Hindsight is 20/20. Tunnel Vision... Not So Much

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I should have known better.

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What began as what I thought was a simple plea for some Blogcritics writers to steer away from blatantly racist language in regards to the crisis in the Middle East has become instead a platform to espouse those very views. In effect, it's evolved (or devolved) into a microcosmic vignette of a seething hatred that echoes the tensions of post WWI Europe.

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In a perverse way, I should feel vindicated, I suppose. For years, I've said that everybody has an agenda, and the more insidious that agenda, the more vehemently it is denied. A cynical viewpoint, perhaps--but a cynic, as Ambrose Bierce said, is only a romantic who's seen reality. And the reality is this: we're living in a world in which everyone's already made up their mind.

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We haven't learned from history's mistakes, and we're rushing headlong to repeat them. Don't think for one second I'm advocating pacifism here--it is a basic responsibility of every human being to destroy evil. The trick is in defining evil, and therein lies the barrier to reasoned argument.

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The Holocaust was evil. 9/11 was evil. Does that mean all Germans are evil? Does that mean all Muslims are evil? Of course not. Does that mean politicians and hatemongers from every spectrum are going to spin evil to rationalize their agendas? Almost certainly. Hitler had to be stopped, and he was--at least for a time. His spectre still haunts us, channeled as it is through any number of hate groups. Osama Bin Laden, on the other hand, still eludes us, but nonetheless serves as a convenient poster boy for some ill-defined war on terror.

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Let me share an anecdote with you. Days after 9/11, here in Dallas, a skinhead extremist walked into a convenience store and shot the owner to death. It wasn't a robbery-- nothing was stolen--it was "retaliation" against 9/11. The man he killed wasn't even Arabic--he was a Sikh, recently immigrated from India with a wife and infant child. That was irrelevant to the murderer, and even as he got the needle, he went to hell proclaiming his patriotism.

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I mention that only to illustrate how absurd our mindset has become, knowing that it will fall on deaf ears. We've forgotten that in America, our greatest strength lies in our diversity. On a daily basis, I work with Kurds, Mexicans, Iranians, Africans, Israelis, American Jews, Indonesians, Koreans--even Aussies. Guess what? Not a terrorist among the bunch.

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Call this a plea from a person known to advocate emotion in writing. I'm not pleading from a Neville Chamberlain vantage--I am foursquare for rooting out the bad guys and killing them on the spot. The Israelis are not the bad guys. Neither are the Lebanese. There are issues here that Americans don't fathom, and don't even attempt to understand. It's much easier to sit in air-conditioned comfort and scream "my side is right and your side is wrong!"

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Meanwhile, World War III has begun.

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Pass me another Bud, would ya?