Rather than simply quote, perhaps I should expound . . .

Yesterday I posted several quotes from other authors that I felt expressed important points that we are not getting through the liberal (though the liberals deny it) media . . . I’d like to comment specifically on Neil Cavuto’s column.

I’m so grateful that Mr. Cavuto wrote this column, because it brings to light the double-standard of the media and many Americans’ views on violence and how we relate to it.  For many years now, we’ve been desensitizing ourselves to violent behavior — through the movies and t.v. we watch, the “songs” we listen to, the video games we play.  While I am no fan of rap music and I don’t play video games, I have to confess I’ve watched my share of “blow ’em up/shoot ’em up” movies over the years.  Yesterday I watched a fairly “family friendly” movie with my 8-year-old daughter — “Stranded” based on the Swiss Family Robinson story.  It was a Hallmark Entertainment feature — and the violence was fairly mild, except for when an island native saved the Robinsons’ lives by slaying a pirate with a well-aimed spear.  My daughter asked me, “Did he die in real life?”

I have always thought my daughter to be a pretty sophisticated child — not because she is “adult” in her behavior, but because she excels academically.  I was embarrassed to have the revelation that she’s still looking at this world through 8-year-old eyes, regardless of vocabulary or reading level.  I explained to her the “wonders” of movie making and how they have pretend spears that make it look real.  She believed me, but then I wondered — “When confronted with REAL life, will she have a difficult time differentiating between real and make-believe?”

Many Americans have a difficult time differentiating between real and make-believe.  They also have a difficult time differentiating between people who REALLY need help and people who need to help themselves. 

If we’re not confronted with the truth of what happened on 9/11, with the truth of the beheadings and the many other vile acts by terrorists over the years, it is much too easy to stick our heads in the sand and/or forget about the spectacular horror of each event.  And if liberals would like to say, “these things happen because Americans are arrogant and the world hates us” — well, I’d like to know why that plane fell out of the sky over Lockerbie, Scotland.  I don’t know for certain, but I’ll wager a bet that it wasn’t an “Americans Only” flight.  Not to mention that the most recent beheading to-date was a South Korean gentleman.

We have to wake up and realize that this is not a movie, it is not a video game.  It’s too easy to put the horror of it out of our minds when we’re not confronted by it — when it’s not shoved in our faces.  Then it becomes easy to say — we shouldn’t be over there.  We should mind our own business.  We should leave those people alone.

Well, 3,000 people were minding their own business and they should have been left alone.