Bidinotto: “Let me spell it out for you: You are assuming (1) that the American soldiers are acting immorally, and (2) that they know their activities to be immoral, but are ignoring that fact.”

No, I’m not. I’m asking you whether or not it is true that individual soldiers bear at least partial moral responsibility for the actions they carry out, even when they are acting on orders. And further whether large-scale surrender of individual conscience under military orders (whenever it happens) is “horrifying.” Neither I nor the passage I asked you about says anything at all about whether in fact the conduct of soldiers in the Iraq War specifically is immoral.

(And yes, I realize that the rest of the article does make that point. So what? The question is about the passage that you singled out for excoriation, not the rest of the article.)

Bidinotto: “Neither is the case. So — no, the last statement is not applicable.”

I didn’t ask whether it was “applicable” to the Iraq War or not. I asked whether it is true or false.

So, is it true?

Here’s the comment of Joel Stein’s that Bindinotto singles out for special outrage: “The truth is that people who pull triggers are ultimately responsible, whether they’re following orders or not. An army of people making individual moral choices may be inefficient, but an army of people ignoring their morality is horrifying.”

Isn’t this true?

Well, the maddening thing about the bombing in Pakistan is how perfectly happy the grinning hyenas of the War Party are to come out for so obviously disproportionate to the supposed gain. 18 innocent people were massacred in an attack that could have, in the very best case, by the government’s own claim, killed 4 top leaders. It’s one thing to claim that you can morally massacre, say, a half million civilians in firebombing and nuclear terrorism in order to save millions from death in an apocalyptic amphibious assault; I think that’s actually the height of immorality, but it’s an understandable vice. But it’s hard to explain what would make somebody think it’s OK to slaughter 18 innocents in order to get at most 4 of the guilty without simply resorting to the terms of madness and unhinged bloodlust.

Ah, sorry, I meant of course “suicide bombings of civilians”. I just haven’t heard about a whole lot of suicide bombings against military targets outside of WWII.

Sure you have. For example, Beirut (1983), the U.S.S. Cole (2000), and the Pentagon (September 11, 2001). Suicide bombing in the modern form mostly originated in the Lebanese civil war, where it was very often used against military or militia targets.

Three of the five men pictured in the first portrait — Washington, Jefferson, and Randolph — exercised absolute personal tyranny over more than 1,000 of their fellow human beings, and politically supported the system that extended that tyranny over some millions of their fellow Southerners. As far as I know, none of the men pictured in the second portrait hold slaves or support slavery.

Might it be the case that Leviathan has distinctly grown for some groups of people, but that it has also distinctly shrunk for others?

“I don’t think it justifies suicide bombings however.”

There’s nothing about suicide bombings that makes them essentially or even presumptively unjustifiable. The problem isn’t the method of delivery but rather the use of the method to attack civilians. (Would it be better if Hamas bombed innocent people from planes?)

Sorry. Pet peeve.

Jesus. He’s like the creepy aging Liberace of the fashion industry.

The photograph of him at the beginning of the story tells you as much or more than most of the interview, really.