Markos Moulitsas on courage and cowardice
Posted by Joseph Knippenberg
NRO’s Byron York calls our attention to this juvenile rant from Kos. The nicest thing one can say about it is that he hasn’t read his Aristotle, so that he forgets that courage is a mean between cowardice and foolhardiness. His pose is that of a foolhardy man. For more, go here. Power Line’s Paul Mirengoff thinks that Kos will provide a perfect foil for HRC. But only if she makes it through the primaries.
10:08 PM / January 3, 2006
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The right argues that anyone who is concerned about abuse of presidential power is foolhardy and reckless. Do you agree? Isn’t it possible that the manly wisdom of FDR ("we have nothing to fear but fear itself") has been replaced by a less manly willingness to follow a President who invokes fear for every major policy decision?
Brett, you wax tendentious and caricature the views of "the right." Who on the right is saying that presidential powers are being abused, but it’s okay because we’re irrationally afraid? My view (and the view of most of "the right" as I understand it) is that we are--quite reasonably--very concerned about stopping terror attacks and view the vigorous USE of presidential power as a crucial means to that end. I don’t agree with your assumption that Bush has abused his powers, and there are authorities decidedly not on the right who share my view (consider Cass Sunstein) that the Administration is on solid legal ground.
As for FDR and fear during wartime--for crying out loud, the man had Japanese-Americans interned en masse. Oh well, any stick to beat Bush with, I guess, right Brett?
I’d be concerned that Bush was "abusing" his power if indeed he were doing so, but he’s not, so I’m not. Meanwhile, terrorists are still plotting the mass slaughter of Americans, no "ifs" about it, and the left doesn’t seem too concerned about that, at least not in comparison with their obsessive desire to cripple the president using any lie or distortion they can get their lamestream-media mouthpieces to flog.