Ok... apparently, from reading
Instahacks summary of commentary on the Spanish elections, they are a sign that the world is ending and that the Spaniards are cowards, instead of a showing of a democratic populate throwing out a bunch of people who weren't protecting them but pissing away time and resources in Iraq.
Still, from purportedly smart people, I'm shocked by the number of blind assumptions and misleading propaganda coming from these guys:
(begin rant)
Funny, I didn't know that only terrorists were allowed to vote in the Spanish elections. Plus, I like the subtle way of saying a democratic election is not legitimate because you disagree with the voters reaction to an attack. (And assume that the voters reaction went the way the terrorists were expecting)
Jeff Jarvis
observes: " In any case, it's a damned shame that terrorists can have an impact on the election and can help bring in the side they apparently wanted."
Apparently wanted, huh? Based on what evidence? For all we know the terrorists believed in the conventional wisdom, that most everybody believed until today, that a terrorist attack would tend to raise support for the incumbent government. In that case, then they would have wanted the PP to stay in power. Unless they could have mystically forseen that the government would lie to its people and drop the ball like it did. Just because YOU don't like the result and the result changed the status quo doesn't mean that's what the terrorist wanted. Hell, based on the logic above, if the PP hae won, we could just has easily have shrieked: THE TERRORISTS GOT WHAT THEY (APPARENTLY) WANTED!
Indeed. Meanwhile Mark Aveyard notes a contradiction: "Remember being told by the left that Saddam's regime and Al Queda had no relationship, that they actually hated each other? Now they're saying that Al Queda attacked Spain because the US ousted Saddam!
No, that's what Al Queda's saying. And maybe they're saying that because they know that it will get right-wing wingnutes in a lather for blood by making them thing Iraq is accomplishing something, and will encourage them to continue their useless, wasteful adventures, further polarize the world. Al Qaeda might not give two shits about Iraq, only where it can be used as a propaganda tool. Guess what? By believing, and repeating as gospel, their propaganda you're playing right into their hands.
And what we're saying that the attack on Spain might not have happened if Spain, and the US, wasn't distracted by an Iraq red herring -- because we might have been focuses on, you know, figuring out how to stop attacks like this and Al Qaeda wouldn't have Iraq to use as a propaganda tool. Further, we don't know WHY Al Qaeda attacked Spain. I can't read their minds, and neither can anyone else. Unlike the right-wing, I don't take Al Qaeda's reason for the train attacks at face value. Their public reason is likely calculated to get the response they want, not to actually tell us thier motives. Al Qaeda isn't going to just come out and say, "We bombed Spain to continue to throw fuel onto militant recklessness of the right wing so that we can hasten the class of civilizations." Guess what? You're playing right into their hands believing the Al Qaeda spokesperson them without question (because it fits your biases... it must be true!).
And Eric Kolchinsky emails: "Al Queda (or any other terror organization) will rightly perceive that they can influence elections through violence. This vote has greatly increased the probability of a pre-election attack -- here and in Europe." Yes. And it's reduced the likelihood of addressing this problem without major bloodshed. The Spanish electorate has made a very shortsighted and cowardly decision, and the world may suffer as a result.
Again, they're assuming that they can read Al Qaeda's minds and motivations. My guess is that putting in a new government with a mandate from the public to take the fight to the REAL terrorist threat, instead of an Iraqi mirage, was not on the top of the "Al Qaeda: Things we like" list. Al Qaeda could very well have been trying to (and failing to) ensure the PP, who had done almost nothing to stop them (unless you can say with a straight face that they were threatened by a few thousand troops in Iraq), stayed in power, but only became more rabidly right wing (like the US). Who can say? I can't read their minds. But the right shouldn't pretend they can too.
On the other hand, reader Paul Harper emails that he thinks the real problem was that voters felt Aznar was playing politics with the bombing, blaming ETA when the evidence favored Al Qaeda. Perhaps so. I don't think, though, that the terrorists will take that message from these events.
So, we basically need to make our decisions based on the MESSAGE that we send to terrorists? What is that message? Again, he's assuming that he knows what Al Qaeda wanted to accomplish. Maybe the message the terrorists are getting is: "We now want governments that will DO SOMETHING about terrorism instead of pissing their time away on irrelevant damn-fool ideological crusades in Iraq." In which case, this is a GOOD message that we WANT to send.
Also, he's essentially saying that the choice of a fellow democracy is somehow invalid simply because it sends the wrong "message". This is doublethink. While Instapundit condemns Spain's election: "We can't let the terrorists control what we do!", out the other side of his mouth he's saying, "We should do things in a way that sends the right 'messages' to terrorists." Either way, we're letting what the terrorists are thinking, or our (probably misguided, and likely biased) guesses of what they are thinking, control what we do.
I'm deeply disappointed with the Spanish decision, and so are a lot of other folks, obviously. But it's worth noting that democracies make bad decisions sometimes -- just like every other form of government -- and that this decision, though shortsighted and cowardly in my estimation, is only one decision among many, by many nations, and that it's subject to revision later. So don't plunge into despair. It's disappointing, and it's certainly not a good thing, but it's not the end. And as events develop, the Socialists may very well find themselves adopting a less conciliatory approach than they currently anticipate.
Argh! This lack of intellectual rigor from a BLOODY LAW PROFESSOR is appalling. He's just basically extrapolating his dislike for the Spaniards choice into his very narrow, ideological worldview without questioning his logic. How does he know the election results were because the Spainards were "cowards" or "shortsighted" or somehow capitulating. Maybe the Spaniards were just SICK OF a government that FAILED TO PROTECT THEM, failed to listen to them, lied to them for political gain, and wanted to try putting in a new government that might actually take positive steps to defend them by going after real terrorists instead of wasting time in Iraqi frivolity. This is at least a REASONABLE interpretation of the Spanish sentiment, in which case, the news from Spain is not the clear cut -- "certainly not a good thing" -- that our ideologically blinded and logically corrupt law professor professes it to be.
I'm just getting sick and tired of the intellectual bankruptcy of the hawks. They see the only options as "DO IT OUR WAY" or "CAPITULATE TO THE MUSLIMS". They can't even CONCEIVE that maybe their might be another explaination: "DO IT ANOTHER WAY BECAUSE YOUR WAY OBVIOUSLY ISN'T FUCKING WORKING". Since they can't see this, they call their former allies "capitulating" "cowards" simply because the Spaniards no longer agree that the Bush way of fighting terrorism is the best way.
Guess what, it isn't the best way. I think it's more cowardly to keep trying a path that is obviously failing than to take a chance, reject failed policies, and try something new.