Several weeks ago in The Student , Erik Christianson ’14 wrote an article extolling the virtues of libertarianism. I have no critiques of his position as far as civil liberties and gay marriage go, but the core of libertarianism lies in its view of personal property and its economic ideals. In this, it constitutes nothing more than a justification of shortsightedness and lack of social vision and a defense of the ability of the powerful to oppress the powerless.

Last week, Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas submitted a petition for statehood to the United Nations. Clearly a two-state solution is imperative to ending the conflict. Both sides realize this — according to a March 2010 poll, 72 percent of Israelis and 57 percent of Palestinians want a two-state solution. It’s the only hope of ensuring a lasting peace, delivering justice to the Palestinians and it’s necessary for the survival of Israel as a Jewish state.

It is Sept. 14, 2011, and we are at war. I’m not talking about the wars in Iraq or Afghanistan; the secret CIA-lead wars in Yemen, Pakistan, or Somalia (and who knows where else); or even the “War on Terror.” No, the United States is in the middle of a civil war — a political civil war, ironically fought along many of the same geographic, racial and ideological lines that still stem from the last. Although the consequences are perhaps not as clear-cut as the physical division of our nation, they are nonetheless grave.

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