You all ought to be ashamed of yourselves.
What kind of progressive sees injustice and walks right on by? What kind of progressive calls "for an immediate end to...intervention" and the unabated resumption of human suffering? How can you be a progressive and not see the moral imperative behind intervention as a "Crusade" against the forces of evil--in Africa and at home?
On the other side of the coin, though, what kind of pro-intervention forces would support "helping to arm and train the rebels" in Libya? That's just ludicrous, and could drive the situation in that country from bad to worse.
Of course, when I say "intervention," I'm not speaking of the precipitous and open-ended commitment we've made in Libya. I'm not talking about the snipers opening fire on their own people in Yemen, or the American-equipped Saudi troops crushing peaceful protesters in Bahrain. I'm not talking about sending our military to get involved in the developing bloodbath in the Ivory Coast, nor am I proposing we send enforcers to pick sides in any of the myriad brewing conflicts in our global sphere of influence. We must realize the nature of the increasingly multipolar and politically pluralistic world in which we live; America cannot be the world's policeman anymore.
Real progressives support intervention: intervention to protect consumers from scheming banksters. Intervention to protect unions and save middle-class jobs from those plutocrats who seek to destroy them. Intervention to prevent our economy from descending into another Great Depression and save millions of American jobs and financial futures. Intervention to stop the merciless attack on women's rights and their health care. Intervention to help those who can't get medical care because their insurance company's primary responsibility is to their shareholders. Intervention to stop the Kochs from buying Washington and corrupting our state houses. Before we go taking sides in every conflict around the world, let's take a stand and intervene on behalf of the Americans who are our friends and neighbors. As the bumper sticker says, "Regime Change Starts at Home."
Real progressives should favor intervention to stop the humanitarian crises that don't dominate our violence-dominated headlines: the 16,000 children who will die today of starvation. The more than one million Americans with HIV/AIDS. The women in our country and around the world who die during childbirth. The millions of American children who live in poverty for whom school lunch is the only real meal of the day. Real progressives should make their business what some would prefer they neglect, like the growing income gap that has reached levels not seen since the Great Depression. (Note: I will be posting a diary later this week explaining how the gap actually harms our economy--an economist's view in layman's terms.)
Call me a sell-out, call me what you will: I support intervention. After all, it's an American tradition.