This... this is just so wrong, on so many levels

There was a time when I sympathized with the Chechen cause. "Hey, they want to be an independant nation." I'd say. "What's wrong with that?" I'd ask.

Then the events of this week that brought us this...

Reuters -- A woman grieves over the body of her child killed when Russian troops stormed a school seized by gunmen in the town of Beslan, in the province of North Ossetia near Chechnya, September 3, 2004. Russian soldiers battled Chechen separatists on Friday to end a two-day-old school siege and more than 150 people have probably died, Interfax quoted a presidential adviser as saying. Some children are still captive, but more than 400 hostages have been freed, it said.

(Via Allah)

Strapping on suicide belts and storming schools and taking innocent men, women and children hostage... that's bullshit. I don't care what your cause is. It's bullshit. If I woke up tomorrow and learned that Putin (to paraphrase Frank J) bombed Chechnya to ashes and then nuked the ashed, I'd have a hard time getting choked up about it.