“Do you often come here to mock the hippies?”

He likes living among liberals, he says. “Liberals from the sixties do a great job of creating all the comforts of life — gourmet food, specialty jams, the best environmentally conscious waters.”

Not that anyone is listening. Yoo has become the focus of national anger about every excess in the war on terrorism, and minds are made up. But dismissing him as a monster just means that we don’t have to think about why he did what he did. Grant him his good intentions, entertain the possibility that he did it to save lives, recognize the honor in his refusal to hide, and his story becomes a cautionary tale about the incremental steps that can lead a nation to disaster.