Posted on 01/13/2005 8:27:49 AM PST by Theodore R.
Will freedom work in Iraq?
Posted: January 13, 2005 1:00 a.m. Eastern
© 2005 WorldNetDaily.com
I share President Bush's hope that freedom will prosper in Iraq.
I agree with President Bush that freedom is the best way to deter war because free nations seldom attack one another.
I remain cautiously optimistic that the free election this month in Iraq will be a very important step toward reshaping the Middle East and countering the oppression and violence that has too often marked the history of the region.
However, as Americans we need to realize freedom is about more than elections.
The founding fathers taught us that even the best devised government with all the appropriate checks and balances on power is wholly insufficient for sustaining and expanding liberty.
They showed us that for a people to be truly self-governing, they must operate within a system of cultural morality.
In short, as professor of government Charles R. Kesler points out, there is a distinction between a right to be free and a capacity to be free.
While it is true that every human being on the planet, by nature, has a right to be free, it is equally true that not every human being on the planet has the moral capacity to be free.
The founders saw the creation of this new republic, a distinctly different kind of system than had ever existed before in the world, as a unique experiment in self-government.
It was clearly not a "democracy."
Yet, President Bush has consistently – and wrongly – used that term to describe what we are trying to achieve in both Afghanistan and Iraq. Believe me, democracy would be disastrous in either of these countries, just as it has proved disastrous every where it has been tried.
In the United States, our founders established a constitutional republic operating under the rule of law and the will of the people. It was a system devised to protect the rights of minorities as well as to be accountable to majority opinion.
It's time to ask what safeguards are in place in both Afghanistan and Iraq to protect minorities. It's time to ask whether a people divided by tribal loyalties, religious differences and cultural customs can overcome those barriers to peaceful co-existence and self-government. It's time to ask, bluntly, whether self-government can work for people not operating within a Judeo-Christian worldview.
It's worth noting that the new constitutions of both Iraq and Afghanistan pay tribute to Sharia law – Islamic law. Has there ever been a peaceful, self-governing nation in the history of the world operating under the confines – or even under the inspiration – of Islamic law?
If so, I'm not aware of it.
Even in the United States, where biblical morality has been under attack for at least 100 years, Americans are clearly losing their ability to govern themselves. We rely more and more on government coercion to keep the populace in line. Are we expecting too much for such experiments to work in places like Iraq and Afghanistan – nations that have no experience with self-government?
Frankly, I think we are.
This is why I believe the best solution for these nations is to break them up into smaller states.
Iraq is an artificial country. It was a creation of the imperial powers of the 20th century. Its borders were arbitrarily drawn on maps for reasons that have little to do with the best interests of the populace.
It seems self-evident to me that smaller nations, with homogeneous populations, have a much better chance of maintaining freedom and avoiding volatile internal conflict. Smaller nations are much less likely to attack their neighbors.
Is Iraq better off today than it was before liberation? Yes. Is Afghanistan better off today than it was before liberation? Yes. But the sacrifices we made to achieve these objectives were too great not to keep exploring better ways to keep the peace and expand freedom.
If you're as old as I am, you remember when the rebellions in Africa against Europeans were going to usher in self rule and freedom. It hasn't really worked out that way. One wonders if democracy is really a 'one size fits all' form of government. I don't think a successful democracy has ever been forced on a people from the outside.
I agree. And also democracy doesn't always equal freedom. Iran is a democracy.
The only other alternative is long term occupation in ALL the Mideast countries and we don't have near the manpower for that
Or at least an existence that will rise and fall on the merits and determination of a people, sans coercion.
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