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.