You are either ignorant, or a liar.

1 – Egypt (now an ally of Israel) attacked Israel then, along with all of its neighbors.

2 – Israel has no interest in spending its money, and risking the lives of its young, in order to kill Palestinian people. When the suicide bombings and missile attacks ceases several years ago, there were no Israeli bombings. It is ONLY when Israel is attacked, or an attack has been promised by a “credible” aggressor, that Israel uses its military force.

3 – Israel has offered the Palestinian people their own state on many occasions. Bill Clinton brokered a deal in the 90’s that Arafat passed on. And current leaders of Israel signed on to a plan to create a Palestinian state. Their only proviso was that attacks from terrorists had to stop. Then… the Palestinian people elected Hamas into government… a terrorist group… and undermined the peace process that the leader of the Palestinian authority sought.

Clearly a reasonable and informed analysis of the situation would not lead to the conclusions that you offered in your comments.

I made a reasoned argument. In response you offer no reason, only a conclusion. That is the easy way out.

Amazing such thinking still exists. Pathetic.

- People can want to help other people but that is not altruism. Altruism is sacrificing yourself for other people. What’s wrong with it Donahue asks? Rand responds – what’s wrong with committing suicide?

- What I mean by sacrifice is to give up some value that is important to you for a lesser value. To die for your neighbor is sacrifice. By extension – evil.”

This is really an absurd notion. Many Christians have sacrificed themselves for others in following the example of Jesus, i.e. Mother Teresa. Jesus was the most rational being ever and His teachings, when followed sincerely, changed world societies for the good throughout history, as opposed to evil societies spawned by atheists. The former appears much more “rational” to my observation.

When a government censors a citizens ideas then one gets into the arena of immorality as it violates the 1st amendment.

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

Once again note the term ‘Congress’ shall make no law.

Nothing to do with a private indivuals choice.

A government is of the people.

An private individual offerring a public forum may do what ever is in his/her best interest and as such is not abrogating the right of the other poster to post the opinion anywhere else.

The removal of the post in this context is amoral not immoral.

Robert H. Weinstein

I always try this analogy to explain what is actually going on;

Much like some stores limit themselves to particular products, so do some forums limit themselves in the scope of discussion. Thus, if you go to a hardware store expecting to buy shoes, it’s not ‘censorship’ for the store owner to refuse to sell you shoes. He’s not trying to suppress shoes, he’s not trying to deny you the right to wear shoes, he just doesn’t sell them himself. And just as on the forum, he may even direct you to a shoe store (which some people will no doubt go to and try to buy a hammer.) Along the same lines, motorcycle clubs are not censoring individuals by refusing to allow them into the club because they drive a Honda Civic. It’s a MOTORCYCLE club.

These forums typically state their purpose and focus succinctly in their forum rules. There are no surprises here, and for those folks that go in and either fail to read those rules, or read them and intentionally ignore them, we typically point them back in that direction with a reminder.

The other thing is, participation on our forum does not limit people from participating on other forums. Many of our members participate on other sites that vary in scope and purpose. With the internet being as big as it is, it simply IMPOSSIBLE for one site owner to censor any individual from talking about or expressing their views. Individuals who want to explore issues that are not allowed on one website can FREELY go to another website with a different focus and air those issues out there.

The choice is quite simple; if you don’t mind adhering to the rules of a particular site or organization, you can join and participate. If you don’t like the rules, no one is forcing you to participate. But it is false and a complete waste of time to make false assertions of censorship when you simply assume the motivation behind the clearly stated rules of participation. I’ve found that people’s gripes with Objectivism (or Objectivists) tends to bias their assumptions toward the negative. A person with a more objective mindset would at least entertain other possible reasons.