September 18, 2003
THE MINNESOTA MUST-READ
Lileks ... he so good:
Posted by Tim Blair at September 18, 2003 09:53 PMIn short: the same people who chide America for its short-attention span think we should have stopped military operations after the Taliban was routed. (And they quite probably opposed that, for the usual reasons.) The people who think it’s all about oil like to snark that we should go after Saudi Arabia. The people who complain that the current administration is unable to act with nuance and diplomacy cannot admit that we have completely different approaches for Iraq, for Iran, for North Korea. The same people who insist we need the UN deride the Administration when it gives the UN a chance to do something other than throw rotten fruit.
The same people who accuse America of coddling dictators are sputtering with bilious fury because we actually deposed one.
Oh well, it is Uncle Sam's duty to coddle dictators: after all, not only Al Qaeda but leftoids need to be assured Ammerikka is evil.
Posted by: d at September 19, 2003 at 10:02 AM"Snark'', indeed. Caz, take a bow, as Frank Zappa would say: "I know when I've been Lileked...all over.''
Posted by: slatts at September 19, 2003 at 12:11 PMI've been having this discussion with a couple of Euroweenies.
"So just how is giving Saddam the boot a bad thing?"
"Pinochet!"
"What?"
"The U.S. supported Pinochet, an evil dictator!"
"Yeeeees... And?"
"America is evil!"
"But they removed Saddam, which is a good thing."
"No, it's a bad thing!"
"Because?"
"America is evil! They supported Pinochet!"
And so on.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at September 19, 2003 at 04:48 PMTo be fair to the Left, the best interpretation I can make of their position is not so much that they oppose America either coddling dictators or deposing dictators but that they don't like the idea of America deciding, on its own, and for its own interests, which dictators it will coddle and which it will support.
So if America was trying to topple Allende today (or Hugo Chavez, the nearest analogy), I'd be out there on the streets waving placards, albeit probably not balloons filled with piss. But stopping the USA getting rid of Saddam Hussein? It'd be as if feminists said "We don't want laws against domestic violence, because these will be enforced by the police, and in the past the police have shown that they too can be violent and misogynist".
Posted by: Unlce_Milk at September 19, 2003 at 05:38 PMRonald Reagan (quoted in The Federalist):
"I had a copy of the Soviet Constitution and I read it with great interest. And I saw all kinds of terms in there that sound just exactly like our own: 'Freedom of assembly' and 'freedom of
speech' and so forth. Of course, they don't allow them to have those things, but they're in there in the constitution.
"But I began to wonder about the other constitutions - everyone has one - and our own, and why so much emphasis on ours. And then I found out, and the answer was very simple ... but it is so great that it tells the entire difference. All those other constitutions are documents that say, 'We, the government, allow the people the following rights,' and our Constitution says 'We the People, allow the
government the following privileges and rights.' We give our permission to government to do the things that it does. And that's the whole story of the difference - why we're unique in the world and why no matter what our troubles may be, we're
going to overcome."