“The Decent Opinion of Mankind”

In announcing his campaign for the Presidency in late 1967, Senator Eugene McCarthy assailed the war in Vietnam on the grounds that it was opposed by the “decent opinion of mankind.” That’s an interesting phrase, when you think about it: and one that’s been at the core of Democratic foreign policy ever since. American policy can be legitimate, the left holds, only so long as “decent opinion” supports it. But who defines “decent opinion”? The hard-working, hard-fighting Americans who are willing to stand up against tyranny or the limp-wristed, faint-hearted Europeans who want to see the “nuance” in evil?

This is not an irrelevant question. It is, in fact, at the very core of this election. While George W. Bush is probably not as hated around the world as some would suggest (I’ve used my Bush-Cheney ’04 coffee mug at work every day for several months without being attacked on it), it is certainly true to a great degree. Why, just the other day, a local Moslem took such great offense at my two pro-Bush bumper stickers that he followed my car for several blocks, screaming anti-American obscenities at me: with his mother in the car, I might add. He stopped (and drove off) only when I got out of my car at a stop light. Some warrior for Allah he was.

Of course, I’ve just wandered off-topic. But it seems to me that my little tiff does cut right into the heart of the matter: many Americans look down upon their countrymen. They seek approval from sophisticated and cynical Europeans, from wise and worldly Orientals, and from the deep and spiritual followers of various foreign religions. George W. Bush certainly carries with him the support of none of the following. I very much doubt if any Western Moslem would respond violently to a “John Kerry for President” sticker. While I simply regard any such outburst of violent conduct on the left as a manifestation of their collective insanity, a great many Americans: even normally decent ones, assume that the bizarre response of my Moslem friend (one which, to varying degrees is repeated the world over) means that there must be something wrong with George Bush.

They take the hate that these degenerate gaijin feel towards President Bush as a sort of personal insult. He represents America, and they hate him, so they hate us because of him. They feel that his unpopularity implicates them as well. It pains them that their President, unlike the wise and sophisticated William Jefferson Clinton, is roundly mocked at fashionable Paris dinner parties. The(y) are embarrassed, like the rube who picks up the wrong fork.

The latest meme floating about is “sophisticated foreigners support John Kerry for President.” A cover story in Canada’s Maclean’s magazine focused on this point: other stories in the European press (including in the London Spectator, one of my favorite magazines) have tried to hammer this home. Foreigners like John Kerry; they appreciate his approach to the issues. His cousin if France’s former Minster of the Environment. On the orders of Kim Jong Il North Korean state radio has been approvingly replaying his speeches.

This, in general, is viewed by the average American as a positive. Who, after all, doesn’t like being popular? Shouldn’t all nations want that? Why should America hurt the feelings of its friends? These are not points which are going to sway conservatives, but they will sway those people the Democrats need to lie to in order to win in November: stupid people.

I have essentially zero doubt that all sorts of foreigners would fawn over John Forbes Kerry just as they did over Bill Clinton. His “intelligence” and “sophistication” would be constantly touted. This, of course, would come with a price.

In exchange for the adoration of these people, a President Kerry would have to essentially do their bidding in foreign policy. In a Kerry Administration, the foreign policy agenda would be jointly set by Europeans, the United Nations, and various people at the State Department who, based upon their demonstrated level of patriotism, may well be in the pay of one of the former.

For the Republic to forge its foreign policy with the goal of seeking the support of the “decent opinion of mankind” would bring about results similar to those of a high school girl who screws every guy in sight: it would bring a temporary boost in popularity, but at the price of dignity, honour, and health.

I(f) a genius is shipwrecked with fifty retards, the genius will make himself unpopular by behaving normally: so ought he decide to behave like a retard for the sake of popularity? Should he join them in diapers and forget all he knows?

Any person with half a brain ought to see that the fact that President Bush is disliked in much of the rest of the world means that the nation is on the right track. After all, if the rest of those countries knew a damned thing about managing themselves and their relationships with others, there wouldn’t be so many problems in this world for America to fix. If you want to see how well a European approach to the world will work in the future, take a look at the history of the former Yugoslavia before the United States got militarily involved. The European approach to foreign policy, such as it is, is based upon the firm and sound principle of talking vaguely tough and then never actually doing anything. Belgrade is only a few hours from Berlin: yet the Europeans let the killing go on for years. Do you really think that these people can teach us a single thing about fighting terrorism?

There is only one truly “decent opinion” today: the American opinion. Everyone else is stupid, misguided, ignorant, or aligned with the forces of evil. Now, of course, this sort of statement will raise the blood pressure of sophisticates the world over. “Why, the world can’t be reduced to black and white, good and evil,” they will say. But they are utterly wrong: between freedom and slavery there can be no choice. The deliberately confuse the murkiness of means with the clearness of ends. “They bomb, we bomb,” they say, “so aren’t we all the same?” This sort of foolish and juvenile moral equivalency runs in their blood. They can see no difference between an evil bomb, loosed by Moslems, which kills thousands of American civilians or a righteous American bomb which blows Islamist fighters, or their supporters, or their sympathizers, straight into a fiery hell. “Both are bombs,” they say. But one is Godly, and one is not. One is moral: and the other is not. They refuse to distinguish between a few unfortunates, collateral damage in the parlance of the day, who tragically are required to involuntarily give their lives in America’s righteous cause and deliberately murderers Americans and Israelis. They fail to distinguish between the event and the response. The blood of all who die in this war is on the hands of the Islamist, for it is he who has initiated the battle.

The “decent opinion” of mankind is nonsense, a shield to provide armor to the beliefs of cowards, traitors, and seditionists. There is only one “decent” opinion; there is only one acceptable option: George Walker Bush must be re-elected. Only he can take this battle the enemies of all decent men. Only he can make them suffer for (their) sins.

My “decent opinion” is this. If re-elected, George Bush will, in the words of Stonewall Jackson, make our forces the army of the living God, and his country. We will strike out and destroy the evil that threatens us. American simplicity must carry the day over foreign “sophistication” and nuance.

Adam Yoshida appears to be unaware of the first use of the phrase "a decent respect for the opinion of mankind"...

It appears in the first paragraph of the Declaration of Indepedence:

When in the Course of Human Events, it becomes necessary for one People to dissolve the Political Bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the Powers of the Earth, the separate and equal Station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent Respect to the Opinions of Mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the Separation.

I actually think this strengthens Yoshida's point: just as the Framers took it upon themselves to explain their Declaration of Independence, so should Democrats (certainly one aspiring to be president) explain themselves, their positions, and their arguments with the current president when it comes to how we should be fighting the war on terror. The same should be required of the French, Germans and other critics -- how can they defend their pacifism (sp?) and critiques of US policies which uphold UN resolutions and requirements?

But the bottom line is: none of these have a Decent Respect for the Opinions of Mankind -- at least not the Mankind (i.e. Silent Majority) that doesn't agree with them. Like the Hollywierd Left: those of us in Flyover Country don't matter, certainly our opinions, morals and ethics don't matter. This is the Great Divide of our Time.

Thanks for including me in Yoshida ping.

I am too annoyed by this notion that we can't be right if everybody else disagree. History is full of examples of great scientists/inventors who were laughed at by everybody around but who we know now were right. Or another example: Israel, universally condemned by the UN as the most repressive country in the world. Is it really?

What helps in a discussion, is to go to the details. On what grounds France opposed regime change in Iraq? What motives Russia had? How is their position better than ours? If left alone, what [fill in the blank] would do? If US did not check USSR every step throughout the world, but retreated quietly into our borders, what color the world would be now?
If US troops pulled out of Korea, what would happen there?

You know the answers. But it is an interesting exercise to pull an honest answer out of our opponents.

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