As a Catholic conservative let me just beat Mark Shea to it–this is absolutely disgusting. It in no way represents conservative thinking. In fact, what it best represents is how muddled your thinking can become once one is untethered from faith.

The disgusting John Derbyshire takes delight in the burning of another human being.

I have no doubt Corner readers will be just as shocked and grieved as I was on reading this story from England:

A prisoner has been accused of throwing boiling oil over an al Qaeda terrorist who planned to murder thousands with dirty bombs.

The attacker is described as a 22-year-old from Sunderland, up there by the wall in the windswept northeast of England. But who was the victim of this dastardly attack?

[Dhiren] Barot was sentenced to life, with a minimum term of 30 years, for planning to plant radioactive, chemical or toxic gas bombs and pack limousines with nails and explosives in the UK and America … Barot was arrested in August 2004 and accused of conspiracy to murder. He admitted planning to bomb several targets including the New York Stock Exchange, the International Monetary Fund HQ, and the World Bank.

The attack, we are told, left Barot with “excruciating burns.” Poor fellow!

I am shocked and grieved. I am shocked and grieved for this poor fellow and I am shocked and grieved that NRO publishes anything so cruel.

I don’t think that Derb is representative of “that thing that used to be conservatism” as Mark would say (although I wouldn’t blame him in this case), but rather a representative of that thing that is atheism. With that said, I do not wish to be identified in any way with such thinking. To take joy in the purposeful burning of another, to take joy in excruciating pain of another human is most monstrous and may I say there is nothing conservative about it. To allow this post to stand is to allow conservatism to be identified with cruel vengeance and I want no part of that.

I have thought for some time that NRO should dump Derb. Now it is a must.

DUMP DERB!!