Many Iraq war critics have own blindspots

What we see and hear on TV daily – the horrors of the war, the abuse of prisoners, the merciless killing of hostages – is a testimony to what hatred and moral blindness can do to people.

Unfortunately, the truth that these evils come from moral blindness and not political maneuvering is lost on many self-righteous people.

These people want to play the blame game and heap all the motives and tragic conclusions at the door step of President George Bush, and walk away as if they are superior in their sense of compassion.

It is terribly important to realize that horrific events such as this war cannot be quarantined off as if they come from a different sickness then many ills in our society.

It does not seem right to hear these people sounding off that the war is just so “immoral” when usually they are the ones saying, “don’t force your morality on others.”

If you are going to bring in morality in terms of talking about Iraq, then you have to be willing to look at morality in terms of other issues.

We are shocked when terrorists behead hostages in a merciless manner. Clearly we can “see” this is inhumane and immoral. But how is it so different from a tiny baby who is killed while being born (partial birth abortion)?

These same people don’t want to “see” the baby being killed, or admit the immorality of that act because that would mean forcing a moral judgment on others. Yet there have been some 40 million babies aborted in our country compared to the thousand or so victims of the Iraqi war.

Similarly, we can see the sexual abuse of the Iraqi prisoners was immoral. However, in terms of issues like allowing promiscuous sex on TV, or whether there is a freedom to use pornography, or whether traditional marriages should include homosexual ones, morality is not to be considered as an argument!

The fact is that right and wrong exist in all these scenarios. To build a world without the horror of war, we have to be willing to fight any evil.

You can’t justify beating a moral drum on selective issues, and be ignorant and blind to evil in others, even seemingly benign issues. To do so is incredibly hypocritical and callous.