The popular uprising in Lebanon, and what it means

It seems like democracy is busting out all over the Middle East these days. Since that Inaugural speech Bush gave, the Egyptian government has promised election reform, the Lebanese government has resigned per the demand of massive popular protest, and the Baathist regime of Syria is talking of a pullout from Lebanon.

Of course this has nothing at all to do with Bush's preceeding tough talk on precisely these subjects, or his election victory that puts him in a position to talk tough, or the successful elections in Iraq that vindicate his pro-democratic policy. Nothing at all. Pure coincidence. Just dumb luck. Right? Well, not so fast.

Defeated Leftists and Democrat partisans, in a spirit of sour grapes, have insisted there is no connection. Some have even been so clever as to say that to assert a connection is to commit a post hoc fallacy. Well, it isn't and here's the difference: in this case there is abundant evidence of a connection.

First off, let's talk about correlation. Correlation is when there is a pattern of two things happening at the same time, and one *not* happening without the other. Correlation is not causation, but it *does* indicate the presence of a causal relationship. You can argue about the exact nature of the causation (see below,) but you can't say there isn't any, unless you're in denial. And if you're in denial, no intelligent person will waste time arguing with you. Certainly I won't.

First, some historical facts. There have been three epochs in the past hundred years in which democracy has expanded significantly in various parts of the world. They were: the final period of World War II, the 1989 to 1992 period, and our current post-9/11 era. In that same hundred years, there have been three eopchs in which the united States forcibly advanced the cause of freedom. These three epochs all began just slightly before those other three epochs.

And the first two epochs of expanding freedom came to an end at preciely the same moment that the United States, for whatever reason, started to back down and compromise. Once the United States, against Churchill's objections, decided to let the Soviet Union have Eastern Europe, freedom and democray ceased to spread, not only in Europe, but throughout the globe. Once Bush decided not to follow through against Saddam's regime in the first Gulf War, but stuck to the limits of his United Nations mandate, the Shia rebellion met with disastrous defeat. This current epoch, happily, has not yet ended. John Kerry would gleefully have brought it to and end, but he didn't get the chance.

In 1968, the people of Czechosolvakia rose up and demanded freedom. The Soviet Union did not see fit to grant it, and moved in with tanks. The United States did nothing. This was the Cold War era, when no one believed the Soviet Union could be defeated, and all statesmen hoped for was containment. So much for the theory that street protests by themselves can bring about freedom. It doesn't work that way.

And what of the Korean War? Vietnam? Bloody conflicts, and long ones, precisely because they were undertaken in a way that compromised victory. In World War II, we were willing to do what it took to win. But in these Cold War conflicts, we were willing neither to win nor to quit.

This was the longest and worst phase of the Cold War - the phase when we were unwilling to do what it took to beat back Marxist-Leninist tyranny. And this was precisly the era when democracy did *not* advance, and tyranny did. Ronald Reagan brought an end to this lamentable age. The small-minded jeered when he demanded Gorbachev "tear down this wall." Even today they insist the disintegration of Sovoet Communism was a coinciddence, that Reagan's tough policies and tough talk had nothing to do with. But remember this: no one but Reagan saw it coming. For some people, not even hindsight is 20/20.

And so the Soviet Union vanished like a bad dream, and western Europe was belatedly freed, and then Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait. In a brief flowering of unity of purpose, the United Nations went along with the idea of not letting Saddam take over the entire Middle East piecemeal. But then Papa Bush wimped out. He was succeeded by Bill Clinton, who had no interest in doing anything about anything that didn't directly concern his carnal appetites or his popularity. Under Clinton, there was NATO's move into the Balkans. A good thing, if a bit late. If it hadn't been for Monicagate, Clinton may never even have bothered. Once it was all over, he handed it over to the united Nations, under whose oversight most of the gains have since come undone.

The pattern of correlation here is this: when the United States backs up the human desire for liberty with force or a credible threat of force, this liberty tends to be achieved. Not always, but much more often than not. At the same time, when liberty movements are snuffed out by the force of repression and tyranny, we find that the United States did *not* back up the human desire for liberty with force or a credible threat of same. This pretty much always happens. (Giving Bush credit for the success of the Orange revolution in Ukrainia is a reach, but only a very slight one.) So there you have the two sides of a correlation. And any statistician will tell you that you ignore a strong correlation at your own peril.

When you see a correlation, there are three possible causal relations behind them. First, A causes B. Second, B causes A. Third, both A and B are caused by some unindentified C. Well, since the epochs of American toughness begin just a few years *before* the epochs of spreading democracy, I don't think we have to wonder which of these is the case here. A tough US foreign policy results in the spread of freedom - unless someone has a more plausible explanation to offer. And remember: coincidence is not an explanation. You have to do better than that.

Now, I don't mean to belittle those good people in Lebanon who massed in the streets calling for an end to Syria's puppet government. Demonstrations such as this, as well as the anti-terror protests in the Iraq, help dispel the vicious lie that the Middle East isn't ready for democracy. These people say they're ready, and who are we to second guess them? But just demanding something doesn't magically make it happen. You need force to back it up. They provided the desire. We're providing the force.

(Meanwhile, Bush is *not* forcibly pushing democracy in the Far East, at least not yet. He's refusing to give Eraserhead Kim Jong-Il the bilateral talks he demands, but that's as far as the pressure goes. Not coincidentally, we see no march of freedom in that region. Certainly not in Communist China. Part of the problem here is nukes. It's Cold War II, and again the fear of nuclear holocaust restrains us from putting the despots there in their place. A missile defense would help a lot. The other part of the problem is we need to stop shoveling money into Red China. Our aid money propped up the Soviet Union, and now our investment money is empowering up these thugs. Corporate greed is driving that, and no good has ever come from greed. The lie that this will somehow bring about democracy is wearing thin now, so many years after Tienanmen Square. But that doesn't bother the purveyors of this lie.)


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