Justice...

...escapes me, to be honest. I just don't think I fully understand the concept, but I like to think I'm getting there. If you demonstrate "justice", you do what is "just", meaning "fair" or "right". The problem is we tend to look at justice with a comic book mentality. You know, something like: "You've been chosen as part of the Justice Squadron, meeting at the Fortress of Solitude!" It's all about bringing criminals to justice. Vengeance shall be ours. People do wrong, and, by bringing justice to the situation, we make things right.

But doesn't it go deeper than that? Don't we believe that we are all created equal? Shouldn't every human have the same rights as every other human? To be sure, humans make detrimental decisions, and those decisions have consequences. But does that mean we should assume that the homeless man, the divorced woman, and the angry teenager find themselves in those circumstances simply because they screwed up? After all, aren't we all, in some way, screw-ups?

People need to be free, and a lot of folks everywhere are not. People need to be free to choose their path in life--not a path of wanton selfishness but a path that betters humanity and themselves. This freedom is not something we necessarily deserve. In fact, one could easily argue that humanity deserves bondage and punishment. Rather, this freedom simply seems right. It seems to be the intended order of things. If justice is truly defined as that which makes things right, then this "qualified freedom" must be available to all. And, moreover, all the selfishness, hatred, and violence must be eliminated from our world, because those are the things that inhibit such a freedom.

So it's election day. You tell me which of these two fellows is going to pull that off...