Word: judgments
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...Simon DeDeo is saying that one should not pass moral judgment on the situation in Kosovo without familiarity with the facts, then I wholeheartedly agree. But instead of urging people to learn about Kosovo so that may make an informed moral choice, he simply throws up his hands and implies that judgment is impossible or irrelevant...
...little worth: it neither explains the situation to people, nor does it take a well-reasoned moral stand, either for or against the bombing. So what is the point of writing it? To say that the ordinary person isn't in a position to make a moral judgment and shouldn't bother trying? And that the war is entirely in the hands of ordinary people, beyond the influence of leaders, and is therefore anarchy...
...calling the shots in Kosovo, then no one is responsible for anything except what one does in his own house. Milosevic is not responsible for massacring Kosovars. NATO generals are not responsible for bombing civilians. No one is right, no one is wrong, therefore no judgment can be passed...
Above all, Milosevic is a crafty autocrat. He relies exclusively on his own judgment, and little is done without his consent. While other institutions of state exist--a government, an elected Chamber of Citizens, ministries--he has limited their capacity to function. Only the police force works--an organization full of "his guys" that is exhausting in its myriad forms of harassment. The state is Slobodan Milosevic...
...right is arguing about seem to boil down to a simple riddle about America's health: Are we better or worse, richer or poorer, not so much in our pockets as in our souls as a result of all that has happened in these past two decades? On that judgment rides more than who wins the White House next year; this is about what politics can and cannot do, about whether the culture war was a waste of time after...