Where Are The Peaceniks?

I’m sorry but this is one reason why I have no real respect for the so-called “peace movement”. I would think a peacenik would abhor all war and call for peace whenever and wherever it broke out.

But alas, the peace movement is currently silent (Day Four) when it comes to the recent Russian invasion of Georgia.

In a prior employment venue, it was my job to make sure “Democracy Now!” aired on our station. When it came to the Iraq War, there was hardly a day that passed when there wasn’t some activist or academic who authoritatively bashed the Bush Administration for the “invasion” and our war crimes, torture, and genocide authorized by President Bush, and aided by cronies former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and Vice President Dick Cheney.

These people were ready to hold war crime tribunals against President Bush, despite the fact that Iraq was basically liberated by a Saddam Hussein (that many Democrats publicly claimed had weapons of mass destruction years before Bush was first elected) that gassed and murdered his own people, allowed rape, torture, and murder to be committed against his own people, and repeatedly violated United Nations resolutions.

Yet, when you go to the Headlines section for the August 11, 2008 edition of Democracy Now!, they couldn’t resist an opportunity to bash America while reporting the Russian invasion.

Fighting Occurs One Month After US Military Exercise in Georgia

Georgia is a close ally of the United States, which has been pushing for Georgia to join NATO. Over the weekend, the US military began airlifting 2,000 Georgian troops stationed in Iraq back home. Last month, 1,200 US troops took part in military exercises in Georgia. Both the US and Israel have helped arm Georgia’s military. Georgia also plays a pivotal role in the supply of oil from the Caspian region to the West as the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline runs through much of the country.

So, this is all America’s fault.

But surprisingly absent are any voices in opposition to the Russian invasion. With all the pictures coming out of the area, illustrating the anguish, pain, and carnage occurring there as you read this, where is Code Pink or the Women in Black? Where is Howard Zinn or Noam Chomsky or Medea Benjamin?

Could it be they are silent because there are few communists, deep down, that socialists don’t like?

Look, as many of you know, I respect consistency. I also point out double standards.

When President Bill Clinton ordered the invasion of Haiti, where were the war protesters? When he ordered the invasion of Mogadishu, the bombing of Iraq, Sudan, and put troops on the ground in Bosnia (a nation of which we had no national security interests), the peace movement was in absentia.

I guess silence is better than nothing….

Now is the time for Georgia and Russia to show restraint, and to avoid an escalation to full scale war. Georgia's territorial integrity must be respected. All sides should enter into direct talks on behalf of stability in Georgia, and the United States, the United Nations Security Council, and the international community should fully support a peaceful resolution to this crisis.
— Barack Obama statement, 8/8/08

“Show restraint”?

Has Senator Obama not been watching his television or reading up on the goings on in Georgia? Asking both sides to settle down has me picturing Barack as a girl standing near two men in the midst of a fistfight, shouting “Stop it! Stop it!”

Maybe he didn’t want to come off as confrontational, but to believe the United Nations can end the fighting by just asking, is almost the textbook definition of naive. Barack Obama is a peacknik, however as he’s running for President of the Unites States, he doesn’t have the luxury of being selective like his fellow anti-war pals are today.

Will Medea Benjamin get one of her Code Pinkies to confront Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and shove simulated blood-stained hands in his face as one did Condoleezza Rice?

Of course not.

Does the anti-war left privately sympathize with the commies ethnically-cleansing a pro-Western government in the former Soviet republic (seeing how liberals have a chronic dislike for anything capitalistic)?

Whatever the answer, consistency is the only thing that garners respect.

If the anti-war types have that visceral a response to war, then it shouldn’t just be about one we are involved in, where millions of people just happen to be free today. They should also protest war where civilians are being systematically exterminated, while a sovereign nation is annexed.

Sorry. Consistency from an anti-war liberal may be asking too much.

This column by radio broadcaster Bob Parks originally appeared on Outside the Wire. You can read the original here.