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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Nadine Carroll who wrote (75944)	2/20/2003 11:56:47 AM
From: JohnM	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

No, Nadine, something called The Left did not oppose the Afghan war. Your evidence is (a) a New York Times report which was about means not ends (and I'll have to check with conspiracy central to see if the Times counts as "the left); as for British papers, the quotes you offer are also about means, not ends. You'll have to do better than that. As for Walzer, as I've typed before to you, I don't consider Walzer a terribly good source for telling us what "the left" thinks. I like some of his work, but there is a bitterness in him which appears in these kinds of commentaries which makes him less reliable. If you wish to assert "the left" opposed the ends of the Afghan war, you will need to do better than that. Got any minutes from those meetings of "the left?" The general message coming off those demonstrations, aside from "No War" was "It's All About OIL!, Bush is a Fascist, Israel is Fascist, Free Palestine, Bush is a bigger danger than Bin Laden, Bush is the Real Terrorist" If this is not the message preferred by most marchers, they should have done a better job forming a polictical opposition. I don't doubt you read them that way. But that's certainly not the prevalent view; not even close. Had that been the message, you would not now see Blair and the Italians working so hard for a second resolution. What we had post 9/11 was a burst of sympathy (from Europe) and a burst of schadenfreude from the Middle East. That doesn't naturally translate into sympathy for actually American policies anywhere, particularly if those policies include military intervention. As Mark Steyn said the other day, Saddam is just the MacGuffin. This argument is really about American power. We can try to be liked, or we can take action, any action. One or the other. Power breeds resentment. Oh, I completely disagree. As usual, Mark Steyn is wrong, somewhere beyond wrong. Those demonstrations were about the proper exercise of American power and Bush has convinced large portions of the globe that he will not do so. The contrast with Clinton is remarkable.