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Missile Defense

Russian military leaders have expressed concern about US plans for a national missile defense system. Will defense technology be limited by possibilities for a strategic imbalance? Is this just SDI all over again?

gisterme - 10:41pm May 3, 2001 EST (#3209 of 3214)

rshowalter wrote: "...Who are the evil people?

Should you, for example, know their names before you kill them?"

EVIL 3 a : causing or tending to cause harm :

BANEFUL, HARMFUL, PERNICIOUS

NOXIOUS 2 : creating destruction, woe, or ruin : RUINOUS,

HARMFUL 3 : perversely productive of discomfort or misery 4 : darkly or grimly threatening or foreboding

So the "evil people" meant are those who exhibit the characteristics of that definition. The problem with those folks is that those characteristics remain invisible until great harm has already been done. Some examples of people who have fit that definiton are:

Adoph Hitler

Joseph Stalin

Chairman Mao

Pol Pot

Napolean Bonaparte

Timothy McVeigh

All the European victims of WWII are the responsibility of Hitler's evil. His henchmen were beloved brances off the root. It cost about 20,000,000 lives to kill them.

All the vicims of Soviet pogroms during Stalin's time are his responsibility. God only knows their number. His henchmen were locked in place by fear. Stalin grew too powerful to be killed.

Tim McVeigh is a sprout from the Hitler root. Fortunately he wasn't bright enough to multiply his power like the others.

See the point? For the ones who are smart enough to become world leaders, believable untruth is the cloak that hides them at first. After that, they are protected by their own ill-gotten power. Lies are the enabling force behind the propagation of evil; like the ratchet handle in an abominable tool kit whose sockets incude hatred, induced fear, irrational anger, bigotry, xenophobia, and the plain old lust for power, to name a few. One size does not fit all. All of Hitler's henchmen would have probably died peacefully of old age if their boss had not appeared on the scene with that tool set.

It's not the victims who are evil, Robert, it's the person who's pleasure is to create vicitms that is evil. From one evil seed a huge tree of death and suffering can spring.

lunarchick - 11:23pm May 3, 2001 EST (#3210 of 3214)
lunarchick@www.com

Like the carpet bombing of Laos for example, how many years has it been now .. and America has done little to rectify the situation. Not a lot!

The people on Laos Eastern boarder want to plant rice .. they have MINES to contend with -- still! There are hungry people, who have no means of support, little to no clothing, and terribly marginalised. What has and is America doing to rectify this situation - that America created?

I note the USA got thrown off the HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION ... a Texicutioner is an unfit symbol ... countries with a clearer understanding of Humans and Rights have taken the seat!

leungki - 05:23am May 4, 2001 EST (#3211 of 3214)

Showalter, international law has no teeth right now because it is rightly perceived as the occident's method of imposing its frenetic and largely unhappy way of life on everybody else. If there is conflict in the world, it is over resources. Yet despite Malthus, the world has sufficient resources to keep everyone happy.

Things are of course relative, but the reality is that in developed countries conflicts are much less likely because everybody has access to a certain "vital minimum". The OECD recommends that rich countries spend 7% of their budget on development in developing nations. I agree completely with this and even if out of every $100 only $1 is spent sensibly it's still less of a waste than buying yet another rocket-propelled phallic symbol.

rshowalter - 07:27am May 4, 2001 EST (#3212 of 3214)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

gisterme 5/3/01 10:41pm ................ We have a tremendous amount of common ground. We live in the same world, have some body of shared background, and share many concerns that I believe we'd give similar weights to. I agree with your list of "evil people," as far as it goes. Neither of us are entirely prudish about the occasional need for force, or killing. We both share similar concerns about the importance of ideas, and evidence. On many objectives, I think we agree.

I agree with your language here:

"For the ones who are smart enough to become world leaders, believable untruth is the cloak that hides them at first. After that, they are protected by their own ill-gotten power. Lies are the enabling force behind the propagation of evil; like the ratchet handle in an abominable tool kit whose sockets incude hatred, induced fear, irrational anger, bigotry, xenophobia, and the plain old lust for power, to name a few. One size does not fit all. All of Hitler's henchmen would have probably died peacefully of old age if their boss had not appeared on the scene with that tool set."

I have concerns at the level of balance, detail, and technique -- I think some of the things that the US has done, and anticipates doing, are subject to improved, more beautiful solutions. You might not agree with my suggestions, but I'd guess that you also have concerns at the level of balance, detail, and technique, and that we share a good deal of common ground about the areas where balance, detail, and technique need to be thougth about.

We both share a good deal of common ground about morality, and also, I think, about aesthetics.

I'm concerned that the United States has proceeded in ways that are, sometimes, incompletely founded and unbalanced to an ugly degree. We need, I believe, to be more able to combat the evils you set out just above. We need, in essential ways, more capable military forces. At the same time, I believe that the improvements needed can be done, and should be done, with much more concern for collateral damage, and human costs now not accounted, or given insufficient weight.

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