The Crime Of Tolerance: Let's Make A Deal

"Tolerance becomes a crime when applied to evil"
- Thomas Mann, The Magic Mountain

If Thomas Mann was right, and tolerance in the face of evil is a crime, then what does a poor guy like Lando Calrissian do, clown shoes or not?

With all the compromises made around US health care, the parallels are obvious. Thanks to Darth Lieberman's ever shifting parameters, it's now just a withered shade of what it could be. That's what happens when the insurance industry gets to call the shots. Has Obama become his greatest foe, an embodiment of Blake's "The Grey Monk"?

The iron hand crush'd the Tyrant's head
And became a Tyrant in his stead

Or when he says, as he did in Oslo last week, “We can understand that there will be war, and still strive for peace,” has he mastered Keats' "negative capability"?

As Yoda said, "Do, or do not. There is no 'try."