists who believe that the answer to every problem is to be “understanding,” to compromise, to be utterly tolerant of everything (except, of course, intolerance). “Tolerance” has become “cool.”
By contrast, Islamic fundamentalists aren’t described as “tolerant” very often. They are idealists–malicious idealists willing (sometimes even eager) to die for their cause. The President has denounced those responsible for the recent attacks as “evil,” [and intolerant,] but what has he said about their ideals? What has he said about a philosophy that preaches that women are slaves, that political freedom is demonic, that self-sacrifice is good, and that human life is expendable?
Nothing.
What has the United States, in recent history, had to say about governments that actively implement that kind of philosophy? Nothing. In fact, U.S. leaders–afraid of being labeled “intolerant” by cohorts in the U.N.–have spent years negotiating with these [despotic] governments in an effort to reach some sort of “compromise” where none is possible. In the choice between good and evil, America’s squeamishness over pronouncing moral judgment has placed the United States firmly and squarely nowhere–but with room for compromise. It isn’t any wonder that depraved philosophies and governments continue to fester throughout the world. “In any compromise between food and poison,” prominent American author Ayn Rand once wrote, “it is only death that can win.”
And so it has.
Governments that foster poison philosophies should be dismantled–or annihilated if necessary–and replaced with a proper form of government. They are facilitating the death of innocent people of all nations, including their own.
There can be no compromise with them. By allowing these governments to continue, the United States is making the choice to protect the guilty at the expense of the innocent. On one side are freedom, capitalism, and prosperity. On the other side are slavery, suffering, and poverty. Think about what those concepts actually mean. These sides are not morally interchangeable. They’re not just “different but equally valid” alternatives to one another: One side is food and the other side is poison.
Pick a side, America, or death will pick one for you.
