Here is the essence of the article and the expression of the Moral Code needed for this civilization to endure and prevail.
An example from WWII of what I think he means. Relevant today with the torture issue:
Prof. Paul Fussell, a cultural and literary historian, and professor emeritus of English literature at the University of Pennsylvania wrote a book some time ago about his experiences as a US Army private in WWII. No conservative Fussell, but he describes an incident in the Battle of the Bulge when a small unit of GI's captured a few Germans. Being cut off from their unit and in desperate shape they needed to know exactly where the German tanks were to avoid being killed. The Germans prisoners refused to talk. Their Sergent lined them up and said that if they didn't talk he would begin killing them one by one. They still refused to talk. He immediately shot the first one in line in the head. The rest of them talked. The Americans were able to save themselves.
As Peters points out in this excellent article. We didn't win the war against the Germans and Japanese by playing fair. We played to win.
Good advice, IMHO. Pols could take a page out of Mom's book.