The Libyan madness

Lizzy

Thank you Melanie: Steyn in his element. I feel better after reading that and sent it on.

Simon Thekeston

Thanks. I wish he was still writing for the Spectator.

Robbo

Rather than having a sporting chance of coming out on the winning side by facing both ways I'd say it's a fair bet that we'll come out on the losing side from every which way it is looked upon. We are led by buffoons.

Bill Rees

Maybe we should all threaten to stop reading The Spectator until Steyn is restored. That quality of writing is sadly lacking from the mag these days.

VEBott

Wonderful! Steyn thinks the war is adrift. A sure sign that it's bang on target.

TomTom

Mark Steyn is wonderfully satirical but clear-headed such a change from the fogginess that permeates English journalism in the MSM.

Never mind, the wonderful thing about legal training is that you can find an angle in any problem to exploit and perpetuate the problem to fee generation stage.

Obama knows that Cameron and Sarkozy are probably going to be out of office next year and wants to hand the leadership of the Middle East over to Putin when he returns in 2012.

I am rather looking forward to some Russian diplomacy in the region, I feel they might be less adolescent in their approach and have fewer hormonal problems

An America

Steyn, in his always unique way is pointing out that no one...I mean no one...the rebels, Gadaffi, the French, the Italians, the English, the Americans, etc. have absolutely any idea what they are doing!

One day, Hollywood will make this into a comedy.

Why do the citizens of these western countries continue to vote these buffoons into power. Why do we let the leftist media pick our leaders for us.

At least there are people like Steyn and Melanie out there that are exposing the big ugly picture.

gareth

That's great writing - can't wait for his new book which should have been out in october 2010 according to Amazon......but seems to have been delayed, no reason given.

When you read the other Spectator writers it's clear Britain is half way to being a coerced PC nation with group-speak condescension the name of the game.
Big Brother's rules of life apply, where to have an opinion is extreme and liable to get you voted off, better being a genial non-entity, and be the least unpopular and safe.

Graeme Thompson

Melanie, elements most likely to commit atrocities against pro-Gaddafi civilians are the Jihadist elements of the rebels. Shouldn't we be whacking them too when the occasion presents? Doesn't that heighten the possibilities of a democratic outcome if and when Gaddafi falls?

It seems to me the 'new right' are being far too cynical about this intervention for ideological reasons.

The last minute salvation of Bhengazi by the French Air Force was a righteous act that all people of goodwill should rejoice in.

I have very little confidence that the present crop of leaders we have will have (apart from Sarkozy, I have high hopes for him) the ability to bring about a democratic transition in Libya (in accordance with the Bush doctrine, let us remember), but while the possibility remains, surely all democrats should be getting behind the intervention rather than acting like 'stoppers' during the Iraq war?

david elder

But - but Melanie - this is being done by the sophisticated UN and Europeans - not by the ignorant US cowboys like Tony Blair ...

daniel maris

So what do you suggest we do?

Let Gadhaffi win?

Recolonise the country?

Let the Israelis take it over?

You never tell us.

Why ever not if things are so simple...

Baron

brilliant writing, the Steyn’s piece, no question about it, but neither he, nor any one of you has even hinted what else should the Americans, the two European leaders have done when the Khadaffi’s bunch of killers touched the outskirts of Benghazi. I take it you would have been, that must include Steyn whom I also admire, in favour of our doing nothing, right?

what do you reckon then would have been the most likely outcome of sitting back, watching events unfold on the box? A mass slaughter of those who turned against the tyrant, a mass exodus of those who feared the slaughter, I reckon, unless you believe the nutter, having established control, would have turned all forgiving, compassionate, magnanimous. The outside free world may have swallowed the slaughter with few marches under the banner ‘free Libya’ here and there, but those Libyans fleeing the mad colonel would have unlikely ended up in Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, more likely on the streets of Swindon, Manchester and places claiming asylum, welfare support, but hating us nevertheless for doing nothing, letting the farting colonel regain power. That would have pleased you then, wouldn’t it?

when the region was full of our SOBs, Mark Steyn used to argue, equally brilliantly, that we should do our utmost to destabilize the tyrannies before the young, unable to have a say in matters of local politics, prosecuted by the rulers, were to leave the region in numbers, arrive on our shores, destabilize us. Fortunately for us, the unwashed in the region have gone for a self-service, took to the streets, destabilized the regimes mostly without our getting involved. Why are you ranting against it now, ha?

Greg

Please see Time Magazine story on the raped woman Eman el-Obeidi and the Libyan lies
http://globalspin.blogs.time.com/2011/04/03/promises-unkept-the-latest-on-eman-el-obeidi/

Sergio I.N.

Has anyone seen Bananas by Woody Allen? ~"This time the CIA is not risking to make any mistakes. Half of us will fight for the government, and the other half for the rebels" Or something like that.

Ian Hills

These Libyan "freedom-loving democrats" have started flogging plundered chemical weaponry to Hamas and Hizbollah.

Michael White

Is there yet a timetable for formal UN apologies to be extended to those civilians attacked in Zimbabwe, Sudan, Haiti, Somalia, Yemen, Myanmar, Iran....etc?

Joseph F. McNulty

A bigger game is afoot. The Libyan war is meant to create the precedent for humanitarian intervention at UN or Arab League urging. You know who it will be directed against. This is perfect for Obama. He is the worst president in history on issues concerning Israel. He will now be able to impose a crippling "no-fly zone" (and maybe a "no-drive zone") on Isreal at UN or Arab League insistence to achieve "peace" and unilaterally creat a Palesltinian state. And Obama can still rhetorically pose as a "friend of Isreal" on the basis that he really did not want to do it, "but it's the will of the international community," and Obama is really "saving Israel from those extreme settlers and religious parties." An era of peace and friendship is bound to follow, and, besides, Israel will eventuallly get over having "peace" imposed on it. Does the fact that Samantha Power is being touted in The New York Times as the next secretary of state tell you anything?

Richard

You're onto something here. Why has the US cultivated the jihadists of eastern Libya over the years (the "leader" flown in to take charge has lived in the US for several years, within communting distance of Langley)?

Bernard

If would be great to see Philips and Steyn getting a job with the eternal students in the Guardian, that would shake em up. Alas, we'd have a better chance of the Papal Nuncio signing for Rangers.

Hatoul

hmm, take a look at this:
http://www.virtualjerusalem.com/news.php?Itemid=3131
is this something we should be worried about?

Mark

Why have our politicians involved our country in this civil war? Nothing to do with us, not our country, not our people, not our problem, unfortunately we don't have an empire anymore so why do our politicians act as if we do.

Its a good article by Steyn and it just goes to show never intervene in another country's affairs and get involved in unnecessary wars. A more selfish isolationist foreign policy is exactly what we need.