Some interesting posts at Non Prophet, the Colorado Springs-based blogger who previously revealed that Focus on the Family had distributed Michael Moore’s home address. He’s been writing about Soulforce, a group that protests against the use of religion to condemn gays from a Christian perspective.
Soulforce protestors recently attempted to deliver this letter to Dr. James Dobson at Focus on the Family’s Colorado Springs headquarters. The Reitan family were arrested for trespassing when they entered the premises with the letter (photos here.)
Non Prophet was on the ground to interview the Reitans after they were released. Check it out.
I watched Rosemary’s Baby over the weekend. I don’t know who I’m typing SPOILER ALERT for, but I don’t want to hear any whining.
[click to continue…]
After reading Kevin Drum, Julian Sanchez, and Glenn Reynolds, I’ve come to the following conclusions:
1. It is too much to say that “democratization of the Middle East” argument was only seized upon by the Administration after the failure to find WMDs. It’s not hard to find pre-war quotes from Bush where he pitches the benefits of a democratic Iraq. So there’s a reasonable argument that the quote which arouses Reynolds’ ire (“The only plausible reason for keeping American troops in Iraq is to protect the democratic transformation that President Bush seized upon as a rationale for the invasion after his claims about weapons of mass destruction turned out to be fictitious.”) is misleading, if you interpret “after” as “only after”.
2. However, it’s impossible to make a straight-faced argument that democratization was the main argument, or even an important argument, behind the Bush Administration’s case for war.
Over and over again, Bush insisted that we were giving Saddam the chance to avoid war. He assured his audiences that Saddam could prevent an invasion by disarming. Not by democratizing, not by ceasing his brutal tactics, and (until hours before the invasion) not by leaving power. In fact, Bush makes this promise in just about every speech linked in Reynolds’ “link-rich refutation.”
If the U.S. was willing to cancel the overthrow of Saddam’s brutal, undemocratic goverment in the event that he could show proof of disarmament, then neither democracy promotion nor human rights could have been the reason for the invasion. I can’t see any way to square this circle.
[click to continue…]