Jonah Goldberg says that we should have installed liberalism in Iraq, not democracy. There is a confusion between the two, and as he points out, introducing democracy in an illiberal society will not necessarily provide helpful results.
…many on the left see no problem singing the praises of leftwing regimes which put “equality” ahead of democracy. As Derb once put it, “Wherever there is a jackboot stomping on a human face there will be a well-heeled Western liberal to explain that the face does, after all, enjoy free health care and 100 percent literacy.” But regimes which put liberty and the rule of law ahead of democracy and the like are always immediately derided as dictatorial “strong-man” regimes. I’m not saying that such criticism isn’t sometimes accurate. After all, democracy is good and tends to innoculate against tyranny and without democracy enlightened regimes often go bad. But I would still have preferred to live under Pinochet than Castro or Lee Kuan Yew instead of Hugo Chavez (or, heh, the Hapsburgs than the Soviets).
As someone who still considers himself a classical liberal, that makes a lot of sense to me, given the often ugly choices of the real (as opposed to ivory-tower) world. It’s easy to overrate and overemphasize democracy. As Churchill once said, it’s the worst possible system, except for all the others.
And the windmills aren’t even real. Speaking as a supposed skeptic about God (he’s actually an atheist–that is, someone who not only doesn’t believe in God, but who actually believes that there is no God), Michael Newdow is an idiot:
Michael Newdow, the Sacramento, California lawyer and doctor who had previously launched a court challenge on behalf of his daughter over the phrase “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance said in schools, had argued that “In God We Trust” on monetary instruments violates his rights.
Newdow claimed that by using coins and currency bearing the phrase, he is forced to carry religious dogma, proselytise and evangelise for monotheism.
The black crepe is out at Kos. Read this, and particularly the second comment:
I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a look of misery and dejection on the face of my daughter as I just did a moment ago. She just couldn’t understand why the President would be going to Iraq when so many things are wrong in this country. “Doesn
Michael Barone says that Dems are winning everywhere except the polls.
To paraphrase Golda Meir, they’ll start to win elections again when they learn to love their country and its military more than they hate George Bush. Which probably means that they’re due for a long sojourn in the political wilderness.