Goldberg and Guthrie

Some supporters of the President respond to criticisms that Iraq posed no threat to the United States by citing the moral case for war and the liberation of the Iraqi people. Can someone tell me why Libyans' freedom is so much less important? By giving up his WMD program, has Gadafi purchased the right to continue the human rights abuses detailed here by Amnesty International? (Admittedly, not as bad as Saddam's - but not good either.)

Of course, the United States can't go into every country and stop every human rights violation. That's why it matters whether or not the President told us the truth about the threat posed to us by Iraq - and that's why the response that "even if we did go in on the basis of flawed intelligence we still did a lot of good" is so dishonest.

By the way, I still support the war in Iraq - because, and this is a justification Bush never gave, the human atrocities going on there were partially our fault. Perhaps we were justified in using the Saddam and the Iraqi people as a pawn against the USSR and Iran - but we were obligated to fix the problem. I have no problem with the United States using its military strength in the cause of enforcing international human rights standards, and I have no problem with the evil leaders of the world (I am comfortable using that term, unlike some on the left) knowing that we reserve the right to displace their regime at any time. But this was not the justification that Bush set forth - and as proven by Libya, it is not the basis on which he conducts his foreign policy.