Having studied and taught ethics, this article naturally caught my attention:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/...
It seems the Sec. of Defense thinks that opposing this war is a sign of moral weakness and an 'appeasement' to a new kind of facism.
This is the worn out Fox News argument. You do not support the war. Therefore, you do support terrorism.
But linking terrorism to the pre-WWII strains of facism is a desperate, though familiar, reach for these people.
The unfortunate aspect of these statements is that they bear no philosophical scrutiny. Rumsfeld is an educated and well-read man. He has however, mastered the use the right-speak of values and morals.
His comments were, admittedly, red meat for a veterans' audience.
But we on the left, we suck at making big ideas palatable to so many people. It as if those of us with intellect and education don't want to use it to enlighten, but to alienate those without.
We need to make education and learning, well...sexy! Otherwise you get Rumsfelds. Even in the most basic and common moral theories, DR could not measure up to the minimum standards of morality. To Aristotle he lacks wisdom, to Kant he lacks honesty, to Mill he lacks the kind of intellectual honesty that is open to the views and beliefs of others. These are the well-known figures of the western moral canon. He not only is a repudiation of their definitions of what it is for a man to be 'good' or 'right;' he is the one of the weakest role models for what is 'moral' in the political world.
Yet, he defines morality for a great many people in this country.