VDH ping.
Now, that's a superb article ! Blimey, it is almost an adress to the world ! Who is this Hanson fellow ?
Americans believe that freedom and consensual government — far from being the exclusive domain of the West — are ideals central to the human condition and the shared aspirations of all born into this world.I have a lot of admiration for VDH. However, I'd like to respectfully disagree with this sentence. If anyone feels I'm right or wrong I'd love to know what you think.
I think we believe something darker than what he's writtern. We believe that the natural aspirations of all men born into the world is to dominate his surroundings -- including other people, food, treasure, and anything else around him. But since this produces a state of perpetual war, poverty and chaos, people can eventually learn over time to settle for something less than their real aspiration -- they learn that liberty for all is a better ideal. The dark drive to dominate can then be turned in peaceful and useful directions -- into sport, science, business, art, etc.
I hope I'm not belaboring the point -- it just seems to me that freedom and consensual government are emphatically not natural at all, and we shouldn't be surprised if other cultures don't accept these ideals right away. It takes time and work and education, and even then there is no guarantee of success.
So when we see the worst kind of barbarism around us (in Iraq, Haiti, N. Korea, Africa, etc, etc) we shouldn't be surprised or think it's unnatural. And we shouldn't think it will be easy to change.
I previously nominated VDH for Secretary of State. If that's not available, I nominate him for Presidential Speechwriter.
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