Atenas y Jerusalén. Sobre la necesidad del valor

(published in Weekly Standard, March 22, 2010, Vol. 15, No. 26)

Last Thursday, Athens was paralyzed by rioters protesting the government’s austerity program, which is needed to keep the Greek nation solvent. The protesters chanted “No sacrifice” and “Higher pay.”That same day, near Jerusalem, the Palestinian Authority honored Dalal Mughrabi on what would have been her 50th birthday. A square was named after her in Ramallah. She and 11 other terrorists hijacked a bus in Israel in 1978, and killed 37 Israelis and one American.

The challenges posed by these developments are representative of those all civilized nations face. They aren’t that complicated. Dealing with them doesn’t require extraordinary subtlety of thought or exquisite elevation of soul. Common sense and courage will suffice.

Do we have to curb our profligacy today so we can be prosperous tomorrow? Common sense says yes. What does it take to do this? Basically, political and civic courage. Now, how to do this—how to cut budgets so we are living within our means, how to control the natural tendency of the welfare state to grow, how to get present-oriented populations to invest for the future, how to move from a public policy that doles out entitlements to one that sets a framework for achievement and self-reliance—this is a complex challenge of public policy and political strategy. But the fundamental challenge is simple. Not easy, but simple.

Similarly, the need to condemn rather than to tolerate (or even glorify) terror, the need to defeat rather than appease it, is obvious. Doing that in a resolute and determined way takes courage. How best to weaken and defeat the forces of jihadist terror, how to deal with the nations and cultures that are its breeding ground, how to mix together in one’s policies hard and soft, smart and dumb power—that is complicated. But the basic challenge is simple. Not easy, but simple.

We need to resist indulgence at home and appeasement abroad. This task needn’t be the subject of endless handwringing and conspicuous chinpulling. But it does require—to use an unfashionable phrase—moral virtue. In particular, it requires courage. 

It takes courage for a polity to say no to the temptations of welfare state politics. It takes courage to turn away from the public trough and refuse to think of ourselves as victims and entitlees. It takes courage to become, once again, self-governing citizens. And it takes courage to rally ourselves to fight against—and to preempt—the forces of terror and the nations that harbor and sponsor them.