Not really Gautam: you asked for a way in which you could interpret the invasion as morally bad, and I provided it.
If i had said, that under no circumstance should we violate soveirgnty, then I would be elevating it mighty high (& could only
defend it by extension from individual rights).
And Nazi Germany obviously forfeited its soverignty rights by invading everyone as far as their eyes could see. Rights are reciprocal:
I respect your right to life or free speech or whatever and you do the same in return.
And Gautam, how do you get that simply because someone attempts to thwart your desires, they are irredeemably an enemy?
If a old friend of yours goes slightly cuckoo and attempts to slay his wife, do you allow him to do so, or try to stop him and get him help?
I have no doubt that the ultimate goals of Europe and America are the same: world happiness, and hopefully power along the way.
Our interim goals differ though. Heck, that goes for almost every group- aside from the ones motivated by greed, most people
act from mixed goals of wealth and altruism, and clash from differing methods.
Opposing 'democracy' in the Ukraine could be seen as actually helping it. 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. 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
Gautam Mukunda wrote:
OK, then you're elevating state sovereignty to a
remarkably high moral principle. There are plenty of people who believe that - it's not an illegitimate position. I don't happen to, but I respect it. In that case, though, how do you feel about Yugoslavia, where we were grossly violating its soveriegnty on many occassions? More than that, why attach such moral importance to the sovereignty of a totalitarian dictatorship? I don't care about the violations of the sovereignty of, say, Nazi Germany in 1945, for obvious reasons.
Second, I don't understand what you mean about the right to choose their own government. I think we can say with confidence that the people of Iraq did not _choose_ Saddam Hussein. The whole point of the war is to try to give them the chance to choose their own government, exactly the way we did in Germany, Japan, Italy, South Korea, Grenada, Panama, and Afghanistan.
OK, so the Europeans are trying to counterweight the US. _That's my point_. When states try to do that, they are not your friend. Another word for states that try to weaken your state is "enemy." Or adversary, at least.
Finally, it's true that the US has interfered in
elections in the past. Not very often, but it has
done it. It _should not_ have done that. But why are
you bringing it up? What do previous misdeeds on the
part of American governments have to do with the
choice of some on the European left to oppose
democracy right now? At least in the case of the US
it was doing it within the context of the Cold War -
which does not excuse, but does mitigate, the act. Unless you want to elevate balancing against the
United States to the same moral level as defeating
Communism, how is opposing democracy in the Ukraine in
any way comparable?
===== Gautam Mukunda [EMAIL PROTECTED] "Freedom is not free" http://www.mukunda.blogspot.com
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