The gap between Says and Is

Over at Unclaimed Territory Glenn Greenwald takes a short but pithy look at the gap between our stated foreign policy objectives and what we actually do.

Last week, the Bush administration normalized diplomatic relations with Libya -- and is soon to remove them from the list of terrorist countries for the first time since 1979 -- despite the fact that that Libya's internal repression is among the worst in the world and it is about as far away from democratizing as a country can be. All of those pro-Libya actions are direct and glaring contradictions of our supposed foreign policy principle of only supporting countries which provide democracy and freedom to their citizens (although, purely coincidentally, Libya has developed superb relations with international oil companies).

In virtually every Middle Eastern country, we seem to be acting as contrary to our ostensible ideals as possible -- including our increased support for Gen. Musharraf in Pakistan despite his increasing stranglehold on that country's democratic processes, our strengthening alliances with Egypt and Saudi Arabia, and our contempt for those governments which are democratically elected but not to our liking, including Hamas, Hugo Chavez, and even the government of Iran.

It's as though we think that Muslims -- whose improved view of the U.S. is allegedly the objective of all of our foriegn policy actions, including our occupation of Iraq -- won't notice the ever-widening gap between our pro-democracy rhetoric and our actions. Of course they notice.

As always, Glenn is thoughtful and rational - he finishes by acknowledging that

There are good, convincing, legitimate reasons why we should maintain alliances with undemocratic countries which nonetheless promote U.S. interests (including, for instance, a country's cooperation in tracking Al Qaeda activities, as Libya's intelligence service provides). Virtually every country makes its foreign policy decisions based on that self-interested calculus.

But - you knew there was a but, didn't you?

But we are a country which has now loudly proclaimed that everything we do -- including invading soveriegn countries -- is justified by our need to bring democracy to the world. Once a country makes that the proclaimed centerpiece of its foriegn policy, acting in direct contradiction to it achieves nothing other than the destruction of national credibility and the failure of every claimed foreign policy objective.

I don't have much to add - what is there to add? Read Glenn (you should anyway).