If I understand you, I think I do, all people are bad… but some people are really really bad.

 I see several problems.  First your example of a not so bad sin is a man who takes great pride in his yard.  Now this is probably not the only sin this guy commits.  He probably commits other worse sins.  But if it were the only sin he committed and if he doesn’t find Christ then he will burn for eternity.  He will burn for eternity for thinking he has the best damn yard in town.  The guy who commits murder… even Hitler… he gets the exact same sentence:  eternal damnation.  I am not trying to argue that God is not just or that God is a complete rat.  I am simply trying to suggest that these “very minor sins” are pretty serious.  I am not sure we really understand the absolute nature of good and evil.

My second and very much related point is to highlight your use of the word “huge”.  You say there are “huge” differences in the amount of evil in different people.  You know as well as I do that the word “huge” has no meaning whatsoever without a reference.  In this case you are comparing the immorality of Hitler to the immorality in normal people.  You say that Hitler’s immorality is “huge” relative to, say, my immorality.   But the business of salvation is not based on MY level of immorality or even Mother Theressa’s.  Absolute morality involves a comparison to Christ, not to me or Pope Benedict or anyone else.  When you compare different people to Christ the differences are really quite small.  A proton is huge relative to an electron, but it is just a proton.  I may be a paragon compared to Hitler, but I am still completely worthy of damnation.  N’est pas?

So given that people are inherently corrupt shouldn’t we be very careful about comparing good people (us) to bad people (them).  Didn’t Christ say this explicitly?  What is that in Mr. Ledeen’s eye anyway?

When Ledeen says that many people, even whole societies are evil, isn’t that anti Christian?  Isn’t that God’s business to determine?  Isn’t Ledeen being blasphemous?