UPDATE

The recent water boarding of a
four year old by her father because she was not cooperative in reciting her ABCs. He is a soldier who had served in
Iraq.  This event is sad commentary
on a creeping American moral nihilism. 
Nihilism is a failure to truly believe in basic precepts such as
kindness, compassion, and love. 
Sociopaths are nihilists, but so are increasing numbers of Americans who
are not.  Some “believe” in these
values, but will not go to bat for them. 
Others don’t even go that far. 
Power and wealth are oh so much more real. They can hold Wealth in their
hands and Power – just watch people cringe and bow when you have it.  Of course, then Power and Wealth own
you far more securely than you own them.  

When President Bill Clinton was
criticized for setting a bad moral example because he fooled around with Monica
Lewinsky, I thought it would be a poor parent who looked to the President for
moral guidance in raising their child. 
There were plenty of hypocrites,
Democratic and Republican alike. 
John Edwards, he of the secret child and sex tape, said “I think
this president has shown a remarkable disrespect for his office, for the moral
dimensions of leadership, for his friends, for his wife, for his precious
daughter. It is breathtaking to me the level to which that disrespect has
risen.”  I thought these arguments  were stupid, and as it turns out in many cases hypocritical.  Applied to adults these arguments are stupid, but I now
think they had a point despite themselves.

The
President does contribute to the moral sense of his times.  A goodly number of Americans apparently
think in hierarchical formats.  
Good and bad or, more complexly, a pecking order where they are happy so
long as others are below them. If Alpha Dog or Alpha Baboon doesn’t
object, it must be OK.  These are
the people who call the President our “Commander in Chief,” which he is not.

Bush
showed that immorality, like fish rot, can spread rapidly when it starts at the
top and people have this attitude. 
Some parents apparently really do need a President to give them a good
example in living, an example they are incapable of accomplishing by
themselves.  Not all
parents, of course.  I know many
who are genuine adults, with a strong enough character not to need such
instruction.  But I may have been
wrong for those who think and live in terms of their position in hierarchies.

Among his many unexpected failures
of leadership, Barack Obama has failed to take a strong moral stand against
tortures such as waterboarding when done by people hired by the
government.  He and his government have
done what they could, which is quite a bit, to protect the criminals who
tortured and murdered in our name. 
Let us move on, he says, and put that stuff behind us.  I wonder how effective that argument
would have been at Nuremburg? “The war is over.  Let’s let bygones be bygones.”  

“OK, you can go home now.”

But for citizens of weak
character, if it is not illegal, it must be OK.  Along the way our entire culture is degraded.  If water boarding is not torture, then perhaps it is an
acceptable means for disciplining children.

Some people who once said “unlike
Russian communists, Americans do not torture” have shifted to saying torture is
necessary, or that what is torture when done by others is not torture when done
by Americans.  Or perhaps it’s no
worse than a fraternity prank.  I
guess that’s true in a way.  Sometimes
people die in fraternity pranks. 
Then we wonder when weak minded or mentally injured people take this
reasoning seriously, and bring it home to their child rearing.

UPDATE: Evidence of the utter failure of Obama’s “moral leadership” can be found here in figures of rising support among Americans for torture.  A pathetic group of bedwetting citizens who have abandoned the principles this country was founded on.  I am ashamed to be part of such a society.