The Democrats' "Alternative" for the Middle East

Blogger Lebanon Profile has produced a brilliant guest post at Michael Totten's site on the Democratic Party's "alternative" approach to fostering democracy in the Middle East, or lack thereof:

The Democratic Party critics of the President and Arab critics of American policy have a lot in common.

They love to go on the attack against people taking action, but offer no alternative. They snipe at President Bush and the oh-so-evil neo-cons, but offer few alternatives.

And when they do offer alternatives, the two groups sound exactly alike: "let the people choose their government; it should not be imposed from above," "Muslims should have a government culturally sensitive to their religion," "you must understand that America cannot support democracy because it has supported so many heinous regimes in the past," "America must first deal with Israeli aggression, and then everything will fall into place in the Arab world."

Where is the alternative in those statements?


On Democrats and Arabs


Far too many in the Democratic Party and its liberal base are more interested in opposing whatever the Bush Administration does than they are in aiding the nascent wave of democratic change occurring in the Arab world. They have so invested themselves in the idea that the administration's policies have to fail that they are incapable of offering constructive suggestions or alternatives.