Bill Hobbs and Donald Sensing both link to this Charles Krauthammer piece which explains liberals' willingness to use force in Liberia but not in Iraq thusly:
What is it that makes liberals like Dean, preening their humanitarianism, so antiwar in Iraq and so pro-intervention in Liberia? ...Bill and Donald both seem to imply that liberals' aversion to using force is based on a belief that America is bad. Maybe I'm putting words in Bill's mouth, but Donald says directly:
They all had a claim on the American conscience. What then was the real difference between, say, Haiti and Gulf War I, and between Liberia and Gulf War II? The Persian Gulf has deep strategic significance for the United States; Haiti and Liberia do not. In both Gulf wars, critical American national interests were being defended and advanced. Yet it is precisely these interventions that liberals opposed.The only conclusion one can draw is that for liberal Democrats, America's strategic interests are not just an irrelevance, but a deterrent to intervention. This is a perversity born of moral vanity. For liberals, foreign policy is social work. National interest - i.e., national selfishness - is a taint. The only justified interventions, therefore, are those which are morally pristine, namely, those which are uncorrupted by any suggestion of national interest.
Hence the central axiom of left-liberal foreign policy: The use of American force is always wrong, unless deployed in a region of no strategic significance to the United States.
I think it is the Left's belief, no longer subject to empirical analysis, that America is bad for the world. Actions, whether military or not, that enhance America's national self interests are therefore anathema. If old "Engine Charlie" Wilson's motto was, "What is good for General Motors is good for America," the Left's motto runs perversely: "What is good for America is bad for the world." ...I don't dispute that some liberals view America this way, but I don't think that most do. Hey, I'm as cynical as the next guy, but Charles Krauthammer has a better analogy when he compares foreign policy to social work. I don't think that most liberals want to hurt America; rather, they think that our nation should act more like a world judge or referee rather than a participant. We have the most power, and we should use it to enforce fairness, not to promote our own interests.In their mind, America is an imperialist nation, imperialist in many forms - economic, cultural, linguistic and especially militarily. If America's gross transgressions are to be corrected, then America's national power must be turned away from promoting America's national interests. Hence, America's armed forces can be used only for reasons that do not serve its interests.
The backbone of liberal ideology is arrogance and elitism, and this perspective on foreign policy follows directly (and strikes me as very European). America should act as the third world's daddy, because we're smarter, richer, and just better in general. It's not fair for us to use our power to our own advantage, and as a judge would we should recuse ourselves from any situation that presents us with a "conflict of interest", such as Iraq. On the other hand, we're allowed to intervene in Liberia precisely because we have nothing to gain; we can be neutral and fair and calm the squabbling children.
Winds of Change also touched upon this Krauthammer column with this post:
Dumb and Dumber -- The Two Schools of Democratic Foreign Policy
http://windsofchange.net/archives/003756.html
What's this "we" stuff?
Since we know--the liberals keep telling us--that the poor and disenfranchised fight our wars, the liberals want us to expend even more of them making the liberals feel good about themselves.
But not at the price of actually advantaging ourselves.
That would be too much.
As it happens, what is good for the world is generally good for America, and pretty close to vice versa, at least in the long run.
So there aren't many situations where no American interest can be discerned, which is going to annoy the liberals.
The problem, of course, is agreeing on what things are "good" for America and the world, and what things aren't. I tend to think free trade and democracy are good, but others disagree.
Free trade and democracy are likely to be to our advantage as well as to others'.
That being the case, especially free trade (imagine the howls about big corporations), it can't be done in such a way as to satisfy liberals.
I think a case can be made that failed states incubate terror and instability. Or maybe not.
But the case is at least plausible initially.
Still, it's a matter of how many notifications of next of kin are worth making some piece of ground better.
Especially when the bad guys look an awful lot like the good guys and the atrocities look like everybody's idea of a good time.
You may be as cynical as the next guy, but I'm not the next guy. My working motto is "It's worse than you think it is, _and_ they're out to get you." As my dear old grandpa said, "It's always darkest just before it gets so damn dark you stumble and break your neck."
The problem the Left has (most of them ceased to be liberal in any real sense years ago) is the that, unlike Wilde's cynic ("He knows the price of everything and the value of nothing."), they know neither the price nor the value of their policy choices, _and_ they willfully don't want to be shown.
They claim the right to decide which things are "good" and the rest of us should pony up or else, and they decide which things are "bad" and no one should be allowed to do them, despite being willing to pay the price.
They are petty tyrants in the very sense of the word, and given the chance they would be real tyrants. Else why prop up Castro, Saddam, Mugabe, Kim, et al?
Pfeh!
The problem the Left has (most of them ceased to be liberal in any real sense years ago) is the that, unlike Wilde's cynic ("He knows the price of everything and the value of nothing."), they know neither the price nor the value of their policy choices, _and_ they willfully don't want to be shown
Yeah, unlike all the Chickenhawks, eh?
A Chickenhawk knows the price of themselves and everyone else and spends the currency of the other first, with no hesitation. Jeebus, I wish I had your "conservative" moral clarity, then I would know the whys and wherefores of everything too.
Thank you for living and sharing your wisdom with us. I am abjectly sorry for being a Liberal Democrat (gee is there any other kind?). I repent and convert. Where do I sign up and get my Right-thinking Party Card?
Oh goodness, I thought the chickenhawk argument was settled a long time ago.
If you really want to get on the right track, I can give you some good pointers.