Tom wrote: "Davin, for one, has rejected any argument for the war that is based on the fact that the world and Iraq are a better place without Saddam in power, and submits that the several thousand Iraqi casualties render the war immoral on almost any possible level, regardless of how many others would have died had we left the regime in place."

Okay, lets dump reason for a moment and try simple morality on you:

The world would be a better place if we had no violent crime at all, and one way to do that is to kill every violent criminal on their first offense.

The world would be a better place if we had no anti-social or sociopathic tendencies, and one way to do that is to isolate what genetic underpinnings can be found and kill everyone with those genes, or maybe just sterilize them and their living babies.

The world would be a better place if people nipped off and killed themselves when they grew too old or too sick and wee a drag on the healthy and fit.

I personally think the world would be a better place if people (like you) stopped advocating and supporting slaughtering, murdering, trampling and maiming other people, regardless of number, based simply on THEIR estimations of what will make the world a better place.

Tom, these 'lets go kill 10,000 people to save 100,000' arguments are as childish and as patently immoral in their content as the 'better world' modalities I presented above.

No person or people has the right to weigh on a scale the death and suffering of thousands versus their beliefs about how the world should be. There are moral cases for war, and self defense of a nation of people is one them. You are not God, Tom, and only a God has the right to make the moral decisions you make with such devil-may-care ease. Since I don't think God exists, that means NOBODY has the right to which you arrogate. Yes, the world sucks sometimes, but the only way to make it better is to act in a way consistent with your principles and encourage others to do so as well- WITOUT using death, murder, suffering, maiming etc as an instrument of encouragement.

To switch back to reason:

Your argument is completely false in the sense as we don't KNOW yet if Iraq will be a safer, better place. We could leave, we could be whipped out of Iraq by geurilla warfare, or a nother regional confict erupting elsewhere (Korea, China, Russia). A dictator could ooze on in from the wings that could make Saddam look like playmate of the year. Any number of things COULD happen. Thats why arguing these modalities is not only morally wrong, but not reasonable. Nobody knows what the future may bring. WEither way, your kind of in a screw-ball position on this, if you ask me.

Davin L.