But he ignores some very large points to make his.

1) The deaths of Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru. For one, they did not know the droids were fugitive droids. They don't even select them, Luke does (and he has no conscious way of knowing anything about them, only the Force saying "pick these droids". As far as harboring Luke, as far as we can tell in the movies (Which is the evidence this author is using), Vader does not look for his children or seem to be inclined do. He does not know Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru are housing Luke and he was unlikely to have anything to do with their execution in the first place. Therefore their status as "traitors" is entirely irrelevant and only visible through the eyes of movie-goers (and subjective at that!).

2) Alderaan was CANON a peaceful planet and always was. It was well known for being such. If you read some of the "behind of the scenes" writing and development, it's clear this is how it was always intended to be. Furthermore, Tarkin never indicates that they have any belief that Alderaan has anything to do with the Rebellion. He needed a way to test the Death Star. He needed the information out of Leia. He went to Leia's home world that has also never been a fan of the Empire and laid out a cruel ultimatum. Leia attempts to save her cause and her planet and he calls her bluff...and exchanges the lives of millions (Trillions of you count flora and fauna) for information he does not even receive. Additionally, he probably caused the Rebellion to gain support from any similarly-minded allies of Alderaan who were on the fence about giving support to the Rebellion or simply resenting the Empire. So it wasn't even a great decision at all.


Then there's the point Ghav brought up...Order does not equal Good. The Empire is clearly Lawful Evil, Lawful Neutral at best. You know, it could even be that Palpatine had what he called "good intentions" at the heart of it. We can't really know and most of the Expanded Universe has declined to indicate such.

And both in the Canon and the Expanded Universe, the Dark Side is clearly shown to be at least considered "evil". There's a great deal of philosophy on the subject, but the general consensus by the actual writers is Dark Side=Evil Side. Thus if you consider it "negative energy", It would be totally likely that Palpatine started as a Sith with "good" intentions that he still believes are good...but the Dark Side twisted him so his actions no longer fit what he originally desired.



When it comes to the general argument of "what's better, Dictatorships or Republics", the author makes some good points...but he doesn't make them in the context of the movie very well.