Posted on 02/23/2007 7:34:13 AM PST by Leisler
The easiest way to tell the difference between a liberal and a leftist is that a liberal cheers against his country only when a Republican is in the White House, while a leftist cheers against his country all of the time.
Take the 1999 Kosovo War, for example. If you'll remember correctly, the man in the White House at the time was Bill Clinton, a man who liberals believed could do no wrong. The Clinton State Department was unable to rally the UN Security Council to support the operation, so Cinton simply went ahead with it over international objections. The veto-wielding Russian Federation would have squashed any such mission to Kosovo if it had been given the chance, and it continued to protest the operation until its end.
If you believe that all military actions must be explicitly sanctioned by the almighty United Nations, you'd have to conclude that the Kosovo War was illegal under international law. So if the war in Kosovo was illegal, does that make Clinton and his administration "war criminals?" If you ask a liberal that question, he will say no. Ask a leftist, and he will say yes.
Therein lays the difference between a liberal and a leftist. Liberals are constantly contradicting themselves, and it's quite easy to prove that they lack any true principles. Their appraisal of any particular action hinges on who's doing it. The good guys (Democrats) are always right, and the bad guys (Republicans) are always wrong. Simply change the party in power, and liberals will change their minds on just about everything.
Leftists on the other hand, are a lot more consistent. They're consistently wrong, venomous, anti-American and misguided, but at least they're consistent. No matter who is in power, you can expect the leftists to take to the streets denouncing this guy or that guy as a "war criminal."
Liberals did not seem bothered by the lack of a UN mandate in 1999. By 2002, however, the approval of the UN was deemed absolutely imperative. President Bush went to the UN and pleaded his case to a corrupt international body. He finally secured UN Resolution 1441 with the unanimous consent of all 15 nations in the UN's governing Security Council. It clearly stated that Iraq was in material breach of its 1991 ceasefire, as well as 16 subsequent resolutions, and that Iraq had one final chance to come clean with UN inspectors. Iraq failed to do so.
Suddenly, some UN member states got cold feet. They had seemed so forceful with their ridiculous 17th resolution. But when you've cried wolf 16 times, people like Saddam Hussein don't take you seriously anymore.
That's doubly true when Saddam has key members of the UN and UN member states on his payroll through the Oil-for-Food Program. While all opposition member states claimed that they were against the war on principle, there is ample evidence that the real reason they wanted the dictator in power was because of monetary interests related to oil and weapons trading. The opposition members of the UN Security Council didn't oppose the war because Saddam lacked weapons of mass destruction but because they were on his payroll. In any case, 500 WMDs have been found in Iraq since 2003.
Bush went ahead with the war anyway. Was it illegal? Perhaps, but I don't really care. I oppose any attempt to turn over our national sovereignty to the UN, especially in its current state. If the Iraq War has proven anything, it's the incompetence and corruption of that international body. They were wrong about Kosovo, and they were wrong about Iraq. In both cases, disreputable member states such as Russia, China and France tried their best to shelter the despots Milosevic and Saddam. Study the history of the UN for awhile and you'll find that sheltering despots is what they do best.
I sometimes wonder if this entire mess in Iraq could have been prevented if Saddam had actually believed that the UN meant business. What if the UN had acted after the first resolution? What if they hadn't taken bribes? Could this have been resolved peacefully?
For all of you liberals out there who say that this war in Iraq is illegal, I say go arrest Bill Clinton. Arrest Wesley Clark, the supreme NATO commander in Kosovo and hero of the Democratic Party's left-wing. Once they're being taken away in handcuffs, we can discuss what to do with Bush and Rumsfeld. And to all of you leftists who say the same thing, I would say that the legality of the war is debatable, even if it is an incredibly stupid debate. The important point is not whether we did the legal thing, but whether we did the right thing.
Lack of a UN mandate may make a war "illegal," but it doesn't make it unjust, and it certainly doesn't mean that the war lacks the "unique legitimacy" that Kofi Annan is always talking about. The "unique legitimacy" we seek can never be procured from a body as illegitimate as the UN
great article.
So...there is an intelligent person in the Peoples Republic of Taxachusetts.
I like Ben...
Heck, there's lots of them. New Hampshire is full of them. ;-)
I'm surprised that ZooMass let this guy anywhere near their campus. Great article, though.
Yeah...I expect him to be run out of town on a rail shortly...
It wouldn't take much of a leap to say the 17th UN resolution authorized the removal of Saddam. The lack of yet another "final chance" doesn't make it "illegal". FWIW, the U.S. Constitution determines what the U.S. can do, not the U.N.
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