The virtue of changing your mind

From last weeks episode of Real Time with Bill Maher:

BILL MAHER: Let me try to ask a semi-serious question, because the big knock against Kerry is that he’s a flip-flopper; because sometime between the ages of 18 and 60, he’s changed his mind. [laughter] And he said - he addressed this last night. He said, "I know there are those who criticize me for seeing complexities." And he does sometimes change his mind. I’m asking if this is a bad thing.

And a good example is Vietnam. He went to Vietnam because as a young man, he thought that was the right thing to do. He saw what was going on in Vietnam, came back, threw his medals away, changed his mind. Is it wrong that a guy goes to the slaughterhouse and comes back a vegetarian? Isn’t that what thinking people do? They change their-I’m asking. [applause] [cheers]

FORMER CANADIAN PRIME MINISTER CAMPBELL: If you never change your mind - if you never change your mind, it means you never learn from experience, and that’s really frightening.
...

BILL MAHER: Okay, let me ask, this virtue of being resolute. I agree that, you know, when it comes to what a guy stands for, it is easier to say President Bush stands for this and the other guy, Kerry, straddles. I mean, on death penalty, on abortion, on gay marriage, you’re right, I know where Bush stands. But what if a guy is resolute, but wrong? [laughter] You know, he’s got this great clarity about Iraq. But what if the picture that he’s looking at is the wrong picture? Then clarity isn’t such a good thing.

I mean, I may change my mind about campaign finance reform because I was always for it. But now I see they passed the law and they just got around it. There’s more dirty money in the system than ever. So I might change my mind on campaign finance reform. Does that make me a flip-flopper or a guy who just learned something? [applause]

*I also would have added the pertinent discussion that included words from Michael Moore and Republican Repressentative David Drier, but 1. I imagine just that Moore regardless of what he is saying would be a real put off to the point being made, and 2. I don't want the post being that freaking long. So I trimed it to the main point