Bush, Descartes and the Middle East

"The journey we're taking is difficult, but there is no other choice," President Bush said in reference to Israel making peace with the Palestinians. "No leader of conscience can accept more months and years of humiliation, killing and mourning. I know that peace can finally come."A democratic republic that respects the rights of Jews and non-Jews alike (i.e. Israel) must tolerate the existence of a state committed to violence and terrorism (Palestinians -- remember who they are? The people who cheered in the streets at the attacks on America on 9/11. The people whose leader, Arafat, makes deals with the Iranians, the world's number one sponsor of terrorism).Bush's premise: The view of the philosopher Descartes who claimed, "I think, therefore I am." The infinitely superior philosopher, Ayn Rand, called this view the primacy of consciousness -- the idea that wishes and intentions (the products of consciousness) supercede objective reality.President Bush has now brought Descartes' philosophical viewpoint to the Middle East: I wish it, therefore it will be so.Try telling this to the next victims of Palestinian terrorism.