Sometimes I find it hard to articulate why I think we're doing the right thing. But I think we are, even if the wrong man is doing it.
"The new American policy toward which the times have driven us is as radically different as our critics fear. It breaks with a failed and blood-soaked past. We have finally accepted that it is no longer enough to wait for enemies to attack first. We have accepted our unique responsibility to intervene abroad in the cause of global security and human rights.
And we have dispensed with a corrupt sham sustained by our critics: the notion that a dictator, no matter how cruel and illegitimate, is untouchable behind his "sovereign" borders."
Maybe it is a form of enforced Pax Americana. I don't think that that is necessarily a bad thing.
I have friends who argue that "they" hate us because of what we have done in the past. I don't think that's really true. I think they hate us for who and what we are. I think most of the protesters are sadly misguided. It all boils down to risks and dangers for me, and it is too dangerous for rogue states with Weapons of Mass Destruction and militant religious terrorist groups (who have proven that they are willing to use the methods of assymetrical warfare) to have us as an enemy. The possibility of rogue states allied with terrorist cells is too horrific to contemplate without doing something. If we did nothing to prevent this from coming about, then the results could be horrible beyond all imagining. If a major US city's subways were hit with anthrax, or god forbid, smallpox, at rush hour on a Friday, then the result could be deaths in a matter of days and weeks measured in the tens of thousands if not the millions.
There are only two possibilities. Either the kind of men who made 9-11 a reality can get their hands on W.M.D.s, or they can't. If we do nothing to try to stop them, then that is morally equivalent to helping them. All that is required for evil to grow is for good men to do nothing.
If the U.N. had its way, then we would be doing nothing right now. We would be "negotiating" with a tyrant who, by the very conditions of the ceasing of hostilities the first time, was required to dispose of all W.M.D.s. Can you negotiate with a tyrant? Can you negotiate with an illegitimate regime that holds on to power with fear and oppression? Should you?
I don't particularly like Bush. I don't really trust him in some ways. But I think what he's doing is necessary for the safety of the United States and the world community.
"The new American policy toward which the times have driven us is as radically different as our critics fear. It breaks with a failed and blood-soaked past. We have finally accepted that it is no longer enough to wait for enemies to attack first. We have accepted our unique responsibility to intervene abroad in the cause of global security and human rights.
And we have dispensed with a corrupt sham sustained by our critics: the notion that a dictator, no matter how cruel and illegitimate, is untouchable behind his "sovereign" borders."
Maybe it is a form of enforced Pax Americana. I don't think that that is necessarily a bad thing.
I have friends who argue that "they" hate us because of what we have done in the past. I don't think that's really true. I think they hate us for who and what we are. I think most of the protesters are sadly misguided. It all boils down to risks and dangers for me, and it is too dangerous for rogue states with Weapons of Mass Destruction and militant religious terrorist groups (who have proven that they are willing to use the methods of assymetrical warfare) to have us as an enemy. The possibility of rogue states allied with terrorist cells is too horrific to contemplate without doing something. If we did nothing to prevent this from coming about, then the results could be horrible beyond all imagining. If a major US city's subways were hit with anthrax, or god forbid, smallpox, at rush hour on a Friday, then the result could be deaths in a matter of days and weeks measured in the tens of thousands if not the millions.
There are only two possibilities. Either the kind of men who made 9-11 a reality can get their hands on W.M.D.s, or they can't. If we do nothing to try to stop them, then that is morally equivalent to helping them. All that is required for evil to grow is for good men to do nothing.
If the U.N. had its way, then we would be doing nothing right now. We would be "negotiating" with a tyrant who, by the very conditions of the ceasing of hostilities the first time, was required to dispose of all W.M.D.s. Can you negotiate with a tyrant? Can you negotiate with an illegitimate regime that holds on to power with fear and oppression? Should you?
I don't particularly like Bush. I don't really trust him in some ways. But I think what he's doing is necessary for the safety of the United States and the world community.
posted by Peter at 4:56 PM
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