August 6, 2007

I wrote last week's dream sequence without any idea of the tragedy about to befall the people on the Minnesota bridge which recently collapsed. I grieve with and pray for all those affected by the accident.

The point I was making remains. Should we stop going over bridges because it has been brought home to us that they can crumble?

We shouldn't, of course, plunge into danger needlessly. Identifying risks and planning to eliminate or reduce them is something we expect of leaders, engineers, and ourselves.

I am writing about the temptation to identify something as too risky and abandon it for that reason. We still travel on highways despite their statistical danger. We didn't give up going to the moon when three brave men died in the accidental Apollo 1 fire. We didn't run and hide when we were deliberately attacked on 9/11. We need to continue in America's legacy of strength and keep going even when tragedy strikes.

The simple fact that people have died and are being killed in Iraq does not translate into a reason that we ought to run away. We keep on using our own roads, which, as I pointed out in my last post, has an annual death toll higher than that of operations in Iraq. We have courage. I believe we can and should use it in Iraq, and there are Americans who are being courageous there right now. Let's support them by driving on our roads and giving them the political support to drive home victorious, leaving behind them an Iraq much improved by their efforts.