As the war in Ukraine strains into its third year, America finds itself in the unusual position of acute social division on public policy.

Sorry, scratch that. 

These days, when are we ever not in a position of acute division on public policy and about everything else?

There’s one person who’s not suffering this burden.

N.C. Senator Thom Tillis (R-Huntersville) knows precisely where he stands and apparently precisely where we should stand, too.

His position is that the war in Ukraine is smart and crucial – and anyone who disagrees with him is naive, afraid or uninformed.

One can be reassured Senator Tillis is not uninformed because he recently – in no uncertain terms – told us so.

“Our base cannot possibly know what’s at stake at the level that any well-briefed U.S. senator should know about what’s at stake if Putin wins,” said Tillis on Feb. 12, 2024.

“Some people around here – if they really are being driven just by the perceptions of their base, they should grow a spine and explain if they think it’s a tough vote. It’s not a tough vote for me.”

By now everybody knows that Thom Tillis has no problem with tough because he was raised in poverty and lived in a mobile home.

The many of us who were also raised in poverty and lived in a mobile home must have had a flushing toilet or some other compensating luxury that didn’t make us so tough.

Our version of toughness has us at least questioning some of the presumed wisdoms of our Ukrainian adventure:

• Just how was it that we promised post-Soviet Russia that we would not threaten them by placing NATO at their border with Ukraine, but found a way to very directly betray our word?

• Just how was it that we failed to take into account that any country that lost twenty-five million people in WW II might have an eternal flame of fear regarding border vulnerability.

• Just how was it that our intelligence organizations participated in coups, corruption, genocidal funding, and other forms of waving a flag in front of a bull and imagined that a post-Soviet Russia would feint before our perceived power and strength?

• Just how was it that we imagined we could use our economic might and dollar hegemony to bring Russia to its knees and instead find them stronger than before?

• Just how was it that we thought China, Iran, North Korea, India and a host of other countries with everything to gain and nothing to lose would not sidestep our assumptions and do what served them and Russia in symmetrical resistance to American arrogance?

• Just how was it we let the UK talk us out of an early peace opportunity?

• Just how was it we imagined it was a good thing to be $30 trillion in debt, and continue to spend money on a foreign entanglement we apparently didn’t understand; had little capacity to manage; and where it was impossible to track our investments?

• Just how was it we with absolutely no capacity to manage our own borders would believe we could secure someone else’s?

All this is not to ignore the fact that Putin is a vain and ruthless despot. 

So what? You can box the compass with similarly arrogant soulless examples of the governing elite.

We’re not in charge of Putin, Russia, Ukraine, or the world’s bad guys. 

We’re in charge of us, and there’s nothing at hand to indicate that being good-hearted Americans in turn makes us wise and constructive Americans. 

Good is tougher than that.

We haven’t been nearly good enough with Ukraine, and on the heels of the parade of harms found in Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq, we’re digging deeper into yet another endless war.

That this time we’re spending phony money and their people versus real money and our people should not be a comfort. 

What goes around with war tends to come around.

And so, Senator Tillis, though we’re grateful for the fact we have a ‘well-briefed’ leader at our helm, please excuse us if we don’t find comfort in your confidence.

For insight on why, look to the technology phrase “Garbage In – Garbage Out.” It was once used to describe the reality that poor program information inputted leads to poor information outputted.

Might we suggest its current application to public policy?

Everyone with confidence in the track record, sincerity and professionalism of America’s current phalanx of intelligence agencies please raise your hand.