<<What is it that YOU believe? Do you believe in the right of sovereign nations to self determination. Cause if you believe in the right of other nations to choose their own, admittedly tortured and twisting paths to SELF-determination, then you surely don't believe that our leaders in Washington have the power, much less the right, to choose the governors and governments of other nations. >>
Ed:
My friend and soul brother, putting aside the rhetoric, here is the heart of our disagreement. Yes, I believe that our leaders have (1)the power and (2)the right to influence the government and institutions of other sovereign nations. No question we have the power. As to the right, we have the right because (I believe) it is in our self-interest to promote free and democratic societies.
1. Did we have the "right" to go to war with Germany to stop the genocide of a people?
2. Did we have the "right" to provoke Japan to war to stop their barbarity in China?
3. Did we have the right to overthrow the apartheid regime in South Africa.
4. Did we have the right to stop the ethnic cleansing in Bosnia?
5. Did we have the right to intervene in the government directed slaughter of Tutsis in Ruanda? (IMO we should have but didn't.)
6. Is George W's principled attempt to mobilize the world to stop the slaughter of both black Christians and muslim dissidents in the Sudan "right"? (Every "liberal" who knows anything about this ignored backwater of the world does, although disapproving of every other one of his policies. And "Europe", the black African and, of course Arab, states ignore it too.)
SO TELL ME, WHAT MORAL PRINCIPLE CAN YOU CITE FOR THIS "ISOLATIONIST" BELIEF THAT WE DON'T HAVE THE RIGHT?
Why do you feel that Iraq is a TABLA ROSA that every other world and historical force can influence, but the United States can not?
Sicily
Just for example, I know the historical forces - the centuries of foreign domination and repression - that led to the Sicily we have today: the mafia and that backward, hierarchal and distorted society. In such a society, an individual cannot exist free; he cannot exist as an individual at all. To me that society is "bad", and to hell with politically correct cultural relativism!
IRAQ
The many "peoples" of Iraq were dominated, exploited and suppressed for 500+ years by the Ottomans. Then "colonized" by the British who used the Sunnis to do their dirty work. Then 20 years under the benevolence of Saddam. So I do know something of the tribal and clannish influences that make life all but impossible for the free individual. To me that also is "bad."
So, tell me again why we do not have the right and power to intervene to make things better? Especially if it serves our selfish national interest? |
