One of our letter-writers today asks, "How can a group of people be so ‘pro-life’ when it comes to the unborn and so ‘pro-death’ where our young soldiers are concerned?"
Let’s set aside the hyperbole and zero in on the assumption that most people across the political spectrum share — the assumption that opposition to abortion is a "conservative" position, and so is support of the war in Iraq, while all "liberals" will take the opposite views on both issues.
One reason I reject current notions of "left" and "right" is that I think we’ve got it all bollixed up. To me, opposition to abortion is the ultimate bleeding-heart liberal position, and so is support for using our military power to deliver other peoples from tyranny. (It’s precisely what Wilson, Roosevelt and Kennedy would have done.) Those happen to be two liberal positions I agree with, while I simultaneously hold many conservative views (true conservative views, not the things we call by that name these days).
Help me understand why most folks get it backwards. Or why I do.
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Brad;
Not trying to curry favor but allow me to start by saying IO find the editorial page of The State one of SC’s true treasures. All of you do great work and I have only been terribly dissapointed in the reasoning behind your positions once in the last year or so- I found the logic to endorse Bush for re-election escapist. I do disagree with many positions but rarely the logic.
Now to my point. Whether liberal or conservative is the term you use to denote someone’s position- support for fetal life and pro military do seem to share the same adherents. As you are a Catholic, I understand your position on the former, I do not on the latter. I do believe these are opposing viewpoints on the sanctity of life. However, having a religious label attached to a person doesn’t always mean they can be defined. I am a Methodist, one of the more “liberal” mainline denominations but don’t tell that to most of my fellow members at Trenholm Road.
I’m not sure I agree with your statement about Kennedy, but if Bush truly believes in delivering folks from tyranny we should be hearing more from huim about Sudan- see Nicholas Kristof, New York Times.
Thanks for reading
When I write on my own blog about politicians who seem to favor government social programs to fix all that is wrong with the world, I try to always refer to them as “leftists” or “the left” rather than liberals, because there is a more classic meaning of the word “liberal”, as it relates to “liberty” and freedom, as opposed to the more contemporary meaning having to do with unrestrained government spending.
I would consider libertarians like Larry Elder to be “liberal” in that classic sense, since they promote maximum individual liberty and minimal government involvement in our daily lives. Someone like that also might be referred to as a social liberal and a fiscal conservative.
It is this sense of the word that the President uses when he espouses fostering the growth of “liberal democracies” around the world. It could also be argued that he is strengthening our national defense by doing so. When was the last time we went to war against another democracy?
Unfortunately our purpose in invading Iraq was not to “deliver peoples from tyranny.”
To KC:
It’s the reason I was for the war. At the time, it was most often referred to as “regime change.” (You may recall, unless you are afflicted with selective memory, that in the fall of 2002 the administration was criticized for seeming to have a different reason every day for invading Iraq. The truth was, there were many reasons to do it. The one that mattered most to me was the goal of transforming the Mideast.)
Not that it was totally altruistic. 9/11 taught us that the policy we had followed for the past 50 years and more — promote “stability” in the Mideast so the oil would keep flowing — was not only short-sighted, but positively suicidal. The status quo in the Mideast was repressing the people of those nations, and such conditions produce the terrorism that burst upon us early in this decade.
We had to take a whole new approach, one oriented toward dramatic change. I believe it’s Tom Friedman who likes to say that what we had to do was “drain the swamps” that breed fatalism and hatred. The first swamps were Afghanistan and Iraq.
— Brad Warthen
9/11 taught us that the policy we had followed for the past 50 years and more — promote “stability” in the Mideast so the oil would keep flowing — was not only short-sighted, but positively suicidal.
I wonder it will take to teach us that a policy of 1) pretending a toothless dictator poses a massive threat to us; 2) invading his country; 3) bombing civilian neighborhoods in hopes of nailing the dictator; 4) unleashing fundamentalist thugs; 5) in advance of steps 1 through 4, failing to take any steps whatsoever to protect the country’s infrastructure or cultural treasures, and 6) rounding up the country’s civilians and wantonly abusing them in a notorious prison, and then, when we get caught, failing to hold any high level military officials accountable is probably not a real good recipe for our future security.
You may recall, unless you are afflicted with selective memory, that in the fall of 2002 the administration was criticized for seeming to have a different reason for invading Iraq.
You mean a reason other than “regime change?” Perhaps I am afflicted with a selective memory, because I’m not sure what you’re talking about (or why it’s relevant). Could you be more specific? What criticism? From whom?
I believe it’s Tom Friedman who likes to say that what we had to do was “drain the swamps” that breed fatalism and hatred. The first swamps were Afghanistan and Iraq.
Afghanistan, sure – but Iraq? How many of the 9/11 terrorists hailed from IRAQ?
Or had any connections whatsoever to Iraq?
Invading Iraq on those grounds is like beating up the newspaper boy after the mailman runs over your dog.
By the way, Mr. Warthen, despite my impertinence, I really do appreciate your permitting open comments here. Y’all are either real gutsy or you don’t know what you’re getting into. 😉 I myself will endeavor to be no more than a minor nuisance here.
KC
You have class.
“Invading Iraq on those grounds is like beating up the newspaper boy after the mailman runs over your dog.”
Your friend,
TMNS
Don’t forget that it was that “toothless dictator” who did this.
Good point about the SUDAN. I view that region to be what Osama was shooting for in this country on 9/11/01. This country (in my humble opinion) is engaged in a “holy war” just as the Sudan is. The Koran and its Wahabbi holders are the instigators of the Sudan crisis which has been covered (By American Media) as some primitive, localized skirmish in Africa somewhere. I think rather, it is a template and I think Osama expected that after taking out central functions in this country (on 9/11) he would simply arrive in Washington and announce that he was in charge. The years between the first strike on the WTC in ’92 and ’01 were carefully and
slowly plotted and the Sudan stands as testament to what may lie ahead for America.- Jimbob in Jaxon
Mike, I think you posted the wrong link. I’m talking about Hussein’s capabilities in 2003, not 1987.