"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing."-Edmund Burke

         As promised, I will attempt here to explain a position we state from time to time on posts. It is not so much an ancillary to Burke's dictum as a precursor. "When Good stands and confronts Evil, Evil retreats. It must."
         Every time I bring this up, someone counters with either a Russian mafia or jihadist example,where, once engaged, they fight until only one is left standing.
         True enough, but in fact, the handlers, the underlying struggle, the movers of such men, indeed do change and indeed do retreat from the way they had been doing a thing if confronted by a certain amount and a certain kind of resistance. They retreat, lick their wounds, and begin designing Plan B.
         We may be seeing this in Gaza right now. The Israelis are entirely in control of determining the outcome. They and they alone can cause Hamas to retreat. Hamas cannot cause them to retreat. (Arguably they can even defeat Hamas in Gaza, but only in Gaza. Like the other jihadists, the Israelis know Hamas is but an appendage of a larger enemy, and Gaza only one scene in a three-act play.) Usually the Israelis pull up short, to assuage international pressure, and may do so again. But this may soon no longer be the case. If the Israelis see the bond with Amerika loosening, they will be more willing to play their last hole card.
         And they will win...and that particular struggle with Evil will have ended.

         Christians, indeed, many religions, believe that there is a constant struggle between Good and Evil. In fact, some see it as a controlling force in the universe. They see this struggle as eternal, and Christians believe, in the End, there is a final victory. 
         We have stated our axiom, above, as it refers to the struggle between the forces of Constitution and the liberty of men and the forces of elitism and state power. This struggle, too, is built on an eternal struggle, as Man has always struggled to be free, only being powerless, and until the 18th Century, more or less illiterate, he was unable to articulate his need to be free, much less put into action plans to attain it. That changed in July, 1776. With me, that is an article of faith.
         Moses Sands like to use George Soros as the personification of this desire by elites to win and control other men's lives, although for the life of me, I fail to see what Soros gains by the light of liberty being extinguished in Amerika. Perhaps it is because he gains nothing materially, and it only fills a hole in his soul with Good's defeat, that he is the perfect candidate as an icon of our characterization of Evil. People like Reid, Kerry, the whole Congress are only ravenous hyenas. The Marxists are only self-deluded children, jackals-in-waiting. What they seek they can hold in their hand, touch, taste, feel. Pure Evil wants to defeat Good simply because it is there. Evil wants only to watch another thing die...and among the modern Left, there are millions with this hole in the soul.  So, I think it is fitting that Soros is our bogerman poster boy for Evil.
         I think Moses was right.

         But in my analysis of Good versus Evil I don't really require a religious or theological grounding. That was the point of my conversation last week with Mr .....
         This same struggle has been suggested in the biological sciences, by animal behavioralists. It is especially relevant in studies on aggression and territoriality. Nikko Tinbergen and Konrad Lorenz were both staunch evolutionists, and both very un-religious so my use of the words "Good and Evil" would be anathema to them. So I won't use them biologically. You can make your connection anyway.
         What they observed among many animals in the wild that when two animals (of different species, or even same species but not of the same troop) meet on neutral ground, the larger stronger animal will attack and usually wins. Assuming he's a carnivore, this is where the kill is often made.
         But if the smaller, weaker animal escapes and head back to it's own territory, its defense strength increases. Once it passes its own scent post, entering its own territory it turns and defends with twice the ferocity of open ground. Likewise the aggressor weakens once he passes that scent post. What ethologists can't say with any particularity, is what triggers this turnaround. Although they believe the "scent of territory" sets things off, what came first? The heightened defense display by the smaller animal? Or the sense that he was on forbidden territory by the larger aggressor?
         I'm not an animal behavioralist, but the notion of territory has always been of interest to me, because, in my view, man has not overcome many of his baser instincts, namely to defend territory, and moreover, to recoil (at least a little) from attacking the territory of others.
         I like to refer to that "sinking feeling" in the pit of one's stomach when he crosses that invisible scent-post, when he realizes he's going to have twice the fight on his hands than he thought he might, as "ethological guilt", with apologies again to Lorenz who would never use the word "guilt".
         But I'm looking for an anthropomorphic term to explain a reality, and the reality is that good men (Aristotle's and Aquinas' Good) almost by definition, don't go around attacking or killing people and taking their property and land. Evil men do. My apologies again to Lorenz, but this is why Man stands astride the natural world and a sentient world of his own, or an Invisible Hand's, making.
         Still, my position stands...when Evil in the visage of George Soros, vor v zakone, or Hezb'allah confronts Good...and Good stands, shows its teeth and fights, Evil weakens, and eventually retreats. It has to.
         To be sure, as I'm reminded daily by the hate mail, there are others who see their positions as Good. Jihadists do. So do the Terror-Symps, who see America as peculiarly evil. If you happen to be one of those who see Good in this fashion, at least we both understand the stakes.
          Laisser les bons rouller!
Vassar Bushmills