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LIBYA
When discussing Libya with the voters, there are several different areas that need to be discussed. Most recently, the discussions concerning Libya have been primarily focusing on the death of our Ambassador and his staff.
While the deaths of the Ambassador and his staff were heinous and inexcusable, it remains a sad commentary on the state of diplomacy that when you have diplomats serving in a troubled area where revolutions or wars are going on, that they will constantly remain in potential danger and can consistently be viewed as potential targets by opposing forces in that area.
Conservatives on Facebook and Twitter are eager to bash Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton and do some finger-pointing and scandal-accusing due to these tragic deaths. I myself, on the other hand, am not so quick to blame anyone in particular. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton have to oversee hundreds of Embassies around the world, and it is impossible for any one human to keep track of them all simultaneously. This is why there is a chain of command, and certain duties are delegated to various staff members further on down the line.
Now, it may be that the staff there in Libya requested additional security. Maybe they didn't. Maybe they misjudged or underestimated the aggression by local forces towards their compound. It is difficult to say what exactly happened there without having more facts, but we do know the outcome of that nights events. And it wasn't good for America.
However, most Americans would be surprised to learn that the Muslims in Libya have been causing trouble for America for over 200 years!
Yes, you read that right. This is where the Ron Paul supporters go horribly awry when they believe that America causes all it's own problems by meddling in international affairs. We didn't have any military bases in anyones countries, yet the Muslims were gladly participating in open thievery against us, by committing pirate attacks on our commercial shipping.The Muslims in Libya attacked and seized their first American naval vessel in 1784 when our young country was only 8 years old!!
The Barbary Pirates (as they were called then) not only robbed and stole from people, they attacked other nations and enslaved their populations. The Muslims in Libya were responsible for over 1 million Europeans being sold into slavery.
Thomas Jefferson tried to negotiate some type of peaceful passage for our commercial fleet, but ended up being threatened into paying extortion money by the Muslims. Jefferson eventually got sick of being extorted, and used Americas wealth to build the U.S. Navy and the Marine Corps.
Our American military eventually retaliated against the Muslims by bombarding Tripoli with cannonballs until the Muslims decided to stop attacking American ships.
To this day, the official Marine Corps song talks about "From the halls of Montezuma...to the shores of Tripoli" because it was their first great victory over a foreign power.
So basically, Muslims in Libya have been causing us trouble for over 200 years, most of it due to the inherent immorality of their peculiar religion. But that is another subject for another day.
Another issue, as to whether or not we should have intervened militarily by bombing Libya in 2011, that is a separate question.
Peaceniks, hippies and Libertarians always hate war and don't want America involved militarily anywhere at anytime. Their position is ludicrous and denies the basic existence of evil in this world.
Moammar Ghaddafi was an evil man. Anyone who uses military force against their own civilian population usually is on the verge of losing power because they have lost their moral authority to lead.
Happy citizens don't try to kill their leaders.
I am not opposed to quick, short-term military interventions like this. When we as Americans help stop a mad dictator from killing his own people, it only increases our moral authority in this world by showing everyone else that we lead by example.
Our actions usually help destroy the last shred of dignity or legitimacy that a fallen leader will ever have.
Critics argue that we might have inadvertently helped the Muslim Brotherhood to seize control in Libya.
That might be a fact, but it also might be false. It is possible that fanatical Muslims would have gained power and control in Libya even without our help. Some of this is due to a very basic difference in the belief system and values that Muslims have compared to people in other parts of the world.
The problems in Libya are just one part of a bigger complex of issues across the Middle East.
Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq...it's all the same thing, really.
It's all just part of the larger war against Muslims, just in different neighborhoods.
