The left is not evil; it's just worthless

That's the case Dennis Prager makes about those who refuse to acknowledge evil:

But the non-Muslims who fail to acknowledge and confront the evil of Muslim terror and the evil of those monsters who cut innocent people's throats and murder those trying to make a democracy -- these people are truly worth nothing. Unlike the Muslims raised in a religious totalitarian society, they have no excuse. And in my lifetime, these people have overwhelmingly congregated on the political Left.

David Brooks makes a similar point, quoting Whitaker Chambers:

"I sometimes feel, that it takes a tainted mind to understand - to really understand - the threat of Communism. To really understand Communism is to have touched pitch: one's view of man is forever defiled. To understand Communism means to understand the terrible capacity of man for violence and treachery, an apprehension of which leaves one forever tainted."

Most Americans have never seen that kind of evil up close. They've heard of people like Jeffry Dahmer, of course, but they've never really imagined living under a government run by Jeffry Dahmers. The Iraqis have done it.

Brooks continues:

. . .[B]eneath the joy and exhilaration that came with voting last Sunday, Iraqis showed something grimmer: a stern determination to not let evil triumph.

These Iraqis are people who, like Chambers, have spent their lives in hell and cannot have been unaffected by it. They have touched pitch and witnessed or participated in man's capacity for violence and treachery. They must be both damaged and toughened.

I hope Brooks is right. These people are going to need a lot of toughness for the times ahead.