--- maru <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Not really Gautam: you asked for a way in which you > could interpret the > invasion as morally bad, and I provided it.
Yes, and I was pointing out the premise which makes your statement true. It's only morally bad if you put an extremely high - a Westphalian, really - value on sovereignty. That's not wrong, but such a belief has consequences. > And Gautam, how do you get that simply because > someone attempts to > thwart your desires, they are irredeemably an enemy? In international politics, an enemy state is one that is attempting to do harm to yours, and attempting to weaken your state's power is doing it great harm. That's what the word means. There's no such thing as irredeemably an enemy. We've fought two wars with Germany, one with Japan, and one with Italy in the 20th century, and they're all allies. We fought two with Britain in the 18th and 19th - but the 20th century has been dominated by the alliance between the US and Great Britain. Things changed because Britain stopped trying to cripple or destroy the US, mainly. > I have no doubt that the ultimate goals of Europe > and America are the > same: world happiness, and hopefully power along the > way. Why on earth would you think that? If you said - the ultimate goals of Great Britain and the US, sure. In the last few years, France has (for example) greatly aided the Rwandan genocide. Does that seem a contribution to world happiness? > Opposing 'democracy' in the Ukraine could be seen as > actually helping > it. How? > Try looking at it as 'we had to destroy the > village in order to save > it' from > the US perspective, and you can see why the > europeans would oppose it. No, I certainly can't. I mean, I undestand why some members of the European left don't support it (not European governments, which aren't that dumb). But I understand why The Guardian runs editorials attacking Ukrainian democracy - because they oppose the United States. But that doesn't make it legitimate, and it doesn't make it a contribution to democracy. It just makes it wrong, and we should treat it that way. > Incidentally, this is not the only place on the > globe with contested > elections- > why is it the Europeans are not reflexively > attacking it there? > > ~Maru In general, the European left is in favor of democracy only when it involves Western Europe. Democracy for Arabs, or Asians, or even Eastern Europe - that they're either ambivalent towards, or opposed to. There's a consistency to this position, but not a morality. ===== Gautam Mukunda [EMAIL PROTECTED] "Freedom is not free" http://www.mukunda.blogspot.com __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Dress up your holiday email, Hollywood style. Learn more. http://celebrity.mail.yahoo.com _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
