When somebody in this country stands up and goes against the consensus, a certain segment automatically applauds this as “brave dissent”. Accolades for not going along with the crowd but being your own person, fearlessly speaking truth to power, being the lone voice in the wilderness are given. Yet if the United States decides to stand up and go against the international consensus, that same segment instead of applauding it for such brave dissent rather berates it for refusal to do what everybody else thinks is right. Shut up and go along (how can the US possibly think it’s right when so many other countries think it’s wrong) is the refrain from the otherwise pro-dissent.
A few months ago, some people said that to intervene in Iraq would be wrong – we had no right to impose ourselves on the Iraqi people, but now those same people are urging our involvement in Liberia. And the idea that any Iraqi’s would be happy to have the tyrannical regime of Hussein removed was just neo-colonistic wish fulfillment, yet now the idea that Liberians want the US – why, everybody there says so (well of course not Charles Taylor and his thugs, but then they don’t count). The massive violation of human rights in Iraq were insufficient grounds for intervention there, while the massive violation of human rights in Liberia is ample grounds for intervention. The people who are now demanding the UN be brought into Iraq claim that only the US can successfully intervene in Liberia. And while Iraq was going to be a distraction from Afghanistan and Al-Qaeda, adding Liberia won’t be. Those people who pointed to Afghanistan and said that mess had to be cleaned up before we got bogged down in Iraq, and who now claim we are bogged down in Iraq and Afghanistan, now advocate taking on a third country.
I know a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds, but this is ridiculous.
