There is a right leaning think tank called the CATO Institute.
This think tank is not socially conservatives, but their economic ideas were a major engine of Reaganomics.
I mention CATO because they are perhaps the only trustworthy source where rightwing voters can get an alternate narrative to the one they get from Movement Conservatism (Beck, Limbaugh, Levine et al) -- which has described The War on Terrorism as a war between American freedom and barbarians like Saddam Hussein and Islamic radicals.
The CATO institute tells a different narrative of the middle east. It sees the current turmoil arising not from a clash between good and evil, but from the impact of colonialism., i.e., conflicts arising because of Western intervention in the region, mostly because of oil. [The rightwing voter will not pursue this thread because it opens up a geopolitical universe which his sources never mention. The rightwing voter doesn't hear about vital resource markets, only bad people who hate freedom]
A question arises. A humble question. Is there more to the region than simple evil doers who hate freedom? Should we make more of an attempt to understand Western intervention in the region? Perhaps we should consider that the middle east is one of the only places that didn't experience decolonization during the postwar years, when much of Africa gained independence. Granted, Britain was forced to end it's formal colonial rule in the late 40's, but this only created a vacuum filled by the US and Soviets, who began pouring money and weapons into region. FYI: once you pour money and weapons into despotic regimes (regardless of how noble the objective), you can no longer talk about speeding freedom or voluntary market arrangements.
There is a massive bloc of American voters, controlled mostly by Movement Conservatism, who have never studied the middle east. Rather than thinking in terms of historical and policy specifics -- rather than seeking out the nuances of geopolitics, and the compromises America has made to achieve "stability" in the region -- they are stuck inside broad generalizations about "evil doers" & "Freedom".
Put simply: we have a group of voters whose ignorance is crucial to misadventures in places like Iraq, Afghanistan, and Libya.
Here is my concern. The War on Terrorism is coming back on a major scale in 2012. By this I mean a set of policies that seek to exploit very real national security threats in order to create a context for intervention in "vital" regions. We are going to once again see more than just incompetent, anti-Constitutional bombing raids in Libya (-Lefty presidents since Carter have always managed only a weak military version of their steroidal GOP counterparts). When the GOP retakes Washington, we are going to see much bigger threats and much bigger uses of force. We are going to see color coded fear warnings on FOX News, designed to "sell" foreign policies we can no longer afford.
Here is what I ask. Will the rightwing voters on this board start studying the middle east right now. This will allow you to become more critical of the official narrative, which depends on the fact that you do not know [things like] the difference between the Ba'ath party and Al Qaeda. I will supply study material from your side of the political spectrum. I make this gesture in good faith because we need you --
as citizens -- to hold
your party accountable. We simply cannot afford 8 more years of the Bushies.
Meaning: we need you to hold your party accountable in the way you hold Obama accountable. [FYI: I'm encouraged by the things most of you are saying about Libya, but we need you to expand this into a broader understanding of US Foreign Policy]
We need you to use your criticism of Libya --
which I agree with 100%! -- as a springboard to analyze and question your party's
next argument for intervention. We can't afford for you to go to sleep for another 8 years -- even if you are 100% certain that evil abounds and freedom is on the march. We need you to study history.
http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa159.pdf
