An older woman told me the other day regarding the caucuses that she doesn't attend them. She's independent, and this year isn't certain which Presidential candidate she likes. But she is certain that she doesn't like people who use scare tactics about terrorism. She said, "Last time, they made us all scared to get our vote. And I don't like that. They tried to scare us with their talk of terrorism."
Her comments continued along that line and it all reminded me that there are those who think the threat of violence and the possibility of random yet calculated brutality in our own neighborhood, or inside our airplane, or at our shopping mall, or our child's school is all make-believe, merely the stories of the self-serving politicians on the right.
To those of you who have dedicated your career, long working hours, spent months away from home and risked your life and limb, or gave of life and limb, to prevent that all from happening, I am sorry to hear of perspectives that are so naive. You deserve our gratitude, instead of our shooting the messenger. Yet it is easier to shoot the messengers -- the people who come home with stories of a world of encroaching violence -- than to admit that the world has evil lurking in our midst and that we are called to fight it.
Our dedicated heroes deserve credit and deep gratitude for keeping us sheltered so that we can hold our naivete as though it were wisdom. I am sorry for what that naivete means for our nation. Our country and its freedom depends on the other kind of wisdom which is based on the knowledge that democracy is fragile, that it can break apart in horrible ways, that its survival requires our effort, constancy of purpose, our discipline, while always knowing that the loss of our safety and peace merely takes a tiny spark.
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