Normally I really enjoy Talking Points Memo bit this piece from Josh Marshall is, in my opinion, just laughable in how full of wrong it is regarding the U.S.A.’s response to the situation in Libya.
At the end of last week I couldn’t help tweeting that everything I was seeing in Libya was bringing out my inner foreign policy Realist. And everything I’ve seen this weekend has confirmed me in that view. Indeed, there are so many reasons this strikes me as a bad idea I really hardly know where to start. So let me focus on the three biggest.~SNIP~
No clear national or even humanitarian interest for military intervention. Intervening well past the point where our intervention can have a decisive effect. And finally, intervening under circumstances in which the reviled autocrat seems to hold the strategic initiative against us. This all strikes me as a very bad footing to go in on.
No clear humanitarian interest, Josh? Really? An entire country in the complete control of an insane man? Feel that way about Kim Jong Il, too?
Unable to have a decisive effect, Josh? Really? Have you been watching the headlines or even the news programs today? How about your own website (U.S. Says no-fly zone in place over Libya)? I’d say they are having a decisive effect.
And, Josh, Qaddafi has the strategic initiative? REALLY??? What initiative is that? That no two media outlets spell his name the same way? I have to ask, are you paying attention? Do you realize that this is a true multinational effort? I’m not talking Bush’s farcical “Coalition of the Willing”. I’m talking about a real multinational coalition.
You know all this stuff, right, Josh?
Because it’s really hard to tell reading your absurd piece.
I’m just sayin’…
