The Audacity of Hypocrisy: Obama's Lovely Little Libyan Adventure

Hypocrisy is a necessary condition of leadership in a large, modern democracy. Not just there either, now that I think of it. That’s often obviously the case in foreign affairs and clearly so in our present Libyan adventure. It is quite a remarkable undertaking, based on the most remarkable set of circumstances and thanks to a quite remarkable coalition that has given the mission its tepid blessing. Consider…

Earlier this week President Obama said he “refused to wait for the images of slaughter and mass graves before taking action.” Consider that for a moment. It’s an interesting choice of words making it clear that this is an Al-Jazeera War. No Al-Jazeera cameras* or pictures of any kind from Libya; no war. Such is the power of the camera. Combine cameras with Gaddafi’s stpudity – other tyrants won’t, one assumes, make the mistake of promising “no mercy” – and suddenly that’s a nice little war you have there.