There’s a few problems with your conclusions, here, Billy [1]First, how the hell you got that conclusion out of the topic you started with is amazing to me. Granted that situation certainly didn’t call for trying to talk that particular someone out of it. But it’s quite a leap from there to :
“It is madness to hope that the divisions in America can be reasonably, rationally ‘healed’. It is of a piece with attempting to discuss the ethics of a murderer while he is attempting murder.”
The difference here, and the problem I see with your conclusion, is that it makes the assumption that the socialists among us are willing to take that violent step.. of having the courage of their supposed convictions. And I don’t see that happening. Given the aversion to violence, given the wishy-wshy state of the convictions on the part of the left as a whole, given their wn internal sqabbling which I don’t see them ever coming out of as a unified force… I don’t see them ever being able to mount any kind of movement toward violence. They will lean whichever way the wind blows. A look at John Kerry should tell you that much.
Given that, then, it comes down to the lower level of political action… and that is an action I think the group of people who make up what I’ll call the “Center to Right” can WIN… assuming we actually commit to the path, and are willing to take action within it.