Honourably Disingenuous

Perhaps so steeped in an aura of decency, good humour and optimism that he simply is incapable of understanding that there are entire cultures in which those virtues are quite simply non-existent; call it cultural relativism. A spirit of open goodwill toward others will not necessarily be reciprocated - although it could very well be. When one makes overtures, as one human being to another, innocent of a deeper design than to make human contact, in most instances a connection is made, people responding to the elemental decency in one another.

But that elemental decency can be compromised, and it can be altogether missing, in some individuals, some groups of individuals, some larger congregations of peoples for whom a deeper, darker vision of humankind is set deeply in a national consciousness. People are, after all, naturally suspicious of strangers in a setting where strangers often harbour ill will toward other tribal groups through a long heritage of inculcated fear of aggression.

The Middle East is one of those places, where for as long as history has been recorded, and certainly before recorded history, one group after another, of Bedouin, farmers, settlers, townsfolk, have viewed each other's presence as a threat to the stability of their own in a harsh environment with fixed and finite resources. The Middle East shares with Africa a tradition of warrior-societies.

And collective social attitudes so long ingrained in the consciousness become habitual, even when the original, primitive need for suspicion, fear and response to conflict is lifted. In the United States, there is an ongoing debate, led by President Barack Obama, over an enlightened democratic society's response to direct threats to its security and the safety of its citizens. Mr. Obama insists that moral 'suasion by example will soften malevolence.

It is his considered and honest opinion that an open gesture of acceptance will be met with the same, enabling two solitudes to confer and lead to a situation of trust, overturning conflict. He seems unable to discern that his attitude and his character stems from an entirely different crucible than those to whom he proffers the hand of friendship. Earning him, from those sources, scorn for his effete response to their belligerent provocation.

Mr. Obama claims to believe that the response of the United States government to the impact of 9-11 on the consciousness of Americans reeling from a totally unanticipated violent attack symbolic of religious hatred taken to an outer extreme was the cause of the growth of violent jihad. He somehow overlooks the fact that violent jihad was brought to the United States in an imperative to destroy and leave fear in its wake.

This is what terrorists do. And Dick Cheney is quite correct in stating that if terrorists responded to "fine speech-making and appeals to reason", they would "long ago have abandoned the field". Reason has no place in the arena of impassioned faith that one's religious dictates compel dedicated followers to destroy an enemy, that it is the duty of the faithful to respond to that religiously-inspired directive for the greater glory of the god they serve.

"In the fight against terrorism, there is no middle ground, and half-measures keep you half-exposed" succinctly sums up an observation to be respected, even if the voice and the opinion and the directives of the former vice-president are not held in respect. He lacks charisma and is personality-challenged in a way that President Obama never could be. And he is guilty of urging toward prosecuting a war that should never have been launched.

But in this matter of combating terrorism, he is perfectly correct.