An Honest Appraisal

This is an intriguing and well-written piece from an Englishman living in New York. the guy definitely tilts to the left, but his willingness to re-examine his own preceonceptions is admirable. Here's a couple great excerpts...

So, after 12 months of living in New York is it any surprise that Israel starts to look a little less evil? And that Europe starts to look a little more parochial? That the US starts to look a little more like it is trying to solve some of the world’s problems, and that it is doing so despite the sometimes unfair criticism of its allies? If in England it always looked like the US was the playground bully. Then from the US it looks a lot more like an embattled headteacher in a problem school.

...On September 11, I thought I knew the reasons why the attacks had taken place. And it was not my fault. Moreover, it was somebody else’s fault – the US’s – and they were reaping what they had sown. But in the past 12 months I have slowly come to understand that the wordview I held was tainted by a media that sees the problems in the world (dictatorship in Iraq, authoritarianism/terrorism in the Middle East, the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, global warming) as being the fault of the United States. All of this from a country and a continent that seems to have done little itself to try to redress the balance in a world which it has corrupted/manipulated to a gargantuan degree during the past 100 years.

“We know that,” comes the cry. “But the US has the power to do so much good and yet it chooses to do the opposite.”

Really? Should the US have stayed out of Kosovo? Should it have stayed out of Afghanistan and Iraq? Should it leave North Korea and Iran to their own devices? Is it the US alone that has not done enough to stop the killing in Darfur? Or is Britain, Europe, Africa, just as much to blame? Why are we not rushing headlong into Zimbabwe to get rid of Robert Mugabe? Is it worse to do something? Or is it worse to do nothing?

At this moment, I am proud to be a citizen of a country that has done more than most to help the US get rid of the Taliban and Saddam Hussein. And I think that it would do other Europeans some good to think again about what their countries have achieved, if anything, to try to stem the tide of dictatorships and terrorism around the world. They should wonder whether they are really asking themselves the hard questions. Or whether they are shrugging their shoulders and blaming America because that is what they have been brought up to do.

(hat tip: Andrew Sullivan). I don't agree with everything this guy wrote, but I still admire it. And his brand of liberal thought, where support for our war aims in Iraq is unequivocal, would be worth teaching to plenty of folks in our country.