FINDING THE GOOD

Hugh Hewitt:

The young blogger is best served by "finding the good and praising it," to borrow from author Alex Haley, rather than to slag and singe opponents or denounce other people's positions.

Hugh Hewitt, three paragraphs later:

Though the anti-military left has thrown around the term "chickenhawk" in an attempt to damage the political careers of many Vietnam-era politicians who did not serve in the military, it has never had traction outside of the fever swamp, and even within that narrow slice of American politics, the charge marks the user as one of the nutters, given that the premise of the American republic is civilian control of the military, and especially as veterans rarely --and active duty men and women never-- make that charge, understanding it to be both typically duplicitous in that it is offered by many who do not esteem the military, and deeply at odds with the basic structure of the country.

Contradiction? What contradiction?

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(By the way, the point of Hewitt's column is that even though people who talk of "chickenhawks" are "nutters," young conservatives who want to run for office in the future should enlist in the military now -- not because it's hypocritical not to, but because it will be harder for them to get elected if they didn't serve in the Great Patriotic Total War. I don't know why he believes this, especially given the fact that we may be on the verge of electing President Giuliani or President Romney, which would give us our third straight presidential election in which a star-spangled baby-boomer Republican reached the Oval Office despite having avoided combat in Vietnam.)