in their own words (part 1)

Without much else going on, we are probably all much consumed with the imminent leadership race. I'm personally trying to sort myself out, and learn as much as I can about possible contenders. As I learn I shall share my "insights."

As much as quotation digging and cherrypicking has thus far dumbed down the discourse to an embarrassing degree, I have done some of my own... well.. cherrypicking. In fairness, I am genuinely still making up my mind, so my quotables aren't driven by any agenda. Nevertheless - understand them for what they are. In the case of certain academics that are most interesting to me, they are vast and complex works of thoughtful inquiry reduced to a matter of sentences.

First and foremost, Michael Ignatieff and Iraq. This is just for starters. From The Year of Living Dangerously (op-ed New York Times):

"What tipped me in favor of taking these risks was the belief that Hussein ran an especially odious regime and that war offered the only real chance of overthrowing him. This was a somewhat opportunistic case for war, since I knew that the administration did not see freeing Iraq from tyranny as anything but a secondary objective...

When I said that here was the fundamental case for war, friends scoffed. Didn't I know that the administration couldn't care less if Iraq was decent as long as it was stable and obedient? I replied that if good results had to wait for good intentions, we would have to wait forever.

So supporting the war meant supporting an administration whose motives I did not fully trust for the sake of consequences I believed in."

Those consequences were, of course, the defeat of a leader that engages in ethnic warfare and genocide. This is not to say his endorsement of the war is water-tight or uncontroversial. Many - most - supporters of this sort of Human Security doctrine still opposed the war. Can/should good results be anticipated when objectives are flawed? This is a difficult question, one I'm still coming to terms with. My first instinct has been that they should not.

We can extrapolate one uncontroversial thing from this excerpt, however. Ignatieff cannot be reduced to a "Bush backer." This seems, unfortunately, to be a necessary starting point.