I don’t often link to specific items on Ted Barlow’s blog because I figure anyone who is anyone is already reading him (as well they should be). That said, I commend you to go read this piece on civil discourse. You rock, Ted.
At the end of that same post, Ted links to this Instapundit piece:
In the town of Safwan, Iraqi civilians eagerly greeted the 1st Marine Division.
One little boy, who had chocolate melted all over his face after a soldier gave him some treats from his ration kit, kept pointing at the sky, saying “Ameriki, Ameriki.”
This is the “peace” movement’s worst nightmare, isn’t it?
Ted and Jim Henley have already responded to this, so now I’d like to add my version. It starts out looking like this (via Henley) and like this, from The Agonist:
Tens of thousands of mostly youths protested the U.S.-led war against Iraq in Egypt and the Gaza Strip on March 22. More than 20,000 protesters gathered at Cairo’s prestigious al Ahzar University, calling on Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to provide military assistance to Iraq — or else step down. Anti-riot police were deployed to contain the protesters, but there been no reports of clashes so far. In addition, about a thousand lawyers held a sit-in protest at their association headquarters in Cairo to protest the government’s position on the war. Lawyers associations in Egypt are often connected with the banned Islamist movement, the Muslim Brotherhood which counts thousands of professional Egyptians among its ranks. In Gaza, a reported 10,000 people — mostly students from Gaza’s Islamic University — filled the streets, chanting “No blood for oil,” “Death to America and Great Britain,” and “Where are the Arab countries’ armies and leaders?” Agence France-Presse reported.
and culminates, at some undetermined point in the future, looking like this. If you’d paid any attention to the many rational voices that spoke out against this war, Glenn, you might have understood that.
(I’m sure I don’t have to say that I fervently hope this particular nightmare remains nothing but a bad dream, but I’m going to say it anyway just so we’re all clear on this point.)
UPDATE: Here’s another scene from the “peace” movement’s nightmares. Is it in your nightmares, too, Glenn? I don’t see any mention of it at this time.
Just makes me think of Phil Ochs, specifically these two songs:
The Marines have Landed on the Shores of Santo Domingo and We are the Cops of the World. If Phil were alive today, well, he’d prolly kill himself all over again.
So anti-war protests in Gaza and Egypt, places where the US has never been liked, are supposed to lead to terrorism? Again, this can be a justification against any and all wars where protests take place. Bomb Serbia? You’ll cause terrorism. Liberate Afghanistan? You’ll cause terrorism. This is a blank check argument without a verifiable history to make it credible.
Islamic fundamentalists aren’t enamoured of Saddam. They haven’t been since before the Iran-Iraq War when Iraq fought to stem the expansion of the Iranian Revolution. There thus is no reason whatsoever to believe that war against Hussein will result in more terrorism, and there is good reason to believe that it will improve the lives of ordinary Iraqis.