Sheesh, Strangler. You never get on my case for using big words.
Then again, last time we got into a scuffle, you just didn't read my post because it was too long.
Anyway, my point is somewhat similar to playa_playa's (I think). The author of that article makes a number of good arguments. On the whole, it's quite a good article. But I think he goes a bit too far. He simply dismisses the people at the wedding in Afghanistan who were killed, for example, without acknowledging that it was a tragedy.
Now before you jump on me, let me explain. I'm not saying that the war in Afghanistan was wrong. I'm not saying that the United States, on the balance, has done harm to the world. Did things turn out for the better for Afghanis? Well, we won't know for a while, but my rather uninformed guess is that the answer would be yes.
But that doesn't mean that the civilian casualties should be casually ignored and dismissed. They were still regrettable tragedies. You can't twist things around and say that it was a good thing that some civilians died at a wedding. Maybe civilian casualties are unavoidable, and maybe in Afghanistan they were much less than they could have been. Certainly I don't believe that the United States is an evil empire for causing them to happen. But rather than saying, "Oh buy me a box of Kleenexes!" shouldn't we take a moment to reflect on the mistakes made and see what we can do in the future to prevent it?
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