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Evict Bush!

Saturday, September 07, 2002  

This Slate article is one of a series pointing out the bankruptcy of deciding to ignore world opinion.

'...From the beginning of the Afghanistan campaign, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld dismissed reporters' questions about civilian casualties: "When one is engaged militarily ... there are going to be unintended loss of life. It has always been the case, it certainly will be the case in this instance." In other words: Why make a big deal about what has been a feature of all past American wars? Answer: Because something basic has changed. Back during World War II, when Rumsfeld came of age, enemy civilian casualties had essentially no bearing on America's national security. Now they increase the chances of American civilians dying in the future...'

And on the way that those opinions have become more powerful...

'To put it another way: We have to understand that terrorism is fundamentally a "meme"—a kind of "virus of the mind," a set of beliefs and attitudes that spreads from person to person... for technological reasons, memes are getting faster and slipperier. The information age is doing for these "viruses of the mind" what dense urban living and interurban transport did for biological pathogens during the late Middle Ages.'

posted by Natasha at 10:25 PM | PERMALINK |