Douglas was right, and Lincoln was wrong.
The context of course was the rebel execution of all black prisoners of war. Douglas (and others, including the editors of the Bloomington, IL Pantagraph) argued that the only possible way to stop the rebel war crimes was a tit-for-tat response.
Hezbollah has been attacked by pure-minded leftists in the u.s. for "war crimes" -- for its missile attacks on Israeli cities. In general, that is a bit foolish, since bombing civilians has been a central tactic of every single nation at war since the 1930s, including preeminently the U.S. But even aside from that, Hezbollah in fact has a duty to retaliate in kind for Israeli bombings of Lebanon, just as the Union Army in 1964 had a duty to respond in kind for rebel execution of black prisoners.
As to left critics of Hezbollah, we are again encountering what I have often called sandbox politics and what Yoshie has labelled "Resolutionary Socialism." Verbal criticisms of Hezbollah by u.s. leftists will have _no_ material impact in the world. They merely provide a bit of smug self-satisfaction on the part of the critic for his/her personal moral superiority.
Carrol