If this is the *best* defence of the anti-war left you've seen, ogged, I imagine you've joined the right entirely. The membership card and Halliburton shares will arrive by courier.
I got an email saying much the same thing as you, baa. So, I should clarify a bit. My tolerance for Leiterisms is actually pretty high, and I just glide over them. What I liked was the enumeration of reasons. To wit,
Apparently Nick Cohen has only a passing familiarity with the Enlightenment and its ideals, since he seems unaware that they also include, inter alia, the rule of law, the avoidance of war, democratic accountability, the elevation of reason over faith, rational decision-making that is public and transparent, and respect for the dignity of the individual (which, by the way, would include the tens of thousands killed and maimed in Iraq in the last nine months)--all ideals currently on the defensive in the current environment of mass insanity.
When exactly has it been the practice of the anti-fascist Left to align itself with anti-Enlightenment forces? Is Stalinist Russia Nick Cohen's model for the anti-fascist Left? Could it not be that the actual anti-fascist Left might weigh considerations like (1) the inevitable human carnage of war, (2) the importance of the rule of law in international affairs, (3) the track record of the United States, including many individual members of its current Administration, in supporting brutal tyrannies (including the Iraqi one) when it was economically advantageous to do so, and (4) the risk (and human consequences) of subsequent military actions against other nations by an emboldened American superpower, in concluding that opposition to the war was morally imperative?
That's good, don't you think?
human carnage of war: check
the importance of the rule of law in international affairs: This is a principle of Enlightenment liberalism? Who knew? I suspect this in fact reduces to reason #4.
Track record of members of the administration: this is just the kind of baloney that makes the left look terrible. Who in this adminstration supported the tyranny of Saddam Hussein for economic reasons? Wolfowitz? Cheney? Rumsfeld? Powell?
I understand some members of the left believe all aspects of american policy get approved by our corporate masters, but in this case that mythology is painfull wrong. Those who supported Hussein for *economic* reasons (Russia, France) were precisely those opposed to the allied invasion. Now Leiter may be grasping after the point that the US supported Iraq in the Iran-Iraq war as the 'least bad option.' True enough. What relevance this has for 'trusting' the administration now seems unclear to me. I rather suspect Leiter imagines that vague references to economic interests (the Dread Halliburton?) will suffice to convince all open minded people. Or maybe he can post the picture of Rumsfeld and Saddam shaking hands and do a victory lap. And again I say: embarrassing.
The dangers of an emboldened American superpower: Right. This is why some people think the left is 'anti-american' -- because it is. It sees american dominance as bad. I think the mindset behind such a view usually relies on a tendentious reading of the history of the 20th century, in which America almost universally wears the white hat.
There are, of course, quite good reasons for opposing the Iraq war (including: a belief that it does not matter if Saddam Hussein acquires nuclear weapons, a belief that Saddam will not acquire nuclear weapons in seven-ten years if appropriately managed, a belief that bombing and sanctions have less humantarian costs than war, a belief that the suffering of the Iraqi poeple does not rise to a level meriting a massive commitment of allied force and the loss of allied life). But I don't see Leiter's empahsis in the right place. Rather, I see it centering on the usual mix of mischaracterization ('massive propaganda campaign', 'elevation of reason over faith;) and conspiracy theory.
Those are good points. A few I disagree with.
Drop the "for economic reasons" and some of the current members of this administration do have a troubling track record: specifically, they are very quick to go for the "realist" "least bad" option. So, they supported Saddam, and the Taliban, and several horrible groups in Latin America (and it's not clear that involvement in Latin America was limited to "support"); all in the name of fighting something more horrible still. I'm not arguing for some utopian foreign policy, but I think a good case can be made that the US has often been callous, even when it's been right.
That also takes us to your point about mistrusting American dominance. I think the motivating force behind that mistrust is unease with any unipolar arrangement, and while the US may be a relatively benign superpower (though, again, tell it to the dead people), I can understand why Americans (who, presumably, have some influence over American governance) are vocal in their opposition to actions abroad. I think that's noble, even if often utopian and sometimes stupid.
Finally, I don't get your point about the the massive propaganda campaign. Wasn't there one?
I'm some breed of foreign policy idealist myself, so I'll quickly agree that there are complaints to be made broadly about Republican realists. These criticisms seem less apposite to the case at hand, I think, because it was the realists who opposed intervention in Iraq, and who *lost* the internal debate in the administration.
Calling up past misdeeds of America runs the danger of what Michael Ignatieff calls "enfeebling moral perfectionism." Interacting with unsavory regimes is, alas, just a cost of doing business. One always must make compromises, accepting some evils, opposing others. The only people with clean hands are those who've never done any work. Kofi Annan, I'm sure, would love to see radical regime change in a number of places. But he sucks it up and works with hideous tyrants to achieve other goals. Maybe he makes the wrong compromises. Maybe Cheney and Rumsfeld did (or their boss did) in the Ford administration. Maybe a study of history shows Powell, Rumsfeld, Cheney, and Wolfowitz really as less trustworthy than counterparts in the democratic party or in Germany and France. It's hard for me to condemn without more knowledge than I have (or than 99% of left critics exhibit).
And this tracks back to the "problem" of american power. Power will be exercised by someone. Ignoring that is utopian, stupid, and *ignoble.* But there could be a fine argument against American power if one really thinks we're better served by another hegemon, or great power politics with more substantial roles played by moral exemplars like russia, china, and a punching-above-it's-weight France. I'd love to hear the Left make those arguments more, because it would involve a more substantial engagement with reality.
Last (whew!), my reaction to 'massive propaganda campaign' was the sense one gets from BL that the administration's public argument was *mere* propaganda. Yes, the administration pushed the envelop in ways that I disapprove of, but the core arguments made by Bush are basically straightforward, and basically honest. So relying on the Niger Uranium story = bad, saying "we don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud" = basically good, honest, public argument.