The Left Sucks Up To

30 Jul, 2002 by John Hawkins

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The Left Sucks Up To Europe: Here’s the close of Richard Cohen’s latest whinefest about Bush’s “unilateralist” foreign policy…

“Bush’s problem, and our own, is that he keeps trying to apply a dated ideology — the wisdom of Henry Cabot Lodge — to a world where it still does not fit. The Massachusetts senator was a unilateralist. We tried that route once, and it didn’t work. There’s no reason to believe it will work now.”

Let me take off the gloves and be totally honest here. We have no choice other than to be unilateralists because the majority of the world does not share our interests. Even if the UN wasn’t a toothless organization, they’re more interested in shackling us than helping us with our problems. The dictators and Islamo-fascists in the Middle East don’t want an end to terrorism. They consider it to be a useful tool against Israel that allows them to score points with their people by killing Israelis while giving them just enough deniability to avoid an Israeli attack. Europe views regimes like Iran and Iraq great places to sell their goods and buy their oil. Furthermore, most of Europe resents and fears America’s power so they actually don’t mind seeing us hit with terrorist attacks. We’d view al-Queda sneaking a nuclear bomb into one our cities as the worst catastrophe ever to hit the planet but many European leaders would view it as a chance to catch up. In truth, most of Europe cares as little for American deaths via terrorism as they do for Israeli deaths. It’s basically, “as a long as it’s not us, who cares?”

So how important is it to have the world’s approval? Is it worth it to let Saddam and Khomeini acquire nukes just so France will be happy with us? Should we let we Israelis be driven into the sea to make Germany happy? Is allowing al-Queda to set up another terrorist state in Lebanon or Somalia a good idea if it’ll make Spain think we’re “OK guys?” If LA and DC are vaporized in nuclear blasts but Belgium thinks we’re nice people will that soothe the pain? If hundreds of thousands of Americans die in biological attacks but Jordan thinks we’re not so bad after all is it worth it? Is Kofi Annan praising us in his next speech worth not doing enough to stop terrorists from poisoning a small town’s water supply?

These are the real questions that have to be answered to decide whether we should act unilaterally or not. Basically it comes down to whether we should let large numbers of Americans die to please the world. People like Richard Reeves will tell you it’s worth it, I say it’s not. Make your own decision…