A Liberal Gets Mugged (or imprisoned and darn near lashed)

Consider, dearest readers, the case of Ms. Gillian Gibbons.

Full of impractical thoughts - but good intentions and the right feelings - Ms. Gibbons sashayed from Britain down to The Sudan a few months ago, intent to teach the bright youngins of Khartoum's Unity High School.

"What's that," you say, dearest reader, "ain't Sudan the place that George Clooney goes running around clandestine-like 'cause there's murder and maheym and genocide?"

Um, yeah.

"Ain't the government of Sudan pretty much allowing this genocide to occur," you query.

Um, yes again.

"Ain't Sudan full of Radical muslims, and ain't most of the murder and mayhem being caused by them," you query, puzzled by the plainest of facts.

The answer is yes, indeed, and your confusion is well founded, I assure you. A war zone is an unpleasant place to live. It's really difficult place to teach school, though doing so is courageous. That is, unless, of course, you're not a local, and you're heading into a place where the bulk of the locals want to kill you in the name of the Jihad. Then you're just plain stupid.

Ms. Gibbons, it seems, didn't quite accept that folks who crash airplanes into buildings in the name of religion - or who actively support genocide of peasants - might be a tad off kilter. No no, they just need a few good examples and positive feeeeeeelings, and all will be right in the universe.

All they need is love, no?

Well, no.

"A conservative," it has been said, "is a Liberal who has been mugged."

Perhaps Ms. Gibbons will come to realize the gravity and insult of the intellectual mugging she's just received. And, perhaps, she will join those of us who recognize the enemy for what it is, and stop coddling the irrational with feelings.

Feelings are nice, but they won't salve 40 lashings - not even those inflicted for a teddy bear.