"We don't need more people with guns telling us what to do."

Tom Brokaw, who surely is one of the most credible commentators around these days, following in the footsteps of Cronkite and then Brinkley as elder statesmen of the media, related recently on "Morning Joe" an experience he had with an army unit in Afghanistan. The unit was working on gaining control of a particular area of the countryside, and Brokaw managed to break away and ask a local merchant what he thought of the operation. The merchant said, "We don't need more people with guns telling us what to do."

A succinct commentary on the folly of the US operation in Afghanistan, and in any other sovereign country where we try to impose our will by force. It well illustrates that the myth of redemptive violence is just that, a myth.