One Englishman’s feelings about the British hostage crisis:

I feel humiliated by the impotence of our government and armed forces in the face of naked aggression, a humiliation compounded by the disloyalty of our European partners and the refusal of Russia and China to support British forces kidnapped while carrying out a UN mission.

I feel soiled by the apologists for Iran who pervade our airwaves and press, led by the former Conservative Chancellor of the Exchequer Norman Lamont, now chairman of the British Iranian Chamber of Commerce. Lamont claims that Tony Blair’s support for American policy is to blame for Iran’s hostility, and that the release of the hostages proves that “neocons” were wrong to urge a tough line.

I feel contaminated by the sight of Ahmadinejad posing as a benefactor even as he orders yet more terrorist attacks in Iraq. One of the most recent: a bomb that killed four British soldiers and an interpreter in Basra just as the hostages were being released.

I feel ashamed of Patricia Hewitt, our health secretary, who criticized the woman sailor held hostage for smoking a cigarette, but said nothing about the indignity of her being deprived of her uniform, forced to wear a Muslim headscarf, and patronized by Ahmadinejad because she was a mother.

Tony Blair waited until the sailors and marines were safely home before reminding the British people that Iran is arming, financing, and inciting terrorism throughout the region while defying the will of the international community in its pursuit of nuclear weapons. The BBC’s Middle East editor, Jeremy Bowen, reported the prime minister’s remarks as responding to a gesture of friendship from Iran with “a slap in the face.”

In reality, Blair has been frustrated by his inability to respond more robustly to the Iranian provocation. America’s former ambassador to the UN, John Bolton, told the BBC that the Iranians were testing the British to see if there would be any price to pay for their outrageous behavior. Now they had their answer, said Bolton: “Softly, softly.” I don’t think he meant it as a compliment.

Via Power Line, one Marine tells us his reasons.

I’ll leave it up to you to decide if Sgt. Baker Brooks is ”reciting Republican talking points” or if he’s a ”warmonger” or if he’s hopelessly deluded or if he needs the Democrats in Congress to take him out of harm’s way, because they are so concerned about his welfare. Or if he’s just one of the many Americans who believe we are in a fight for our way of life and who are putting their lives on the line to defend it:

I say that it is the “Right war to Fight” and I mean it with every fiber of my being. America is in this fight now. Much like Israel is locked in war, we are now locked in war. It may be slow and protracted but it will remain.

You may be thinking that this is not the case and that the attacks on American soil were a fluke. I say to you that you are lying to yourself and are in for a rude awakening. Not only are you in for a rude awakening but your self deception will cost our nation dearly in mindset and readiness. You have become tired of fighting. But how can anyone become tired of fighting the right fight? Much like in a foot race you will begin to tire and hurt. You will begin to focus on what is happening to you now. You have lost sight of the goal as you focus on yourself. And the pain that consumes you now has killed your aspirations of winning. You will only be able to win when you keep your eyes on the end goal and you see past the now. But unfortunately our eyes, via the news, have been focused on the now far too long.

Read the whole thing.

Matthew Yglesias thinks that poll results should determine our foreign policy, because they express the will of the people.

Ezra Klein, who often comments wistfully on Yglesias’s half-formed opinions, isn’t quite so sure. Then Klein idly wonders whether there has been a time when America wasn’t gung-ho to go to war.

In the comments, Yglesias responds that neither Kosovo nor Gulf War I “polled well” before they began.

World War Two took place before Yglesias and his acolytes were born, so even though he’s a Harvard graduate, I guess I shouldn’t expect him to know anything about the long history of American isolationism or of the Republicans’ fervently partisan anti-war sentiment in the run-up to that particular war.
On the other hand, I’ve read that Yglesias is under contract to write a book about foreign policy. I’ll let you decide whether there is any reason to take seriously anything that he writes.

Journalist Tish Durkin tells the awful truth to the smug anti-war brigade:

In terms of the what-now in Iraq, [getting the hell out] might be the only option we’ve got. But in terms of the what-next for the United States, it’s not enough.

It’s easy to rewrite a very complex story as a dark fairy tale that begins and ends with the evil of Bush and Cheney. This, presumably, is why so many people are doing it. But it’s still wrong.

If none of this was ever hard - if the consensus is simply that this whole invasion was always a stupid idea and there was never, ever any reason why any good or intelligent person would have considered it - then all we have to do is elect someone nice and smart, and ignore whatever legitimate factors there may have been to mitigate our certitude. We won’t have to think about what, if anything, a dictator can do to compromise his sovereignty in the eyes of the world. We won’t have to think about what, if anything, should be done to enforce peace agreements that have been shredded, or international sanctions that have been ignored. We don’t have to worry about where, if anywhere, we draw the line between allowing international bodies, such as the U.N., to prevent war, and allowing them to perpetuate, if only indirectly, very serious violence of other kinds.

Read the whole thing and, if you haven’t done so already, face reality: the United States is mired in foreign policy issues, challenges, and problems that will be with us long after George W. Bush and his crew have been sent packing.