Deja Vu All Over Again

Rand Simberg bemoans the fact that, in view of yesterday’s failed bombing of NW Flight 253, our politically correct government obviously hasn’t learned anything from 9/11.

This all has a feeling of deja vu to it. We are going to spend the next days and weeks discussing all the things that we discussed eight years ago. The same stupid arguments will be made that are refuted by politically incorrect reality, but at the end, airline travel will be even more onerous, fewer will choose to fly for short trips, the airlines will take it in the shorts again (and probably need another bailout), and the incompetents at the TSA will be rewarded. We will be less free and, in that hoary old phrase, the terrorists will have won, without blowing up a single plane.

Ft. Hood: Ignoring the Obvious

Dorothy Rabinowitz dissects the loony political correctness that has scrambled to exonerate Islam following the Ft. Hood massacre. The unwillingness of so many in power to state the obvious bodes ill for the security of our nation.

It has taken Maj. Hasan, and the fantastic efforts to explain away his act of bloody hatred, to bring home how much less capable we are of recognizing the dangers confronting us than we were even before September 11.

If our intelligentsia, both in government and in the media, cannot bring themselves to admit the ongoing threat to our civilization from radical Islam as a coherent movement, then we will not succeed in defending ourselves against it.

Where Was God?

(photo by James Nachtwey)

On this seventh anniversary of the most horrible day in America’s history, the usual memorials will be posted to remember those we lost on that day. It’s fitting that we should do so.

But there is a deeper issue this event should force us to grapple with, one that is rarely addressed. The depth and intensity of the raw evil that was displayed that day raises the disturbing question, Where was God? If God exists, and if He is so kind and good and compassionate, how could He possibly have allowed such a demonic crime to be committed?

The answer is really quite simple: He was where He’s always been — on His throne in heaven, grieving over the fallen state of His creatures.

God did not create robots. He created free moral agents who have the capacity for great evil as well as great good. What we do with that freedom is our choice. And some people, as we witness all too often, choose to use their freedom in nefarious ways. That’s not God’s fault.

As a believer, 9/11 did not shake my confidence in God. On the contrary, it further strengthens my conviction that there is a God who will someday sit in final judgment on the entire human race. On that day, the villians of 9/11 — and of every other despicable act of evil throughout history — will receive their just reward.

In the meantime, it remains our duty to do what is right, no matter the cost.

“Though a sinner does evil a hundred times, and his days are prolonged, yet I surely know that it will be well with those who fear God, who fear before Him. But it will not be well with the wicked; nor will he prolong his days, which are as a shadow, because he does not fear before God” (Ecclesiastes 8:12-13).