The lesson of Iraq is that populations can't be "given" freedom. They have to take it for themselves. Iranian mullahs are facing a demographic shift they can barely stifle now. We've aided the retrograde government by becoming the bogeyman on their doorstep. Worse we've trashed our good name and reputation in the prisons of Abu Ghraib. We tarnished the appeal of our own ideals by abandoning them to expediency.
The neocons have a grander scheme than wiping out "terrorists" or bringing "democracy" to the middle east. If they cared about al Qaeda, they would have hunted Osama until they had his head on a pike. (140,000 troops in Iraq, 1/10 as many in Afghanistan and none in Pakistan underlines their priorities.) They wouldn't have left Karzai with limited resources and at the mercy of warlords. They wouldn't have allowed the great poppy-fueled engine of narco-terrorist money to hum at record breaking pace. They wouldn't coddle the Saudis and Musharif. If they cared about democracy they wouldn't have installed a compliant strongman in Iraq and wouldn't tolerate similar strongmen in Egypt, Pakistan, and Uzbekistan. How can a group so contemptuous of checks and balances of democracy and republican government at home and so callous to the civil rights of its own constituents bring democracy to the middle east? They have brought nothing but division and chaos abroad and polarization at home. If Americans elect this bunch to 4 more years, heaven help us all.
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