October 18, 2005
Does the American Left Even Believe in Democracy?
I have begun to wonder if the left even believes in democracy anymore. Never has this been more evident then in their reaction to our ongoing efforts in Iraq. No success goes without being mocked or denigrated. When the governing body was selected to draft the Iraqi constitution, the elections were ridiculed because a large portion of a minority representing 20% of the population stayed away from the polls even though the vast majority of the Iraqi people participated on threat of death. Now we have another election in which literally every segment of Iraqi society voted (including those that boycotted last time) and the election is denigrated because this same small minority did not get its way. This is like complaining that an election in America was invalid because the results lacked the majority approval of the Libertarian party.
Later I hear a guy on the radio asking Rush if he would be willing to live under the Iraqi constitution. Rush handled the call poorly but the answer is simple. I can honestly say yes if the alternative was Sadam or any of the other repressive Arab options available. It is not the search for a democratic path or elections causing the current strife, it’s murderers with no plan but death. I suppose he thinks choosing chaos and civil war is preferable. Iraqi democracy may not be perfect but its better then the past or other regional options. Expecting perfection before acting is a conscious decision to do nothing. He later went on to call democracy mob rule and further to rant about mob rule in America. The callers contempt for democratically elected government whether in Iraq or here in the US was obvious.
As a rule I do not always like the results of elections but I firmly believe in the process and am more then willing to accept the results until I get a new opportunity to change them. You will never hear me denigrate free elections which are obviously going on in Iraq and here in America. I can understand the left not supporting the mission there. What I cannot understand is their disdain for Iraqi efforts at establishing a democratically elected government. Do they really hate democracy so much?
Carnival of the Trackbacks XXXIV
Posted by Sid at October 18, 2005 12:41 AM | Politics
Comments
I do not understand the left's position on Iraq at all. They wanted to leave Hussein in power knowing he was a mass murderer. Where is their caring and empathy for the people in Iraq. Even if all of the reasons Bush acted were completely incorrect the desire to help others should have had some appeal. Now they want the minority that contains many of the same people that supported a mass murderer to have more power. That is insane. There is no way the Kurdish or the Shiite people would ever allow the Sunni minority to have power over them again.
Maybe the people of Iraq should have had themselves put on the endangered species list so that the radical left would care about helping them.
Posted by: jeff at October 18, 2005 09:07 AM
A signifigant portion of the anti-war left are not so much against war as they are for us losing. To them, America is the major source of oppression and injustice in the world. Everyone in the world who is suffering is, according to them, doing so in some roundabout way because of American capitalist imperialism. It stems from their zero-sum game view of economics -- i.e., if we're rich, then that means other people are poor because we're hogging all the wealth. And if those suffering people happen to be under the heel of a brutal dicatator, well, that's our fault too, and even if it wasn't, (fill in the blank) dictator isn't as bad as Bushitler.
It isn't so much "insane" as it is flat out evil. They've made the decision that imposing their "fair" system is *the most* important thing, bar none. They don't care a whit for the wishes of other people, because they're convinced they know better than the rest of us lowly peons.
Posted by: Tim in PA at October 22, 2005 12:39 PM
I have read the story and comments and now I will add my two cents worth.
The main reason the left hates what we are doing in Iraq and elsewhere, is that it thwarts their plans for a one world government. They want a world where everyone is on an equal footing. *cues up the anthem of the lefties, “Imagine” by John Lennon.
That will never happen. By nature, the human animal is competitive and will remain so. That is why we have had wars through out the unwritten and written history of mankind. I suspect that this will remain true as long as we dominate the planet Earth. So no amount of crying and tearing out of hair will not stop human nature. The sooner the left realizes that, the sooner we will all get along much better.
Posted by: stan25 at October 22, 2005 02:23 PM
