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… the good must associate; else they will fall, one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle.

That quote is by Edmund Burke, who is often credited with the quote, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing”. Whereas the latter has no history in his works, the former does. I read the news this afternoon and found his words once again flashing behind my eyes like a portent of the coming storm. Only in this case we are in the eye, not the outskirts.

Nature abhors a vacuum, and with “Al Qaeda on the run” (not really), a new head of the hydra has sprung from its neck. IS, or ISIS, or ISIL (as our esteemed Prez prefers, since the Levant is important to the Islamic jihadist) has been growing like a contagion in a petri dish. This is not news to anyone paying attention. I am far from a political strategist, but even I can see that these jihadists are beyond dangerous. And today they proved it. ISIS had captured Jordanian pilot Lt. Muath al-Kaseasbeh. Jordan for its part threatened severe repercussions should he be harmed or killed: all ISIS prisoners in Jordan would be executed. For a while, the world thought ISIS would pause and reconsider.

They did. Instead of beheading Lt. al-Kaseasbeh, they burned him alive.

via When Bad Men Combine… | Uncivil Peasants.

Aggiesprite brings some righteous thunder.

One of my enduring frustrations with the political left is their insistence that I must respect other cultures uncritically (but absolutely not appropriate from them those good qualities they may possess), and must always in every way criticize and condemn my own culture.

To do so is some sad form of mental illness. One can look upon the history of Western Judeo-Christian culture, particularly our own American culture, and see flaws and missteps, and yet still appreciate that it has been stupendously successful in establishing a society that is far more stable, safe, productive, and compassionate than any other culture in the history of the world.

The Left condemns the entirety of our culture, seeking to overthrow it in pursuit of a more perfect humanity. Somehow, even seeing events such as in the news today, through the lens of the shortcomings of our own culture, never once recognizing the agency of other cultures being flawed, disastrous, and fundamentally at odds with their own vision of a future of peace and harmony. No, whatever evil is visited upon the world beyond our borders must somehow be a direct result of some past (or current) action of our culture, our society.

This hideous act today, this barbarity- this is the normal state of man. The peace and prosperity we enjoy in America, and in like societies, they are the aberration that flies in the face of history.  Our culture works. It builds civilizations. It cures diseases. It feeds the population. It provides safety and security to people far beyond the dreams of the majority of the world’s current population, let alone the humanity of the past.

We have before us such evidence, that our culture is the right, proper way, and yet we today as a society have no courage to proclaim our culture to be the best, to encourage others to join us in prosperity, contentment, peace, and liberty.

And lacking such courage, others step forward, and with the certainty that their culture is dominant, they bring forward misery, hate, death, subjugation, poverty and strife. But they do so with a certainty that they shall  triumph over us. And so their cancer spreads.

It is to weep.