September 11 and the Non-Crisis of Values

npr.org — The nation seems again at risk of believing it is fighting a civic war — a culture war — with red conservatives, absolutists and traditionalists battling blue liberals, relativists and free-thinking secular-humanists. We think our disagreements about basic values are extreme. Each side, if the thunder and lightning we hear are real or representative, feels that its way of life is endangered from within — a thought that seemed absurd in the time soon after Sept. 11. And it is absurd now.