Victor Davis Hanson Ping !
Let me know if you want in or out
Posted on 05/01/2005 3:10:04 AM PDT by mal
On March 14, at about the same time Western antiwar groups were organizing their annual spring demonstrations against American efforts in the Middle East, nearly a million Lebanese, including Sunni Muslims, Druze, and Christians, took to the streets of Beirut. Unlike the unhappy and despairing Westerners marching in the large cities of Europe and the United States over the last three years, the cheerful and idealistic Lebanese were not bearing placards of George W. Bush made to look like Adolph Hitler. Nor did they shout condemnations of the “Zionist entity.”
Instead, at some risk to themselves, the demonstrators in Beirut demanded the withdrawal of Syrian troops and the creation of a legitimate government in an independent Lebanon. In this brave effort, they were following in the footsteps of an earlier, spontaneous Lebanese protest over the February 14 assassination, almost certainly at the order of Damascus, of Rafik al-Hariri, the country’s former prime minister. In sheer numbers, their March 14 outpouring dwarfed not only that February demonstration but a much publicized, Syrian-sponsored turnout by supporters of Hizballah just a week before.
(Excerpt) Read more at commentarymagazine.com ...
Man, I've had it up to here with this democracy cure-all snake-oil everyone's hawking. Quick question: How would the people of the Middle East vote on the following questions (the people, not our fantasy of giddy and gracious liberated people):
- Should the U.S. leave Iraq?
- Is it fair to compare Israel's treatment of Palestinians to the Nazi's treatment of Jews?
- Do Arab nations have the same right to an atom bomb as Ariel Sharon?
- Is Osama bin Laden a terrorist or hero?
Yeah, I thought so. And you want them to have democracy? Why was it that everyone from Plato to Nietzsche to the founding fathers considered "democracy" a dirty word? What does GW know that they don't? Every time I hear this talk of "spreading democracy" I wince.
printing it out for study
thanks
first you have to give people freedom, attitudes change over time when you have that. One step at a time.
Just think in 200 years they will become just like America today!
(I'm not sure if that's a good thing, lets hope they are a bit smarter and keep lefties out)
You're quite the optimist. I'm not. I can think of other outcomes: Wasn't Hitler elected by a democracy?
"Wasn't Hitler elected by a democracy?"
As a matter of fact, no. The election of Hitler is one of those "facts" that EVERYBODY knows, but just isn't so.
The Germans that election elected national hero Paul Von Hindenberg. The nazi party only garnered about a third of the vote, but the field marshall thought it good politics to placate this minority by APPOINTING Hitler to the post of Chancellor.
If Hindenberg had been less a soldier and more a politician this might have been a good idea too.
Chill out fellow Pink Flyod fan. When people write "democracy" they don't really mean democracy, which is something akin to mob rule. They mean "representative government". It sucks, but it's better than anything anyone else has come up with.
And I submit to you that South Korea, though far from perfect, with its representative government is a much better country than either North Korea or Vietnam, which do not have representative governments. Then there's Japan and Germany; then there's the countries of Eastern Europe, all becoming better than before because of representative government and all because of American actions. You'd be hard pressed to find a country in the world that hasn't benefited from American forien policy (I can think of one.)
Re the PEOPLE of the Middle East. You may be right, but remember, only about 1/3 of the people in the U.S. colonies in the late 1700s supported breaking away from England. Most of the people in the Middle East simply don't understand what they've never had.
I can think of other outcomes
There are (and never were) any guarantees in this thing. The alteratives to spreading freedom to this part of the world are...what? Turning (say) Syria into a glowing hole in the ground? Slaughter 30-40 million people?
Woodrow Wilson babbled about "spreading democracy." Some historians argue that his disastrous foreign policy paved the way for Stalin, Hitler, and sundry demons of the 20th century. Of course Wilson couldn't have known that. In principle, "spreading democracy" sounds like a grand thing. The problem is our lack of crystal balls.
The devil you know is better than the devil you don't.
"The problem is our lack of crystal balls."
True, there is always the law of unintended consequences which I'm sure raise it's head, but once again I ask what your alternative is?
Also there a major differences between the way Wilson and Bush are spreading democracy/freedom. It appears (at this time) to be actually working.
Let me know if you want in or out
It follows (you offered no alternative) that you think we should do what ... colonize them?
As usual ... ping bump & thanks.
if they're not fit for democracy, it won't last. everyone has an inalienable right to freedom. what he does with it and the consequences thereof are his issue.
Sounds like some people in this country.
I was just thinking that the U.S. started out under a monarchy. The U.S. wasn't perfect at first (still isn't, of course). There were many practices then we would consider unacceptable today (slavery for one). It took a while to get where we are, but we had to start someplace.
Thanks. Think I'll just sit back and uh...listen.
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