Mistakes can teach

To the Journal editor:

How often have you heard/said: “We don’t learn from our mistakes.” It’s generally offered as a lame excuse for doing something stupid, right?

Something that almost anyone could have avoided if they had just remembered the stark lesson learned by having done the same thing before. Well, I think most of us do learn from our mistakes but for some reason often don’t do anything about it.

Changing habits, thinking differently, accepting humility, replacing irresponsibility with responsibility, who knows?

The last several weeks have been filled with news about war with Iran. The Hawks in Mr. Trump’s advisory panel are literally frothing at the mouth to “strike Iran.” They seemingly can’t wait to make another mistake and get the U.S. into another shooting conflict in the middle east.

How painfully pathetic is that? Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, all “mistakes” by any rational measurement (oh, and don’t forget Vietnam!) and yet here we are being led by people most of whom, if not all of whom have no personal stake in it, being taken down the same ill-informed, emotional path that we learned years ago leads to nothing but turmoil, confusion and disorder. In short, a colossal mess in this country and around the world!

Yes, we do learn from our mistakes but all too often we don’t do anything about it and that’s even worse!

BILL WATERS

Marquette