President Biden’s comments yesterday on the campus unrest seemed to want it both ways.  Something often referred to as “splitting the baby.”  Because we don’t get near the Bible in public education anymore, people may not know that reference.  It refers to a biblical story wherein two women come before King Solomon claiming motherhood over a baby and Solomon responds by offering to split the baby in half, half for each woman.  Of course, the real mother immediately reveals herself, repelled by the thought and offers to give the baby to the other woman rather than watch her child die. It is an example of Solomon’s renown wisdom.  But where does the wisdom lie?

President Biden, in his remarks talked about free speech and the right to assembly, but that there is no excuse for violence or vandalism.  Like Solomon, he avoids making an actual judgement, relying on the actors to reveal themselves.  That has been considered political wisdom pretty much since the days of Solomon.  The only problem is the trick is not always wise.  The trick, as performed by Solomon, relies on the basic decency of both women and the sacrificial love of the actual mother.  It would not work when the mother claimants were not essentially decent people.  Before we applaud the apparently “wise” statement by President Biden we must judge whether the two sides of this argument are basically decent people.  The true wisdom lies in making that judgement, not in using the trick.

The answer is simple.  One side has declared its goal to be the destruction of the other side.  Is there any decency in that?  One side attacked a peaceful group of the other side, raping, beheading, torturing and committing other barbaric atrocities.  The other side, attacking in response, goes out of its way to avoid civilian casualties and engages only in legitimate warfare, not acts of terrorism or barbarity.  In this situation, there is no common decency to rely upon to enable the trick to work.

Imagine, in the Solomon story that the claimant, not the natural mother, had responded to the natural mother’s offer to give the baby up by grabbing it and running – relying on the trick to get her desire.  Would Solomon have been so “wise?”  He would have had to command his palace guards to seize the woman running with the baby and bring her back before him, forcibly taking the baby from her, charging her with kidnapping and returning the baby to its rightful mother – a very different scenario.  That’s where we are.  The pro-Palestinian protestors are relying on our basic decency to grab what they want and run – they are not interested in decency or justice.

All these remarks by Biden can do is make matters worse; serve as license to those that have no genuine interest in decency or justice.  There is no wisdom in President Biden’s remarks, just shame born of moral cowardice.