Arguments blaze, but fall short
3-25
To the editor:
In a rhetorical non-sequitur that could send a frog's mind into
convulsions of cognitive dissonance, Mr. Bud Forrest ("Real
traitor in the White House," 03-14) first makes the salient
point that "all men are created equal -period. Not just
we Americans - but even the Iranians, Iraquis, Palestinians,
Koreans, and so on." He then launches into a bitter denunciation
of the administration's plans to free Iraq from the clutches
of a ruthless tyrant who systematically oppresses his people
by means so vicious and diabolical as to warrant serious contemplation
of his removal even if no other circumstances made such action
so utterly necessary. All men are created equal? This he would
say with a straight face to the women of Iran, who under Islamic
law (wherein, incidentally, the notion that all men are created
equal simply cannot be found) are kept largely as slave-class
chattel to the infinitely more equal men of that society? All
men are created equal? This is supposed to argue in support of
the regime in North Korea?! Compare the lives of such equal men
on opposite sides of the DMZ. Tell Kim Jong Il that all men are
created equal - perhaps he is so busy grinding the faces of the
North Korean people into the dirt with the heel of his boot that
he simply hasn't heard the news yet. Furthermore, try arguing
to the South Koreans that the Korean War was a "no-win situation."
Their very existence should be sufficient rebuttal to that canard.
Just so, like so many space pebbles entering the Earth's atmosphere,
virtually all of Mr. Forrest's arguments ablate of their own
dearth of substance before they even penetrate the clouds of
confusion and befuddling resentment which shroud his world view.
Suggesting a president of such consummate artifice and monomaniacal
propensities as to render him an absurd caricature, Mr. Forrest
joins a very vocal fringe in America whose hysterical vituperations
belie a mental curvature so steep it is a notable achievement
when a recognizable thought escapes. And, of course, like space
pebbles, such thoughts travel nicely in a vacuum; and at great
velocities, no doubt, blithely bending and twisting their course
to the gentle contours of the vast emptiness of interstellar
space. Yet, encounter the slightest atmospheric resistance and
like a gumball in a decaying orbit they disintegrate instantly
into nothing, leaving nothing much at all to chew on.
And it is no wonder that such rhetoric finds a home here in the
rarefied air of the Ojai Valley, where the anoxic thinking of
the anti-war movement is displayed on a weekly basis in these
very pages, suggesting to me the possibility that some of us
here just might not be all that bright.
First of all, I challenge Mr. Forrest to delineate specifically
how "the Bush family stands to profit from oil or munitions"
by resuming a war against Iraq. Putting aside the sheer cost
in dollars, not only would it seem the most speculative and cavalier
of business ventures to initiate a war - with all of its uncertainties
and disruptions to the economic status quo - for purely personal
gain, but the circumstances in this case speak to the contrary.
In all of his "checking up on things," it is a wonder
that Mr. Forrest has not uncovered the fact that the U.S. oil
lobby has been pleading with the president to change his mind
on Iraq, out of concern for the disruption a war may cause in
the worldwide supply of crude oil. If Bush and "big-oil"
go hand in hand, "big-oil" has certainly got a sweaty
palm of the first degree over this issue.
Furthermore, if President Bush is as Mr. Forrest contends "a
business opportunist attempting to outmaneuver Saddam Hussein
at any cost, including the lives of people he has sworn to protect,"
either he has utterly hoodwinked the likes of Tony Blair (a left-wing
icon and erstwhile feather-in-the-breeze prior to his stance
on Iraq), Colin Powell, Condoleeza Rice, a preponderance of U.S.
Senators, Spain's Jose Maria Aznar, and the leaders of no fewer
than 18 other European nations, or surely the same charges apply
to each of these venerable individuals. The facile aspersions
cast by Mr. Forrest and his ilk, imputing such venal character
to those leaders who have staked their entire careers and reputations
on the unpopular argument that Saddam Hussein's regime is a dangerous
menace which needs to be finally confronted and dismantled, do
perfect justice to the mindset from which it emanates. That is
to say it is shameful, lewd, and utterly divorced from reality.
The United States does not want to involve innocents in any war
if it can be avoided. Tragically, the nature of our adversary
makes that avoidance unlikely. It is likely that we care more
for the people of Iraq than Saddam does - his record would indicate
as much - and as a result many civilians may be put needlessly
at risk. Surely, war is always tragic. But it is not always wrong.
In fact, lamentably it is sometimes a necessity. It is perplexing
to me how difficult this concept is for some people to grasp.
In this case, as in others, no doubt some men are simply more
equal to the task than others.
So while the Bud Forrests of America pour their molten anger
onto the opinion pages of newspapers and into the obliging microphones
at anti-war rallies across the country, making a travesty of
logic and rational thought, I am reminded of a recent night under
the stars watching space pebbles burn themselves across the sky
in a panoply of streaking lights: like the quality of the anti-war
movement's arguments, too insubstantial by any measure to really
affect anything on the ground, but the sheer number make for
quite a fiery display.
Lars Bentley
Ojai
Left's hypocrisy all too apparent
3-25
To the editor:
The left roars for equal rights for women, minorities and homosexuals.
It lauds free speech and an independent press as essentials of
civil society. The left is a guardian of the separation of church
and state and a watchdog of the judicial process. So it finds
itself in complete opposition to the nature of most Arab societies.
But in the face of this opposition, the left simply sticks its
head in the sand rather than confront the reality that as globalization
integrates the world order ever closer, we will quickly come
to a clash of civilizations unless the world comes to some sort
of agreement on universal values. The left has failed to say
that it will not stand for the oppression of women, the vicious
repression of human rights, and suppression of democratic principles.
The only thing it can come up with is a naive and dangerous blame-America-first
rhetoric as the root of all problems in the world today.
This hypocrisy is at its utmost in the case of Iraq. For years
the left criticized the U.N. sanctions against Iraq. They have
said that these sanctions left the Iraqi population debased and
demoralized, with dismal health care and a falling standard of
living. This decay of Iraqi society was due explicitly to Saddam
Hussein's exploitation of the sanctions to enrich himself on
the lucrative oil black market - building palaces instead of
buying food, and ignoring the suffering of his own people. The
left called the U.N.'s attempts to contain Hussein genocide.
Then, as America moved toward confronting Iraq over its failure
to disarm, those same voices from the left praised those sanctions,
speaking about them with a degree of reverence as the most intrusive
and effective sanctions in history.
Is the anti-war crowd willing to claim responsibility for the
negative end-results of their position? Are they willing to say,
"Yes, it's fine with us if Saddam Hussein and (quite possibly
down the road) Iran, Syria, and Saudi Arabia acquire nuclear
weapons"? Are they going to take responsibility for terrorists
getting their hands on nukes provided by one of these regimes
and using them on an American city? If five years from now Iraq
launches a nuke at Israel and Israel responds by launching two
dozen nukes at Iraq (perhaps at all of the countries that surround
Israel), is the anti-war crowd going to stand up and admit that,
"If only we would have taken out Saddam, this wouldn't have
happened"? Not if, but when countries like Pakistan, Sudan,
and Saudi Arabia stop cooperating with us and start openly supporting
terrorists again, is the anti-war crowd going to say, "Leaving
Saddam alone was worth it"? If Saddam decides to liquidate
the Kurds or continues to deliberately starve hundreds of thousands
of Iraqis to death, is the anti-war crowd going to proclaim,
"Keeping Saddam in power was so important that it was worth
the lives of all those people"?
Being taken seriously when you talk about foreign policy requires
that you do more than go to a protest march and wave your, "Bush
is Hitler" sign around. To really be worth listening to,
you've got to have a good understanding of the benefits and the
drawbacks of a position, and then you've got to make your decisions
accordingly. Whether you agree with them or not, the pro-war
voices in our country have been willing to tackle difficult questions
about the consequences of their policies. But, have the most
strident anti-war voices done the same thing? Have they acknowledged
the terrible risks of the "non-action" they advocate?
For the most part, the answer is, "no." Apparently,
shouting out bumper sticker slogans like "No Blood for Oil"
and trying to come up with creative new ways to compare Bush
to Hitler is more their speed.
Reality is punishing the left. When countless protesters claim
that the U.N. is our only moral choice, and the U.N. shows its
colors by appointing Libya to head the Human Rights Commission
- how can it get worse for them? Well, it will - once Iraq's
prisons open, the people cheer, documents are aired out, millions
fail to die and we turn our eyes to Iran. I hope this grand mental
breakdown eventually leads to a more coherent, thoughtful left.
What the protesters really display is an ignorance, fear, and
lack of respect for Arabs. Could so many people really think
that it is better to leave Iraqis under Saddam Hussein's vicious
tyranny than to liberate them from it?
Their protests suggest that it is not worth risking anything
at all to free Arabs. To risk spilling a single drop of blood
to liberate Iraq would be futile - not merely because it would
be "destabilizing" or "kill children," but
because the Arabs have no capacity for "Western" freedom
anyway. Behind the demonstrators' slogans is the assumption that
Arabs should be left alone because they don't mind being brutalised,
tortured, and murdered by a fascist thug like Saddam. Where they
come from, it is the natural order of things.
That line of thought is nonsense. More than that - it is racist
nonsense. No one knows better than the Arabs the horror of being
oppressed. No one knows better than they that tyrannical oppression
is all that they will get as long as Saddam and his family are
in power. Saddam's despotism is not a denial of "Western"
freedom, it's a denial of the freedom that every person needs
to be able to live a worthwhile life. To imagine that the Iraqis
don't want to be freed, or are not entitled to it, is simply
to suppose that they are less human than us.
So what the protesters are actually saying to the Arabs is what
the Arabs say to Israelis - you are pigs and monkeys not worthy
of respect.
In the last few weeks, I've tried to put myself in the shoes
of an anti-war protester.
If I were anti-war, I might oppose the Iraq effort for one or
more of several reasons: because I was a pacifist; because I
was devoted to the U.N. Security Council, whose approval was
paramount to me; because I believed in perpetual sanctions and
inspections; because I thought that Saddam Hussein could be contained.
But I would still reason, "Even though I'm against this
war, at least the Iraqi people will be free of Saddam Hussein.
At least a byproduct of our war will be the toppling of one of
the cruelest tyrannies of our time. No more torture chambers.
No more rape rooms. No more putting men through shredders. No
more cutting out of tongues for saying the wrong thing."
But you hear none of this from the antiwar protesters. Their
lack of compassion for the Iraqi people is staggering. It's almost
as though the continued torture and murder of innocents were
better than giving any credit to George W. Bush: the Texan, the
cowboy, the churchgoer, the villain, the warmonger.
We're all supposed to respect dissent. It is, indeed, part of
the American way! But I must confess that I perceive very, very
little to respect in the current armies of dissent. Henry David
Thoreau is dissent; this is madness and meanness.
Dennis Carmichael
Ojai
© 2003 The
Ojai Valley News
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