Like I said in the post, some of them are just citizens excercising their rights of free speech. Good for them. But some of them in their zeal have crossed a line into vandalism. It’s akin to PETA, most members just demonstrate, others throw blood onto fur. Rainforest Action Network same thing. 99% of their members, responsible citizens doing important work but 1% going around destroying property. Gandhi never destroyed property. Neither did Thoreau. Civil disobedience is not an excuse for wanton violence. I consider myself a progressive but these people hurt their own causes but they make people like me who otherwise might support them very dubious and turn away from because we need to uphold the rule of law. I’m a pragmatic, thoughtful citizen and I do not think the Osama bin Laden had a “valid” reason to attack the United States. Two wrongs do not make a right. People like Jodie Evans live in a world that is so divorced from reality. And they get their facts wrong. Venezuela did not go from 70% literacy to 98% under Chavez, it went from 96% to 98%.

And there are no “valid” reasons to fly airplanes into office towers and kill innocents. If Osama was upset with bases in Saudi Arabia, take it up with the Saud family. Those bases were put there to defend Saudi Arabia at their request in the aftermath of Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait. We still have bases in Kuwait and Bahrein. I wish we could unwind from those commitments but we can’t. Pragmatism over ideology. There is a right way to exit Iraq and a wrong way. Obama’s foolishness and inexperience will likley make that situation worse not better. Clinton has it right. McCain is closer to Clinton though he foresees a South Korean-type relationship with Iraq. That may work but he first has to get the Iraqis to agree a national plan and agenda themselves. That’s not easy. Iraq is broken but we broke it. We have to fix it. Collin Powell was right on this and many conservatives too know this, we just can’t leave Iraq in a vacuum. That benefits no one except Iran.