Bull

Bull Moose Blog is great. He just re-launched his blog yesterday and has been posting original (not the cheap quoting that I'm always doing) and well thought out pieces like there's no tomorrow. Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo recommended him. Today he hits on the danger of having an Islamic fundamentalist government which would apparently "disappoint" our current President, but "democracy is democracy." But before we get to Bull Moose a bit from JS Mill who has seniority over the born-yesterday Bull Moose. John Stuart Mill-On Liberty:

...for example, an engagement by which a person should sell himself, or allow himself to be sold, as a slave, would be null and void; neither enforced by law nor by opinion. The ground for thus limiting his power of voluntarily disposing of his own lot in life, is apparent, and is very clearly seen in this extreme case. The reason for not interfering, unless for the sake of others, with a person's voluntary acts, is consideration for his liberty. His voluntary choice is evidence that what he so chooses is desirable, or at the least endurable, to him, and his good is on the whole best provided for by allowing him to take his own means of pursuing it. But by selling himself for a slave, he abdicates his liberty; he foregoes any future use of it, beyond that single act. He therefore defeats, in his own case, the very purpose which is the justification of allowing him to dispose of himself. He is no longer free; but is thenceforth in a position which has no longer the presumption in its favor, that would be afforded by his voluntarily remaining in it. The principle of freedom cannot require that he should be free not to be free.

That is why we cannot allow a truly fundamentalist government to take power. (I don't have the time or energy right now to argue fully for what I am premising the previous sentence on, that is, why I think democracy and fundamentalist Islam are diametrically opposed, but I will certainly keep my eyes open for such an argument from someone else that I can post here. In the meantime I'll rely on empirical examples such as the Taliban.) And now, finally, here is what the Bull Moose added to the discussion today:

That is what came to the Moose’s mind when he read Robin Wright’s lead story in today’s Washington Post, “Religious Leaders Ahead in Iraq Poll.” The story cites a poll taken in Iraq by the International Republican Institute, which no one can claim is a French-loving left-wing outfit.

The IRI poll found that the most popular politicians in liberated Iraq are Iran-supported pols
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Since the end of the war, Iran has been extremely active among the Shia. While attention has focused on the violent Sunni Triangle, the real long-term threat to the anti-terrorist cause may be the emergence of an Iranian client state with support drawn from the majority Shia based in the relatively peaceful south.

Bull Moose also goes on to say that one should be careful not to throw Christian babies out with the Bush bathwater.

In short, Suskind attributes President Bush’s ideological intransigence, arrogance, hubris, triumphalism and lack of self-reflection to the fact that he is a devoutly religious Christian with a born-again experience. The Moose suggests that it could also be due to the fact that the President is intransigent, arrogant, full of hubris, triumphant to the max and is not introspective. He is not a religious fundamentalist but rather a militant anti-empiricist.

Yes, some people who possess these qualities are religious. And some are secular. But neither the Moose nor does anyone else have a window into the President’s soul. Religion may actual temper these destructive qualities in the President. Or, the President may simply not be faithful to his faith.
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Yes, we should oppose this President’s overweening arrogance and hubris. But, let’s keep religion out of it. As matter of fact, it wouldn’t hurt if we got some religion ourselves. If the President is re-elected, we may desperately need it!

Like I said, Bull Moose is great.