Imagine this. Across the street a man who has a criminal record has just shot his son-in-law and several women and children. He is standing in the yard with his hand in his pocket staring in your direction. It looks like he has a gun. A policeman, running away, yells, “He has a gun.”
You tell the man to pull his hand out of his pocket. He refuses. You tell him again and again to prove that he doesn’t have a weapon. Your neighbors, hiding behind their curtains, are in danger. Your wife and children are depending on you for protection.
You see movement inside his house. He is now screaming at you with his hand still in his pocket, pointing at you.
So you shoot him. The men, women and children he was holding hostage inside the house are now free from the danger he presented. Your neighbors are safer. Your family is no longer threatened.
But - soon your neighbors discover that this criminal had no gun in his pocket. They look at you accusingly, wondering how you could have acted this way. And no one thanks you. In fact, they begin to talk among themselves about how you could have acted so rashly.
****
This is the way I see the Iraq situation in light of the news that President Bush wasn’t given accurate intelligence before taking out the madman in the desert. I don’t care if he had WMDs in his pocket or not, I still say, “Thank you President Bush for being a man of courage and action.”
