I wasn't asking you if you would sacrifice your child, but you already knew that.

If my son or daughter wanted to volunteer for Afghanistan, I would have been afraid, but I would not have stood in their way.

If my child wanted to join now, I'd do everything in my power to stop them.

Send my child to fight for Syria's ally? For Iran's ally? For a repressive, conservative Muslim regime? For a country whose leaders hate America? For a society that devalues and abuses women?

No, daddy, you want to send America's children to fight there. Just not your own.

So you'de send your child to die for the current leaders of Afganistan? Have you no soul?

No kidding, hoisted upon his own sword again.

I gotta say, this selective moral outrage is fun.....and easy!

I wouldn't sacrafice my children for anything, asshat.

I would have been proud if they were part of the effort to rout the Taliban.

If you two were not so callous, ignorant and mean, you'd make a good comedy show. Kind of like the Keystone Cops.

Or the Bush administration.

How come when it's my kids they are" being sent to die for" but yours would simply be to "rout the Taliban"?

No, I'm pretty sure by your logic you would send your child to die for the "purpose of routing the Taliban".

I think you should tell your kids over dinner tonight that you feel the routing of the Taliban is more important to you than their lives. They should know where you stand on this.

You are right...Pollack has this to say, very much in hindsight and, I think, in a credible fashion. It is long but worth the time.


http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200401/pollack

I think "sponsors" is a bit off. To the Taliban, al queda were heroic friends who had both helped them rout the Soviet Union, and then help them consolidate power over a substantial portion of Afghanistan. That being so, al queda were given more or less carte blanche to operate without oversight within Afghanistan. I doubt the Taliban were privvy to much of the al queda planning, most of which took place outside the country.