Stability in Iraq

Mark Steyn is my favorite columnist and my favorite guest on Hugh Hewitt's show. There was a time last year, when I was listening to him on Hugh's show, and he said something that really got to me, and I said out loud (I was alone in my car), "I want to marry that man." Unfortunately, the following week, Hugh mentioned that Mark is married with kid(s). Bummer!

But he's still my favorite columnist and Hugh guest. His most recent column for the Chicago Sun-Times, has a statement that I haven't heard reported by the mainstream media: "The IMF noted in November that the Iraqi economy is already outperforming all its Arab neighbors."

Why isn't this being reported? Why does the mainstream media continue to promote the impression that all is lost there, that somehow things were better for the Iraqi people before we got there, that somehow it's President Bush's fault for upsetting the stability that existed in the Middle East before he came along?

Steyn has the perfect comment for those who revere stability:

The ''realpolitik'' types spent so long worshipping at the altar of stability they were unable to see it was a cult for psychos. The geopolitical scene is never stable, it's always dynamic. If the Western world decides in 2005 that it can ''contain'' President Sy Kottik of Wackistan indefinitely, that doesn't mean the relationship between the two parties is set in aspic. Wackistan has a higher birth rate than the West, so after 40 years of ''stability'' there are a lot more Wackistanis and a lot fewer Frenchmen. And Wackistan has immense oil reserves, and President Kottik has used the wealth of those oil reserves to fund radical schools and mosques in hitherto moderate parts of the Muslim world. And cheap air travel and the Internet and ATM machines that take every bank card on the planet and the freelancing of nuclear technology mean that Wackistan's problems are no longer confined to Wackistan. For a few hundred bucks, they can be outside the Empire State Building within seven hours. Nothing stands still. "Stability'' is a fancy term to dignify laziness and complacency as
sophistication.

Our efforts in Iraq have destabilized the status quo in the entire region. Iraqis have voted, and according to CBS News Middle East expert, Prof. Fouad Ajami, "the Arab states around Iraq are nervous." This is a good development because, as Ajami says, these countries "are not liberty's friends."

May those countries who value freedom, like Iraq, find freedom for themselves and find economic prosperity as well. And may those countries whose leaders are no friend of liberty find the pressure to loosen the iron grip on their people, so that their countries too may know the blessings of freedom.