EUROPEAN MANICHEANISM: THE CHOICE BETWEEN EVIL OR EVIL:

The Twin Towers and the Tower of Babel: The roadmap of human folly (Pepe Escobar, 9/120/03, Asia Times)

European diplomats are keen to point out that if there is a choice in the Middle East, it is not a choice between secular dictatorship and secular democracy - but between secular dictatorship and Islamic democracy. The difference between what people living in the Middle East want and what the Bush administration says they want is abysmal. A solution will come only when America - and regional autocratic regimes - allow those people to decide by themselves. Obviously, this will only happen when Middle Eastern oil runs out.

What's strange about this argument is that the Iraqis don't much seem to want an Islamicist state (in particular the Kurds who've been running their own affairs for a decade seem disinterested), the Iranians are trying to get rid of theirs, and the Palestinians don't choose Islamicist leaders.

Posted by Orrin Judd at September 10, 2003 2:38 PM