Boy, do we miss Travis McGee

This is going to be sort of a different blog.

I was recently rereading one of John D. MacDonald's wonderful Travis McGee novels. This one came out in 1965, when Castro's Cuba was still new enough and the Cold War was in full swing. MacDonald, who always managed to work a message into the books, said something about the Cold War that to me applies equally well to the struggle with radical Islam.

"That's why they can never make it. They kill off the good ones. They gut their dreamers. Their drab stone discipline is a celebration of mediocrity. If we can restrain ourselves from killing off our own rebels, our doubters and dreamers, all in the name of making ourselves strong, then we can prevail. But if we use their methods, then any victory will be but the victory of one iron symbol over another, and mankind will have lost the battle whichever way it goes."

I'll leave you with that.