Ponderings...

The madcap diversity of human thought and understanding is incredible. By that I mean I cannot comprehend what makes people think and believe the things they do. Not even myself. Lately it has become apparent to me that so many of my very dearest friends have vast differences from me in the way they view the current administration, the war on terror, international politics, gun control...etc...etc....etc.

It would be easy to chalk this up to life experiences, but many of these people share my experiences and still believe differently about them. Jack and Chuck are, like me, veterans and survivors of that horror in southeast Asia. Like me, both of them keep guns and defend our right to bear them. Unlike me, both detest the current administration and see Iraq, Afghanistan, and even Bosnia/Croatia as another Vietnam. They are unwilling to give the slightest benefit of doubt to the administration and seem to blame the politicians for everything that has not worked out exactly as they think it should have in prosecuting these battles. They do not seem ready to place any blame on the military commanders in the field for making not so hot decisions. Additionally, my dear old friend in England also berates the President as a dolt (and worse). I find it very hard to believe that he is any where near as stupid as these people think. Not only was he smart enough to be elected President, but he was smart enough to do so a second time. Has he made some bad decisions while in office? Undoubtably! But what President hasn't?

The common thread with all these people, I find, is the absolute horror that they hold for the fact that people die in combat situations. They constantly point to the deaths as a sign of failed this and failed that. I'm not callous about the loss of life. Lord knows I've sobbed with the best of them over the loss of a friend in war. However, I'm enough of a realist to know that dying is one of the things soldiers do in battle. It is their very purpose to be in harm's way and to continue to function. I found during Vietnam that most of the people who had problems with that war were people who never actually came to the realization that they were really *in* a war. Somehow, they were in some surreal place where things beyond their control happened around them but were never able to accept the idea that people around them, perhaps even they themselves, were going to be casualties. I had no such delusions. I knew that it was a war and that people, maybe even me, would die.

I am completely buffaloed by all this. I cannot see why so many people have an active hatred of the present administration. I didn't want either Gore or Kerry to be elected because I have some fundamental differences with their take on how the country should be run. But I certainly harbour no hatred of either of them. I disliked Clinton too, but I have never hated the man. What is going on in this country to stir up so much intense hatred - and from what I can see - largely only from one side?

Let's not talk about the courts, judges and lawyers........