Al Gore, Burden, Responsibility, and Wisdom

I won't bother to dispute the falsehoods or expose the hypocrisy of Al Gore's speech from yesterday. Others have done that already (see the articles from Front Page Magazine and Power Line Blog, as well as the articles they link to). What I want to ask is why he's saying what he's saying. Really. He's saying things which are directly contradicted by the facts, his own personal experience, and his own past statements. Why?

I've often consoled myself with the belief that, if Al Gore were elected in 2000, his policy in this war wouldn't be substantially different from Bush's, despite the criticisms he offers now. The heavy burden of being the one actually responsible for making a decision often causes you to look at an issue in a much more serious, more considerate, and, most importantly, much wiser way.

I was looking recently, as I have several times before, at the logs I saved of conversations I had shortly after 9/11. It was interesting to see my evolution in thinking from effectively an isolationist, to a hawk, advocating a proactive strategy against totalitarianism, proliferation, and state sponsorship of terrorism in the Middle East.

The events of September 11th caused, or at least should have caused, all citizens of the free world to devote their time, energy, and creativity to solving the question of: "how do we stop this from happening again?" Though terrible, the primary source of September 11th's significance was not the death and destruction wrought on that day. Like Hitler's invasion of Poland, its importance is found mainly in the fact that it shattered all illusions about our enemy. No reasonable person could any longer deny the fact that all Americans were possible targets, not for anything they had personally done, but simply for who they are. And further, no reasonable person could deny that this is a problem for which time is not on our side: the decreasing cost of chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons means that if we do not solve this problem now, we may not get a second chance before disaster strikes.

Reading my conversation logs, some of my first ideas were "should we stop building tall buildings?", and "should we give pilots guns?" They were baby steps in trying to understand the problem. I had to start somewhere. Until September 11th, I never felt personally in danger. No major war involving the United States has happened in my lifetime, certainly never one where there was any chance of massive American casualties. Up until that day, I had the luxury of having opinions with no practical consequence. Now I had been forced to recognize that I needed to take responsibility for my opinions, because now those opinions were of the highest import.

The biggest telltale sign of a failure to take responsibility for the consequences of one's opinions is the criticism of your opponent unaccompanied by the presentation of a credible solution to the problem at hand. It is easy to criticize. It is also vital, when the criticism is warranted. But criticism must by its nature include an alternative course, or else its target cannot be blamed for choosing the only course available.

What we all need to recognize is that the policies this world implemented to preserve international security simply were not working prior to September 11th. It is not enough to sit back and wait for terrorists to strike, or to passively intercept terrorists and their equipment as they cross borders. Ultimately, victory in a war must involve offensives, to destroy the enemy at its source.

Critics like Al Gore do not recognize that we are truly at war. Even after 9/11, our twenty-first century Pearl Harbor, it is still possible for some to cling to the belief that terrorism is primarily a policing problem, not a geostrategic problem; that the proper response is to wait for individual attacks, and to seek out and imprison those responsible. It is possible only because our Pearl Harbor came in the form of planes flying into buildings. We were lucky that that was the form it came in; it was, relatively speaking, an easy way for us to learn the lesson we so desperately needed to learn. But our luck will run out, unless, ultimately, we do in fact learn that lesson.

So, returning to my original question, why is Al Gore saying these things when he should — and does — know better? Is it because he doesn't care about the truth? Is it because he's so blinded by anger towards President Bush about the 2000 election, that he cannot subjugate his hatred of a foe to wisdom in a matter of urgency? I don't know, and upon reflection, it is unimportant.

The truth is, we need to recognize that the problem of terrorism is not a problem for the Bush Administration, it is a problem for humanity. We are all equally responsible for discovering the solution and implementing it, and, though easy to do, leveling criticism without also recognizing the direness of the problem and presenting an alternative solution, fails to live up to that responsibility. Thus, the most telling passage of Al Gore's speech is when he tells Kerry that he should not "tie his own hands by offering overly specific, detailed proposals" regarding the war we are fighting, specifically in Iraq. Al Gore's advice to John Kerry is that he does not need to take true responsibility for humanity's collective problem.

Google Ads

I'm trying out Google Ads to see if they make me any money. You can see the ads at right. Just noticed an ad for Michael Moore books, heh.

Go Dreams

This page on Sensei's Library is an interesting and hilarious collection of Go dreams and other involuntary appearances of Go into the mind. Some highlights:

I spoke too soon

In my last post, I gave Al Jazeera credit for reporting (though belatedly and behind all the other news) the beheading of Nick Berg.

Now they are offering the theory that it is a conspiracy of American media sources to divert attention from the Abu Ghraib affair. That's right: the same American media sources that took the lead in reporting Abu Ghraib are now trying to divert our attention.

Selective Attention

Al Jazeera and most other Arab media had an orgy last week over the mistreatment of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib. What do they have to say this week about the brutal beheading of a U.S. civilian?

Nothing, it seems.

UPDATE 5/11/2004 11:05 pm: It seems Al Jazeera has belatedly posted a story. I guess they listened to me.

What is utilitarianism?

Justin and I were discussing the concept of utilitarianism, when the question was raised: what exactly is a utilitarian? Some people would call utilitarianism a belief that "the ends justify the means". But when it comes down to it, isn't utilitarianism really just some set of values, and a belief in doing what is necessary in order to maximize the realization of those values? After all, both "ends" and "means" are in some sense an "event", and you could say that a utilitarian is simply someone who has a theory as to what kinds of events are good, and what kinds of events are bad, and tries to cause good events to happen and bad events not to happen.

The problem with this definition of a utilitarian is that it would be impossible to come up with a set of moral values which are not classified as utilitarian, since all moral theories are just a set of values — things one considers good and bad, and actions one considers right and wrong. So the word becomes meaningless.

Yet, "utilitarianism" means something, and it means something important. We shouldn't just discard the word. There are in fact people who seem to be so "utilitarian" (whatever that means) that they effectively throw out morality.

Our realization was that a utilitarian is someone who has a set of moral ideas which he doesn't believe apply in some circumstances. Of course, this definition, taken literally, is itself relatively meaningless, because you could easily just say that the person in question has a larger moral framework which states that certain ideas apply some of the time, and others apply during other times. In that sense, there is no logical inconsistency, and he is in fact applying his "moral framework" in all circumstances.

But this lack of unification is a very unnatural disconnect, and suggests that the person, rather than having one underlying unified theory of morality, has some sort of ideal of how things should be, and has a totally different set of values which he feels are justified in achieving that ideal. Certain types of theories, such as communism, pacifism, and isolationism, are irreconciliable with reality. If attempted to put into practice in the real world, the result is catastrophe. These theories are thus "utopian". Some utopians genuinely try to live their lives according to their beliefs, but others reconcile their theories with reality, not by changing their theories, but rather by ignoring their theories when they don't fit. Examples are "pacifists" who make exceptions when they are themselves physically attacked, or communists who realize that the only way to achieve their goals is through totalitarian control. They are "pragmatic" enough that they will use other measures entirely to reach their ideal. In other words: the luxury of utopianism is provided by being a utilitarian. These seemingly opposite concepts, utopianism and utilitarianism, share a deep connection.

The only honest way around this is to recognize that no theory can be moral if it is not practicable in reality.

This is related to libertarianism in an interesting way. Libertarianism as a political philosophy is very deep, and is built on a complicated structure of ideas and values. Some have attempted to summarize libertarianism with the "non-aggression principle", the statement that "no one shall initiate the use of force or the threat of force." When I first discovered this summary, I thought it was brilliant, since in my mind, it is a very succinct way of putting forth the basic libertarian concept of personal sovereignty. And it is brilliant, but it poses a problem: many so-called libertarians learn this as the defining concept of libertarianism, and adopt the principle without the deep moral foundation underneath it. Thus, they attempt to apply this rule dogmatically without any understanding, leading to ridiculous misconceptions such as thinking that the U.S. invasion of Iraq constituted a violation of that principle. Furthermore, many who are exposed to libertarian ideology believe that this principle is the only thing libertarians care about, and are unable to appreciate the deeper moral knowledge contained in the philosophy. Unfortunately, this perception is not without basis, because in fact the majority of so-called libertarians today have taken on just such a dogmatic, utopian ideology.

There is a good Go analogy here. Here are the rules of Go:

1. Two players take turns placing black and white stones, alternating, on the empty intersections of the board. The players may pass if they wish.
2. Stones of the same color which are connected through the lines form a "group".
3. If any group has no liberties (adjacent empty intersections), it is captured (removed from the board). Remove groups of the color just played only if they still have no liberties after having removed groups of the opposing color.
4. A move which repeats an earlier board position is illegal.
5. The game ends when both players pass in a row. The winner is the player with the most stones left on the board.

Belmont Club on Abu Ghraib

Go read the Belmont Club's post on the Abu Ghraib prison affair right away. I don't want to ruin the experience by quoting parts of it for you, but let me just say that it is truly excellent and you should read the whole thing.

More Moore

Michael Moore's latest message accuses Disney of refusing to distribute his latest movie, Fahrenheit 9/11, because of fears that it will anger Republican politicians who give Disney tax cuts:

Michael Moore

For those who still have doubts about Michael Moore, check out "Mike's Message" from April 14th. Some choice quotes:

David No Insane

The most incredible thing just happened to me. I am NOT making this up.

There I am outside on my porch, trying to solve a nefarious problem in Life & Death, when I could swear I was hearing the theme song from Hikaru No Go, an anime about Go which I had downloaded and watched a month ago. I tried to listen closely, and I couldn't really tell if that's what I was hearing, so I just assumed that it was something on TV which sounded vaguely like it, or maybe someone was actually listening to the song, but not in a Hikaru No Go context (after all, it is a Japanese pop song in its own right). So I ignored it.

But then, about a half hour later (just enough time for one episode to finish), I hear the same thing again! This time I walk off my porch, and walk towards the sound. I hear, emanating from a neighboring house, the sound of Japanese dialogue, and then the unmistakable background music of a Hikaru No Go episode! So I grab my goban, and walk around to the front door. This Asian woman in her 20's greets me, and I explain what happened, and ask her, tentatively, "Is someone watching Hikaru No Go?" I guess my pronounciation is bad, because she doesn't understand me at first, but then she realizes what I'm asking and answers that she is in fact watching Hikaru No Go DVDs which she ordered from Hong Kong!

I tell her that I play Go, showing her my goban as evidence. She, it turns out, doesn't play Go, but she's just really into Japanese anime. So I offered to teach her if she ever wants to learn.

Kind of disappointing, but pretty amazing anyways! I mean, what are the chances of that?

Now excuse me while I try to collect myself.