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You Don't Know Jack About Iraq
National Review ^ | March 9, 2005 | John Derbyshire

Posted on 03/09/2006 2:41:38 PM PST by curiosity

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1 posted on 03/09/2006 2:41:41 PM PST by curiosity
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To: curiosity

Poor sap. He actually admits he sides with George Will.


2 posted on 03/09/2006 2:46:46 PM PST by My2Cents ("The essence of American journalism is vulgarity divested of truth." -- Winston Churchill)
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To: Quilla

You might find this interesting.


3 posted on 03/09/2006 2:48:32 PM PST by curiosity
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To: curiosity
I do believe that over the past generation or so, we in the West have sunk into some seriously false beliefs about human nature.

Who has a better handle on human nature, Washington, Madison and Lincoln -- or John Derbyshire?

4 posted on 03/09/2006 2:49:19 PM PST by vbmoneyspender
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To: My2Cents
Poor sap. He actually admits he sides with George Will.

At least he's not deluding himself, unlike some people I know.

5 posted on 03/09/2006 2:49:33 PM PST by curiosity
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To: curiosity
In his 1958 novel Three's Company, Alfred Duggan told the story of Marcus Aemilius Lepidus

Great novel! In fact, I love all Duggan's historical novels. great reads. If you like Roman tales, "Founding Fathers" is a good one.

6 posted on 03/09/2006 2:49:35 PM PST by Cicero (Marcus Tullius)
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To: vbmoneyspender
Who has a better handle on human nature, Washington, Madison and Lincoln -- or John Derbyshire?

Actually, the three great men you cite had a very similar view of human nature as does John Derbyshire. They most emphatically rejected the notion that America's job was to spread democracy around the world. They also did not have any delusions that backward peoples, much less Mohammedans, could be democratized, unlike some of our leaders today.

7 posted on 03/09/2006 2:52:37 PM PST by curiosity
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To: curiosity

So is he comparing our military to Mao's secret police? That is the impression I got from this self-important a$$hat's drivel.


8 posted on 03/09/2006 2:54:56 PM PST by EricT. ("I reject your reality and substitute my own."-Adam Savage)
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To: curiosity

Yeah that experiment with the Colonists didn't seemed destined to success in 1777, 1779, 1812, 1861....


9 posted on 03/09/2006 2:55:34 PM PST by Diddle E. Squat
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To: curiosity

Yes, we should look to Lincoln, who wisely gave up and withdrew when it became clear that a civil war was inevitable and those slave owning savages in the South weren't capable of living under the single democracy created by those utopian but unrealistic colony revolutionaries (who let's remember were only supported by 1/3 of the Colonists.)

Oh wait....


10 posted on 03/09/2006 3:00:40 PM PST by Diddle E. Squat
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To: vbmoneyspender
Frankly,

I agree with Augustine over Rousseau on the core of human nature. I believe it to be evil.

Yet, I support the war in Iraq. Why? It is the right thing to do to spread liberty around the world. And, I do believe freedom is a universal desire.
11 posted on 03/09/2006 3:02:26 PM PST by rwfromkansas (http://xanga.com/rwfromkansas)
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To: vbmoneyspender

IOW, you could agree with both the founders and Derby about human nature (that in some ways it is at the core evil and at the same time longs for freedom etc.), something seemingly impossible....and support the war in Iraq.

I do.


12 posted on 03/09/2006 3:03:46 PM PST by rwfromkansas (http://xanga.com/rwfromkansas)
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To: vbmoneyspender

IOW, you could agree with both the founders and Derby about human nature (that in some ways it is at the core evil and at the same time longs for freedom etc.), something seemingly impossible....and support the war in Iraq.

Keep in mind that many of those who pushed for the Revolution early on were Calvinists who certainly did not believe in the good of mankind.

I am Calvinist myself, but I believe both things.


13 posted on 03/09/2006 3:04:36 PM PST by rwfromkansas (http://xanga.com/rwfromkansas)
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To: Diddle E. Squat
You're comparing the colonies to Iraq? Are you serious?

Let's see. On the one hand you've got a society of civilized, educated Christians, with a long tradition of self-government going back to the Magna Carta. On the other hand, you've got a backward society of Moslems who have known only totalitarianism their entire lives. Oh yes, so comparable.

Talk about deluded!

14 posted on 03/09/2006 3:09:22 PM PST by curiosity
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To: rwfromkansas
Keep in mind that many of those who pushed for the Revolution early on were Calvinists who certainly did not believe in the good of mankind.

Exactly, which is why they believed most societies could not handle democracy.

Supporting the Iraq war and supporting the delusions of our leaders taht we can somehow democratize the place are two completely different things.

I agreed Iraq was a strategic threat, and it was the right thing to remove Saddam. Attempting to replace him with a democracy is just downright insane, and it will fail.

15 posted on 03/09/2006 3:11:41 PM PST by curiosity
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To: rwfromkansas
It is the right thing to do to spread liberty around the world. And, I do believe freedom is a universal desire.

Freedom may be a universal desire, but very few societies can handle it. Those that can't, like Iraq, inevitably descend into chaos if you try to give them liberty.

If you want to create democracy in a place like Iraq, you need a strongman like Attaturk to pave the way. And even then, the democracy that results is quite tenuous.

16 posted on 03/09/2006 3:14:22 PM PST by curiosity
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To: curiosity

All three of those men believed humans naturally want liberty because that is how God created us. And our country has proven that all human beings, no matter their creed or color are capable of it. So have Latin Americans and Asians and Europeans. Derbyshire however believes that certain people are incapable of it, which is why he has in the past referred to Iraqis as being peasants. He has labelled them thus even though many Iraqis are fighting and dying for liberty in their country, which is a damned sight more than Derbyshire has ever done for the cause of liberty.


17 posted on 03/09/2006 3:15:15 PM PST by vbmoneyspender
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To: vbmoneyspender
All three of those men believed humans naturally want liberty because that is how God created us.

Yes, but all three most emphatically rejected the idea that all societies could handle liberty.

And our country has proven that all human beings, no matter their creed or color are capable of it.

I fail to see how. Please elaborate.

So have Latin Americans and Asians and Europeans.

Latin America? You've got to be kidding me! Yeah, Mexico, Argentina, Guatamala, the Haiti, yes, very healthy democracies.

The one country there that's got anything close to a healthy democracy had to be taken over and prepared by a dictator. I'll let you figure out which one I'm talking about.

Asia? Let's see. There's Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea. And the last two didn't become democratic until recently, and had to be prepared for it by what Pipes calls "democratically minded strongmen." Japan had to be nuked first. And all of them were thoroughly modernized and industrialized when time it happened. Hardly comparable to Iraq.

Derbyshire however believes that certain people are incapable of it, which is why he has in the past referred to Iraqis as being peasants.

A view he shares with our founding fathers.

He has labelled them thus even though many Iraqis are fighting and dying for liberty in their country,

Right, that's why Iraq doesn't have a single battalion that can operate independently.

18 posted on 03/09/2006 3:22:26 PM PST by curiosity
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To: Right Wing Professor

You might find this interesting.


19 posted on 03/09/2006 3:24:21 PM PST by curiosity
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To: curiosity

And yet 60% Muslim Malaysia works just fine. Generations that were born in and grew up in totalitarianism in Eastern Europe are successfully transitioning to democracies. Many of the democracies are only token Christian, witness bloody Ireland's recent success has occured during a notable decline in the churches there.

I'm not convinced that Iraq will succeed as a democracy, and I don't totally dismiss your arguments (there are grains of truth and history is replete with failures) but to be frank some of it comes across as based in plain ol' bigotry.


20 posted on 03/09/2006 3:24:42 PM PST by Diddle E. Squat
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