"Mercy for the guilty is cruelty to the innocent"

A handsome black cat of unknown provenance has suddenly thrust himself upon the scene, taunting Tiny and Baby (bottom images below) into full "embattled furman" mode and challenging other neighborhood cats to defend their turf (white-pawed tabby above and in next two images below, confronting the dark intruder from the high ground of our front porch this morning).

"Mercy for the guilty is cruelty to the innocent," Stephen of Horsefeathers quotes Adam Smith in a crisp psychological analysis of the mewling and keening we hear from our friends of the left over the swift justice meted out to the Butcher of Baghdad.

Yet [NYT reporter John] Burns, because of his personal honesty reveals a sickness -- if not a death wish, then a vulnerability -- at the core of Western liberalism.

Burns clearly prefers to think of himself as a liberal man of compassion and understanding, who can even identify with the common humanity he shares with Saddam. However, he is honest enough to acknowledge what survivors made clear: that he suffers from a "profound moral corruption," really a form of narcissistic self flattery. We're "better" because we're capable of understanding and sympathizing with our enemies, whether Nazis, Communists or Islamists, Hitler, Stalin, Mao or Saddam. After all, weren't they just human beings like us, struggling with inner conflicts, fears and wishes. Besides, "evil" is such a judgmental word, far too crude for our advanced sensibilities. And so the West succumbs to a relativistic psychological sickness which hobbles our efforts to forcefully prosecute a war against foes who sense our need for moral self flattery. However, as Adam Smith pithily suggested long ago, this self-flattery is really just a mask for cowardice, allowing us to inflict cruelty on the innocent by prolonging the war, while pretending to be merciful.

"Tom cats perceive inviolable barriers -- invisible to us -- surrounding each other's personal space,"  as we noted in our post "Shedding shame and capturing honor." The body language speaks volumes as neighborhood tabby (left) and Black Kitty go eyeball to eyeball.

Speaking of projecting our common humanity onto others, Mark Bowden in Opinion Journal shines an interesting light on the motives of our well-meaning fellow citizens who "consistently underestimate the deep hatreds that divide people":

Our political system is designed to wrestle peacefully with the divisions of race, class, ethnicity, religion and competing ideological or geographical interests, and has generally worked as intended -- the Civil War being the one glaring exception. Generations have struggled to live up to ideals of tolerance and diversity. When we look out at the world, we tend to see millions longing to get past the blood feuds, to be, in short, more like us. George Bush and the neocon intellectuals who led us into Iraq are just the latest in a long line of evangelical Americanists. No matter how many times history slaps us in the face, the dream persists.

It's that shining-city-upon-a-hill thing.

After capturing a few good images, we broke things up -- temporarily -- with a bit of hand waving and deep-voiced scolding.

Then there's Papa Ratzi's render-unto-God insistence that there is no justification for people to be treated at times "almost as if they were objects." But isn't that the very definition of the sociopath, wherever he may fall along a spectrum from Bill Clinton to Saddam Hussein? Other human persons are mere props in their all-about-me fantasies. These leopards don't change their spots.

High-pitched primal screams pierced the air in the moments before sunrise on Saturday as Black Cat threw down the gauntlet to the feline powers that be in our neck of the woods, Baby (left) -- caught by our camera's eye in mid scream -- and Tiny, lower right, hunched in high dudgeon. Both Chelsea Grays were on their tethers and so were unable to carry out the full physical assault the challenge called for. They were, nevertheless, able to keep the enemy at bay.

He's back! Shortly after shooing Black Kitty off the front porch, we heard another primal scream coming from the dining room nearby, where Baby was going eyeball to eyeball -- as Tiny looked on in disgust, hissing and spitting -- through the window. Black Cat is wily, often establishing eye contact with us, as if imagining we would betray our own. His pleading looks are tempting, but we know which side we are on, and the Chelsea Grays know that it falls upon them "to restablish the right order of things."

As we said the other day:

For the left, Saddam's hanging is -- like everything else that comes down the pike -- just one more Bush-bashing opportunity. For the rest of us -- especially the Iraqis who suffered the tyrant's jackboot first hand -- his execution re-establishes the right order of things.

Are we a cock-eyed optimist to believe in our heart of hearts -- not to mention our gut -- that the timely dispatch of the Butcher of Baghdad has redistributed the cosmic order of good and evil towards the side of the good?

Comments

[goomp]

Did The Black Marauder and Tabby come to claws or was primal screaming the choice of innate wisdom. I personally am an animal with enough insight to understand that a life of peace and safety depends on a society of rules and manners that rewards conforming to the rules and punishment to fit the violation of the rules. The Judeo-Christian manners and rules of behavior as practiced in the late 19th century thru the mid-twentieth seem to my limited experience and knowledge the best compromise yet established to deal with the savage animal nature of man.

[Laura Lee Donoho]

Goomp and Sissy.....what great minds operate at sisu. This is an outstanding post. Plus, I love the play by play narration and photos of the cat standoff.

[Teresa]

I am sure that the speedy dispatch of Saddam to his own level of hell has done more than just about anything else the Iraqi government could have done to move things along in a better direction.

Now the Sunnis know the penalty and that it will be enforced (lesser beings will not have the grand trial by network news). I'm getting very tired of all the whiny people out there who still wait for the "Arab Street" to rise and wreak havoc after every perceived major crisis.

As for Tiny and Baby... they could teach lots of humans a thing or two about protecting their way of life. *grin*

[youhoo]

We shall show mercy, but we shall not ask for it.
-Sir Winston Churchill

I have always found that mercy bears richer fruits than strict justice.
-Abraham Lincoln

[Gayle Miller]

After hearing the words of the excellent Pope Benedict, I found myself severely challenged about the Saddam Hussein execution (while being rather dazzled by the expeditious meting out of justice in Iraq). In the end, I realized that MY OPINION doesn't matter a fig to the Iraqui on the street who suffered through the brutal years of Saddam's regime and that I could not affect in any way the coming death of a monster but only MY reaction to it.

I think that those who are now raising such an enormous hue and cry may have some small degree of hubris in thinking that THEY can affect the law of Iraq and its enforcement.

Meanwhile, I applaud the Chelsea Greys for defending their territory, but I must say that the black kitty is showing good taste in wanting to hang out Chez Sissy and Tuck!

[Laura Lee Donoho]

Just popped back in to see the glorious photos of very brave cats again.

[LanceThruster]

I have a similar cat situation but it strikes me that the Adam Smith quote could apply more aptly to the Ford pardon of Nixon and cronies (though since It's OK if you're a Republican [IOKIYAR] covers that I guess it never occured to you).

Since the porch cats involved are all strays, I have more empathy for the "bully" of the group than you seem to for your interloper since his situation is in no way his fault (in your situation, the outsider cat is doing what cats do - jockeying for position).

I may have to make some tough choices should he not come to accept "peaceful co-existence" but certainly will not relish dropping the hammer of doom on him. He's living proof (currently) that life is as Thomas Hobbes put it, "nasty, brutish, and short."

[pb]

We, too, have a Black Cat, whose visits are not only growled at by our three felines, but summarily terminated by our GrandDog's barking and lunging at the windows. We can lend her to you; she's good with the cats-in-residence.

I am glad that Justice was meted out to Saddam, but sorry that the new government couldn't keep a proper leash on their dogs. It is now up to them to right the wrongs they permitted during what should have been a properly somber, slightly sad, necessary event.

If they want justice for all, they must ensure the dignity of all, even criminals going to their execution.

[LanceThruster]

"Mercy for the guilty is cruelty to the innocent"

Maybe if Saddam had hand-picked a second in command, and stepped down, that newly appointed leader could have pardoned him. I'm sure, since all here are the model of consistency, you'd likely have been echoing the words of the US pResident of Vice - Dick Cheney when you praised Saddam's successor for "understanding that there can be no healing without pardon. The consensus holds that this decision will cost him. That is very likely so. The criticism will be fierce. But Saddam's successor has larger concerns at heart. And it is far from the worst fate that a man should be remembered for his capacity to forgive.

In politics it can take a generation or more for a matter to settle, for tempers to cool. The distance of time has clarified many things."

You coo about the wisdom of Ford, yet I am inclined to think you'd be howling with indignation over something like the following:

"As we are a nation under Allah, so I am sworn to uphold our laws with the help of Allah. And I have sought such guidance and searched my own conscience with special diligence to determine the right thing for me to do with respect to my predecessor in this place, Saddam Hussein, and his loyal wife and family.

Theirs is an Iraqi tragedy in which we all have played a part. It could go on and on and on, or someone must write the end to it. I have concluded that only I can do that, and if I can, I must.

There are no historic or legal precedents to which I can turn in this matter, none that precisely fit the circumstances of a private citizen who has resigned the Presidency of Iraq. But it is common knowledge that serious allegations and accusations hang like a sword over our former President's head, threatening his health as he tries to reshape his life, a great part of which was spent in the service of this country and by the mandate of its people.

After years of bitter controversy and divisive national debate, I have been advised, and I am compelled to conclude that many months and perhaps more years will have to pass before Saddam Hussein could obtain a fair trial by jury in any jurisdiction of Iraq under governing decisions of Iraq Special Tribunal.

I deeply believe in equal justice for all Iraqis, whatever their station or former station. The law, whether human or divine, is no respecter of persons; but the law is a respecter of reality.

The facts, as I see them, are that a former President of Iraq, instead of enjoying equal treatment with any other citizen accused of violating the law, would be cruelly and excessively penalized either in preserving the presumption of his innocence or in obtaining a speedy determination of his guilt in order to repay a legal debt to society.

During this long period of delay and potential litigation, ugly passions would again be aroused. And our people would again be polarized in their opinions. And the credibility of our free institutions of government would again be challenged at home and abroad.

In the end, the courts might well hold that Saddam Hussein had been denied due process, and the verdict of history would even more be inconclusive with respect to those charges arising out of the period of his Presidency, of which I am presently aware.

But it is not the ultimate fate of Saddam Hussein that most concerns me, though surely it deeply troubles every decent: and every compassionate person. My concern is the immediate future of this great country.

In this, I dare not depend upon my personal sympathy as a long-time friend of the former President, nor my professional judgment as an Iraqi leader, and I do not.

As President, my primary concern must always be the greatest good of all the people of Iraq whose servant I am. As a man, my first consideration is to be true to my own convictions and my own conscience.

My conscience tells me clearly and certainly that I cannot prolong the bad dreams that continue to reopen a chapter that is closed. My conscience tells me that only I, as President, have the constitutional power to firmly shut and seal this book. My conscience tells me it is my duty, not merely to proclaim domestic tranquility but to use every means that I have to insure it.

I do believe that the buck stops here, that I cannot rely upon public opinion polls to tell me what is right. I do believe that right makes might and that if I am wrong, 10 angels swearing I was right would make no difference. I do believe, with all my heart and mind and spirit, that I, not as President but as a humble servant of Allah, will receive justice without mercy if I fail to show mercy.

Finally, I feel that Saddam Hussein and his loved ones have suffered enough and will continue to suffer, no matter what I do, no matter what we, as a great and good nation, can do together to make his goal of peace come true.

Now, therefore, I, Saddam’s successor, President of Iraq, pursuant to the pardon power conferred upon me by the Constitution, have granted and by these presents do grant a full, free, and absolute pardon unto Saddam Hussein for all offenses against Iraq which he, Saddam Hussein, has committed or may have committed or taken part in during the period from July 16, 1979, until April 9, 2003."

From: http://watergate.info/ford/pardon.shtml (with minor revisions)