can of worms. i might clamp the lid back on if i get tired.

pyrric, I hope you don't mind that I glued this discussion into my LJ.

Regarding this:

First of all, the following is not an argument in favor of or against either decision, though my personal opinion is that we should fuck Saddam's shit up. I believe Saddam is bad news, and I believe it is in our own best interest, and probably in Iraq's, to bury him and his weapons.

Bush is ignoring millions of protesters, which is unfortunate. If, however, it is true that 67% of Americans (the political opinions of people who are not American citizens don't count towards determining if the President's actions are democratic, even if his actions are unsound or dumb or they piss off other countries) are in favor of the pre-emptive strike, then he's adhering to the principles of democracy.

Yes, the anti-war demonstrations surpass the pro-war demonstrations in number and volume. But who goes out and makes a big scene if they agree with what's going on? If you agree with the President, you stay home, because you don't have to protest anything. Maybe most people really are in favor of a pre-emptive strike, but they're just not running out and yelling about it, because they don't have to.

Even more up-fucking (that's a new word, like "misunderestimate") is the fact that the majority doesn't always know what is in their own best interest. That's what always gets my head spinning when the Big Issues come up. Vague and imperfect analogy: some political figure once made a huge stink about faint readings of radioactivity from a body of water (or something like that) that sat near a factory. "ANY RADIATION IS UNACCEPTABLE!" He got a lot of people all wound up about it. The amount of radiation he was screaming about was about the same as what your alarm clock emits.

The book Uncovering the Dome, by Amy Klobuchar, presents a really good example of this sort of thing. Most people didn't want the Metrodome, but boy was it a good idea. I sure hope I'm remembering that book right.