Doing the Right Thing

AN EDITED VERSION OF THIS POST APPEARS IN THE LETTERS SECTION OF THE NEW YORK TIMES ON MARCH 22, 2011


We comprehend that the undertaking in Libya is indeed fraught with peril on many levels. The Arab nations that join the alliance are uncomfortable partners; we are involved in yet one more muddled situation in a part of the world that views us with much suspicion and much contempt; we are uncertain in our ultimate aims and we are unclear whether those aims can be reached; we don't know, even if successful, what form new leadership will take; protecting our own national security is not the issue here; we are militarily engaged in other countries that require our attention, our resources and drain us economically; and there are other countries in this region who, like the Libyan rebels may soon be looking to us for more than moral support. These are all legitimate reasons to question our sanity in what we have now undertaken.

Yet, despite all of this, if we stand by idly, watching as the seeds of democracy are crushed, and a people are slaughtered systematically by one of their own, what are we? When we have the opportunity and the capacity to act as guardians for a people who cannot protect themselves, and face imminent annihilation, isn't that the moment that all other concerns must be cast aside? If we can do what's morally right, is there any way that we cannot?

Mr. Douthat would suggest that this undertaking, based on moral underpinnings, is at best naive. But I would much rather be in this fight than in the ones former President Bush began during his tenure in office. President Obama, in an impossibly tight box, is calling on us, to use the words of Spike Lee, to "do the right thing". Just because it is not comfortable, and we are not certain where it may lead, does not mean it is not right.