At this point, it's naught but an interesting and, potentially, useful dialectic to me mind you which is the only reason I'm continuing. This isn't personal to me and as such I'm not interested in making enemies out of FRiends over it.
There are several moral aspects involved in this situation which have been obscured by various party members for various party interests. First and foremost, from the Democratic party side, we have a President who, immediately upon being elected President after a campaign that involved demonizing George Bush as a warmongering war criminal, received a Nobel Peace Prize.
The Nobel Peace Prize: Since 1901, it has been awarded annually (with some exceptions) to those who have "done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses."
So, 9 months after being elected POTUS, Barack Obama is handed the most prestigious award on earth for having done the most to promote fraternity and peace in the world. 4 years later it has been estimated by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism that his escalation of the drone war has killed upwards of 216 children to say nothing of those who were left burned, scarred, maimed, blinded, deafened, orphaned, etc.
So, there in lies a bit of hypocrisy. First and foremost, on the part of the Norwegian Nobel Committee for awarding the Prize to Barack Obama with, in hindsight, an incredible lack of appreciation for his true character and then to Barack Obama for demonizing his predecessor as a war monger in his Presidential campaign and then going on to continue the policy of war mongering. Also, and most especially, on the part of the Democratic voters who have contributed immensely to the demonization of George Bush and Republicans in general. They will never again enjoy the moral high ground in any national election.
If you have made it this far, I would also point out a bit of moral obfuscation on your part Mr. Sherman Logan. You contend that A.) Muslims are intentionally "slitting the throats of children" and B.) that we are "accidentally killing" children in the course of bombing what we perceive to be legitimate military targets.
I know Muslims are capable of evil and don't put anything past them but what specific account of a child having his throat slit to you refer to and; furthermore, how is it an accident when we know there are children in the vicinity of the legitimate military target and choose to blow the vicinity up anyways in order to kill the legitimate military target? That's not an accident. that's a matter of expediency and while Barack Obama and the CIA might not make the distinction, God does and, rightfully, so do I. Your moral obfuscation is an attempt to whitewash the reality. I don't like whitewashed reality. I like hard, brutal, painful, honest, reality which is why I have spent the past hour stringing these words together. it is fitting that thunder rumbles overhead as I post this.
I was not referencing particular incidents when I referred to the cutting of children’s throats, but rather to the most hands-on intentional type of killing I could think of.
But there are certainly plenty of examples of children being intentionally killed by Muslim terrorists.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beslan_school_hostage_crisis
http://www.debbieschlussel.com/34299/israeli-baby-decapitated-by-palestinian-partners-for-peace/
What I was trying to express in my post was the importance of intent in moral calculus. When someone attacks a school, as in Newtown, with the intention of killing children, that is morally quite different from a military operation in which schoolchildren get caught in the crossfire. Their being killed, in the second case, is indeed accidental, since it was not intended.
If our enemies can obtain absolute security simply by hiding behind children, they will certainly do so. And to a quite considerable extent, they already do.
If I hide behind children and shoot at armed men, and they return fire, who is responsible for their deaths? Me, or the people who defended themselves against me?
Oddly enough, I agree with you to a considerable extent, as I believe I implied in my original post. I think Americans are much too sanguine about “collateral damage” when it happens to someone else. On FR there are posters who frequently call for the “kill them all and let God sort them out” approach to conflict. Which I find completely immoral, and which they would also, if applied to their own families. In fact, you can make a case that 9/11 was exactly that.
So while I agree that a child killed by “accidental” collateral damage is just as dead as one killed by intentional targeting, I believe there is a significant moral difference between the people doing the killing. There is to my mind a significant though not enormous moral gap created by the intent.
You may certainly come to a different conclusion, but I don’t believe that I am obfuscating, at least not conciously.