Dissent during Troubled Times

[andyfox]

In the thread on Fox News, Bruce Z. has suggested that dissent has a time and place. That the time for it is not now when we're at war with terrorists. That to dissent in certain ways, such as flag burning, gives aid and comfort to the enemy.

To the contrary, dissent is much more important to the well-being of our nation during times of trouble.

It is in time of war when principles are compromised. It is in time of war when a country that pleaded with other combatants to respect cilivian life and not bomb cities burned 100,000 civilians in a single night. It is time of war when a country that claimed to be defending democracy supported authoritarian tyrants and dropped more bombs on the civilians of the portion of the country it was supposed to be defending than were hitherto dropped in the history of the world.

Bruce Z. would have said rally 'round the flag. We elected our leaders, they made the decisions, they are the experts. The fact that innocent people were murdered is, apparently, beside the point.

Without the ability to dissent, we become no better than the terrorists and the communists and the facists.