When a Cloud Covers the Sun

“My life,” says the Dalai Lama, “has not been an altogether happy one; I have had to pass through many difficult times.” Of course hard times include losing his country to Chinese Communist invaders, and trying to promote and  preserve Tibetan culture in exile. “Yet,” he continues, “I regard these difficult periods as among the most important times in my life. Through them, I have gained many new experiences and learned many new ideas.”

From His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s new book, How to Be Compassionate: A Handbook for Creating Inner Peace and a Happier World (translated from oral teachings and edited by Jeffrey Hopkins) :

Consider the so-called enemy this way:

1. Because this person’s mind is untamed, he or she engages in activities that are harmful to you.
2. If anger—the wish to harm—were part of the basic nature of this person, it could not be altered in any way, but […] hatred does not reside in the nature of a person.
3. Even if it were the nature of a person to hate, then, just as we cannot get angry at fire because it burns our hand (it is the very nature of fire to burn), so we should not get angry at a person expressing his or her nature.
4. This said, hatred is actually peripheral to a person’s nature. When a cloud covers the sun we do not get angry at the sun, so we should not get angry with the so-called enemy, but instead hold the person’s afflictive emotion responsible.
5. We ourselves sometimes engage in bad behavior, do we not? Still, most of us do not think of ourselves as completely bad. We should look on others the same way.
6. Therefore, the actual troublemaker is not the person, but his or her afflictive emotion.

When we lose our temper, we don’t hesitate to use harsh words, even to a close friend. Afterward, when we calm down, we feel embarrassed about what happened. This indicates that we, as persons, do not really want to use such harsh words, but because we were dominated by anger, we lost our self-control.
[...]
[W]e can learn to separate a corner of the mind from strong emotions like hatred and observe the mind from this vantage point; this indicates that the mind and hatred are not one, therefore the person and hatred are not one.

“Must’ve Been Drunk”

Merle Haggard & George Jones

This song reminds me of two old friends of mine years ago, when they met a young lady from Des Moines who made a great impression on them, in one way or another.

For lovers of country music only: two living legends in a very “relaxed” state of mind...

Why?

The cover of the May 4/10, 2011 issue of The Stranger

I have just learned that Al-Qaeda has confirmed the death of Osama Bin Laden. Well, I’m not what is usually referred to as a “conspiracy hunter,” but if I were, I suppose I couldn’t help asking why on earth they felt the need to do so. But  I just am not that kind of blogger. They must have become suddenly sincere and intellectually honest, despite their own (supposed) interests. Or maybe I’ve simply missed something… Who knows?

Weren't They a Bunch of Assassins?

Hypocrisy Watch: as everybody knows, Osama bin Laden was killed by SEAL Team Six, officially known as Naval Special Warfare Development Group or DevGru. Yet, when GW Bush was president the media called them “Cheney’s assassination squad.” Now that a Democratic President has employed them to take out Osama bin Laden a lot of things seem to have changed…

Via DDMHA and The PJ Tatler

A Man of God

Yesterday in Saint Peter’s Square the late Pope John Paul II was proclaimed Blessed—the next-to-last step before a Catholic is formally declared a saint—before one million and a half faithful. Yet another show of strength from an extraordinary man. But the event began the previous night, when a crowd of hundreds of thousands, mostly young people, flocked to the Circus Maximus oval to pray, sing and celebrate as they waited for the beatification ceremony. And that’s where and when John Paul’s long-time spokesman, Joaquin Navarro-Valls, told the crowd a simple truth: “The Church does not make saints, it just recognizes that a person lived a saintly life. John Paul was already a saint.”

 That’s what seems to me to be the great thing about the event. He was already a saint. Because of what he did? Well, he actually did many good things—amazing things!—for the world, but it was not mainly a matter of doing, it was a matter of being. You can’t measure it, you can’t manage it, you just know that he is blessed. You see him, you hear him speaking a few simple words and you immediately know that he is a man of God in the truest sense. A Man of God, is there a better synonym for sanctity, without any “ecclesiastical” rhetoric? His last days, his long, brave struggle with illness, his will to show us in his own flesh the Christ suffering... No, sorry, there are no words.

In a 1999 letter written to the world’s elderly he said: “It is wonderful to be able to give oneself to the very end for the sake of the kingdom of God. At the same time, I find great peace in thinking of the time when the Lord will call me: from life to life. And so I often find myself saying, with no trace of melancholy, a prayer recited by priests after the celebration of the Eucharist: ‘In hora mortis meae voca me, et iube me venire ad te’ (at the hour of my death, call me and bid me come to you). This is the prayer of Christian hope.”

Thus prayed the old man of God. And as an ancient Indian saying goes, “The Prayer of the man of God does not go in vain.”

Bombing Libya

 Credit: Reuters/Yannis Behrakis

Certainly it was quite unavoidable, but Italy’s decision to send its warplanes on missions to bomb Libya “has not been easy,” as Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi admitted during a joint press conference in Rome with French president Nicolas Sarkozy. Not by chance, in fact, for weeks Italy has resisted joining the air missions over Libya. The official reason for this reluctance was that, as the former colonial ruler in Libya, the political cost of causing casualties was too high. But the truth is that, first of all, Italy is the North African country’s biggest trading partner, and second of all, both many conservative members of the government and opinion leaders across the Country are doubtful about this whole thing. There is no substantial likelihood, according to them, that the rebels are better than Gaddafi—which is not to say that Gaddafi is a good guy, on the contrary, the fear is that the rebels are even worse than him.

Are they too pessimistic? Perhaps yes, perhaps no, it depends on too many variables—what do we really know about these rebels? Well, that’s the problem, at least in my humble opinion—but I would like to be optimistic, that’s for sure…

Be it as it may, what is certain is that Berlusconi will now have to calm tensions with his key Northern League coalition partner which has threatened to make the government collapse if Italy conducts lethal attacks on Libya.

“I Have Seen the Lord!”

Giotto, "Noli me tangere," Cappella degli Scrovegni, Padua

“ Now on the first day of the week cometh Mary Magdalene early, while it was yet dark, unto the tomb, and seeth the stone taken away from the tomb. She runneth therefore, and cometh to Simon Peter, and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and saith unto them, They have taken away the Lord out of the tomb, and we know not where they have laid him. Peter therefore went forth, and the other disciple, and they went toward the tomb. And they ran both together: and the other disciple outran Peter, and came first to the tomb; and stooping and looking in, he seeth the linen cloths lying; yet entered he not in. Simon Peter therefore also cometh, following him, and entered into the tomb; and he beholdeth the linen cloths lying, and the napkin, that was upon his head, not lying with the linen cloths, but rolled up in a place by itself. Then entered in therefore the other disciple also, who came first to the tomb, and he saw, and believed. For as yet they knew not the scripture, that he must rise from the dead. So the disciples went away again unto their own home. But Mary was standing without at the tomb weeping: so, as she wept, she stooped and looked into the tomb; and she beholdeth two angels in white sitting, one at the head, and one at the feet, where the body of Jesus had lain. And they say unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? She saith unto them, Because they have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid him. When she had thus said, she turned herself back, and beholdeth Jesus standing, and knew not that it was Jesus. Jesus saith unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? whom seekest thou? She, supposing him to be the gardener, saith unto him, Sir, if thou hast borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away. Jesus saith unto her, Mary. She turneth herself, and saith unto him in Hebrew, Rabboni; which is to say, Teacher. Jesus saith to her, Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended unto the Father: but go unto my brethren, and say to them, I ascend unto my Father and your Father, and my God and your God. Mary Magdalene cometh and telleth the disciples, I have seen the Lord; and that he had said these things unto her. ”

~ John 20:1-18

Have a Blessed Holy Week!

Giotto, The Kiss of Judas, Cappella degli Scrovegni, Padua 

I wish all my readers a blessed Holy Week and a glorious Easter!

Going Kindle

Even the last few days have been very busy for me, and as it was not enough I have been mostly off-line lately (new ISP, new modem-router) and still have troubles with Internet connection. Hence the light or no blogging at all. Once again, too bad, since so many things have been happening meanwhile. But if I was prevented from having my say on what is happening in the word—well, no real big loss though, I’m sure you were able to get by on your own these days…—I must say that I took advantage from one of the circumstances which kept me away from the blogosphere: my new Amazon Kindle 3 3G + Wi-Fi.

It has been said that the new Kindle is to the old what the paperback is to the hardback, and this is no doubt true: it’s smaller, cheaper, faster and better connected than its predecessor. Besides being a relatively inexpensive device for reading books (Kindle is widely regarded as the best e-reader on the market), it offers an experimental web browser which is free to use over Kindle’s 3G or Wi-Fi connections. And if you are travelling outside the United States, there is free access to the Amazon store and Wikipedia in over 100 countries anywhere you have a 3G connection. You can browse other websites globally via a Wi-Fi connection. Access to other websites while travelling abroad is available via a 3G connection in over 60 countries. It’s absolutely fantastic. Here is a video review (full written review here):

Breakin' the Law

~ “LETTERS FROM AMERICA” - by The Metaphysical Peregrine ~

Last year the Democrats controlled the legislature and executive branches and did not pass a budget as required by law. That left the Republicans with the task of passing that budget for the rest of the fiscal year (the result of the elections which gave them control of the House). We are $14 trillion in debt; that’s $45,000 for every man, woman and child in this country. Republicans tried to curb some of the spending and the result was the usual Leftist rap, Republicans want to steal from the poor (how does one take from those that don’t have?), starve children, send old people out into the streets to eat dog food and die and all the rest. They actually say those things seriously, and this is just for reducing the rate of growth of governmental spending, not actual cuts.

Most significantly about all this, is the lawlessness of the Democrats, and most especially this president. In the final budget that was just passed to complete fiscal year 2011, was Section 2262, which defunds many “adviser” positions Obama has created in the executive branch. These “czars” are not vetted by Congress, and are not Executive Branch positions; they are the crony’s of Obama, and not answerable to anyone but Obama. These are the full blown communists and extremist “greens” that would not pass a congressional vetting. In response to this, Obama wrote in his signing statement:

“The President has well-established authority to supervise and oversee the executive branch, and to obtain advice in furtherance of this supervisory authority,” he wrote. “The President also has the prerogative to obtain advice that will assist him in carrying out his constitutional responsibilities, and do so not only from executive branch officials and employees outside the White House, but also from advisers within it. Legislative efforts that significantly impede the President’s ability to exercise his supervisory and coordinating authorities or to obtain the views of the appropriate senior advisers violate the separation of powers by undermining the President’s ability to exercise his constitutional responsibilities and take care that the laws be faithfully executed.”

…the executive branch will construe section 2262 not to abrogate these Presidential prerogatives.”

In other words, he will not abide by the legislation.

This is his way. After the oil drilling disaster in the Gulf of Mexico last year, he declared a moratorium on drilling there. He's continued that moratorium and has refused to issue any more drilling permits. Two federal judges have ruled this is against the law, and he’s ignored the rulings.  

He’s refused to protect the borders as is required by law. As a result US citizens living along the Mexican\US border are getting murdered, raped and robbed. Arizona decided to enforce federal law and Obama sued the state.

Two federal judges have ruled that his health care bill, passed around midnight on Christmas\Christmas Eve last year (only Democrats voting for it), unconstitutional. He’s ignored the rulings and has continued to implement the program. Leading up to the vote, he spent an estimated $200 million of taxpayer money to advertise the benefits of the Affordable Health Care Act (aka ObamaCare), and is still spending. This is an illegal use of taxpayer money.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA, department of the executive branch) has been and is paying the American Lung Association (ALA) to finance campaigns against Republican legislators that vote to curtail the power of the EPA. This is illegal. The EPA creates regulations and fees that are in fact legislation and taxes, which is illegal.

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC), another executive branch department, recently passed regulations and fees regarding the internet, in violation of a federal judicial ruling last year confirming the FCC has no jurisdiction regarding the internet. This is an illegal action.  

During the last election, racist Black Panthers stood outside an election site with clubs and made threatening gestures at white voters; caught on video. US Attorney General Eric Holder (a black man) has refused to press charges of this violation of civil and voting rights laws because of the Black Panthers race. (Several staff of the Department of Justice have quit because Holder does not allow prosecution of blacks.) The Department of Justice is in the Executive Branch. This is illegal.   

These are the most blatant violations of the law this president has engaged in. These violations have the support of the mainstream media, the Democrat Party, most federal employees, and the unions. We can only hope the American people wake up enough by election time to realize we have a criminal president; that and his running the economy into the ground with his Marxist principles will hopefully oust this regime.

What Sharia Law Is All About

Ok, perhaps this is nothing new, but, as the old saying goes, repetita iuvant:

Islam is far more than a religion; it is a complete culture which includes a political system and legal code, known as Sharia law. Sharia law is based upon the Qu’ran and the Sunna, which is comprised of the Sira (Mohammed’s biography) and the Hadith (his Traditions). Sharia law covers traditional legal matters such as contracts, wills, criminal law and punishment. However, it also sets rules for conducting all the minutiae of day-to-day life, from every detail of religious behavior to all the mundane tidbits of family life.
Sharia law represents a threat to our civilization far more dangerous than the traditional idea of jihad. Only under Sharia law can Muslims practice “pure” Islam; therefore Muslims will strive to establish Sharia law in any country they inhabit. Our Constitution is an obstacle to pure Islam, as such cannot be practiced in America while it exists. According to Islam, there is no actual knowledge outside of the Qu’ran, the Sira, and the Hadith, and only laws based upon these books are “true” laws. The U.S. Constitution, because it’s man-made law, is inferior to Sharia.
Our Western legal system is based in large part upon the Golden Rule, which mandates equal treatment for all people. “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” – to Westerners this means ALL others, regardless of gender, race, or age. This type of ethical system is unitary because there is one rule which determines the code of conduct, and is based upon critical thought.
Sharia law, by contrast, is based on the dualistic ethics of Islam. One set of rules exists for Muslims while there is another set for kafirs (non-believers). Further dualism of Sharia law is illustrated by the fact that there are two different codes of law for men and women. Because it is based upon the teachings of Islam, Sharia law is the product of authoritative thought rather than critical thought. Its’ absolute truth is discovered by reference to the authoritative texts of Islam. Sharia cannot change – it is utterly inflexible – because the foundational texts cannot change. Accordingly, then, all people in the world, all governments of the world, must adapt to Sharia.

A Huge Theological Issue

Masaccio, St. Paul, Museo di S. Matteo, Pisa 

I’ve been very busy these days, that’s why I haven't blogged lately. It’s really too bad because I had a lot of stuff to talk about. However, the below is my first attempt at trying to make up for the delay.

Steven, at the Metaphysical Peregrine, puts forward a classic theological issue (even though in a very personal context): What about those who have never heard of Christ? Are they condemned to Hell? Well, if I may express my humble opinion on such a huge and controversial matter, I think that Hell may not be the penalty for ignorance; it is the penalty for sin. Furthermore, no one is really ignorant:

For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse (Rom 1:20).

In reality, there are several ways God reveals Himself in this world, and no one can hide behind the claim of ignorance, because the law is written on every heart (Rom 2:1,3). Therefore, to put it the way Steven did in his post, what about us believers? I’d say that it’s our responsibility to take the light of Christ to those who have no excuse.

Praised Be the Bridge

Photo courtesy of Venice Daily Photo (click to enlarge)

“ Let every man praise the bridge that carries him over.”

~ English proverb.

Benedict XVI, Hans Küng and Fr. de Lubac

Is contemporary Europe a religiously-barren place? Maybe, maybe not. What is certain is that two books, written by two Catholic theologians, recently rocketed up Germany’s best-seller list. One of the theologians is Benedict XVI. The other is Fr. Hans Küng, whose text, Ist die Kirche noch zu retten? (Can the Church Still Be Saved?), was published the same week as volume two of Benedict’s Jesus of Nazareth. In his Vatican II diaries, the great French theologian Henri de Lubac entered pithy observations about his two colleagues (as well as all those he encountered). Joseph Ratzinger is portrayed as one whose powerful intellect is matched by his “peacefulness” and “affability.” Hans Küng, by contrast, is denoted as possessing a “juvenile audacity” and speaking in “incendiary, superficial, and polemical” terms. Read this piece by Samuel Gregg, Research Director at the Acton Institute, to further explore the differences between the two theologians and their respective visions of the Church.

If Hillary Calls Assad a Reformer

  Assad & Ahmedinejad

Yet another interesting point of view on the U.S. administration’s policy towards the Arab revolution. This time the focus is on Syria (after Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is “a reformer”). Charles Krauthammer in his Friday column in the Washington Post:

Sometimes you cover for a repressive ally because you need it for U.S. national security. Hence our muted words about Bahrain. Hence our slow response on Egypt. But there are rare times when strategic interest and moral imperative coincide completely. Syria is one such — a monstrous police state whose regime consistently works to thwart U.S. interests in the region.
[...]
Yet here was the secretary of state covering for the Syrian dictator against his own opposition. And it doesn’t help that Clinton tried to walk it back two days later by saying she was simply quoting others. Rubbish. Of the myriad opinions of Assad, she chose to cite precisely one: reformer. That’s an endorsement, no matter how much she later pretends otherwise.
And it’s not just the words; it’s the policy behind it. This delicacy toward Assad is dismayingly reminiscent of President Obama’s response to the 2009 Iranian uprising during which he was scandalously reluctant to support the demonstrators, while repeatedly reaffirming the legitimacy of the brutal theocracy suppressing them.
[...]
No one is asking for a Libya-style rescue. Just simple truth-telling. If Kerry wants to make a fool of himself by continuing to insist that Assad is an agent of change, well, it’s a free country. But Clinton speaks for the nation.

Why Obama’s Libyan Adventure Is Already a Failure

Well, you may agree or disagree with the core argument of this article—it is high time to replace the U.N. Charter (and its obsolete procedures), in whose eyes North Korea, the most brutal totalitarian government in the world, is the equal of the United States, which has done more than any country in the postwar period to protect freedom and democracy, with international rules that encourage countries to end human rights abuses, fix failed states, and oppose rogue nations and terrorist groups, etc. But it’s worth reading anyway, in my opinion. In any case just let me know and we’ll fix it…

While Obama might claim success early on, given the vague mission of protecting civilians, we should not be fooled into thinking that an ongoing civil war represents a victory for American arms.Indeed, a prolonged stalemate would be a disaster. Wounded, vengeful, but undefeated, Qaddafi would pose a greater danger than ever. He could resume his practice of terrorist attacks on Western targets, working perhaps through jihadi elements such as the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, hundreds of whose members he has released from prison.
A protracted civil war in Libya could have effects beyond its borders. It could lead competing outside powers -- France, Turkey, or even China -- to back different Libyan factions. U.S. forces and resources would be tied down even as the United States seeks to wind down in Iraq and defeat a resurgent Taliban in Afghanistan. On the other hand, a premature exit would undermine American credibility in a region that already doubts Obama's steadfastness. Just as the administration's mishandling of last year's oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico revealed its ineptitude in domestic matters, its mismanagement of the Libya intervention may become emblematic of its haplessness in foreign affairs.
The Obama administration's most glaring mistake in its approach to Libya is the central weight it has given to the United Nations. Hanging America's hat on U.N. approval has caused a mismatch between Obama's stated policy goal -- that Qaddafi must "go" -- and the limited means provided by U.N. approval for economic sanctions and civilian protections. Even at this early stage of the conflict, Obama's policy has created a large gap between U.S. strategic ends and U.N.-authorized means

[...]

The one positive in all this? If Libya at least brings about a rude awakening for the Obama administration on the follies of multilateralism and leads to the emergence of a new international security system, it will have done far more good than simply dragging the United States into a civil war.

Found the Original King James Bible

CNN

A little English village church has just made a remarkable discovery, a rare 400-year-old book...

“Courtyard of the Gentiles”

Photo courtesy of  radiovaticana.org

Both the idea and the name—“Courtyard of the Gentiles”—came from Benedict XVI himself, the Pope-philosopher. The meeting, promoted by the Pontifical Council for Culture and launched with major international participation on Thursday at the Paris headquarters of UNESCO, was aimed at recovering a broad cultural dialogue between believers and non-believers, because, as the Pope said in his Christmas greetings to the Roman curia on December 21, 2009, “To the dialogue with the religions must be added today the dialogue with those to whom God is unknown.”

Photo courtesy of cathnewsusa.com

The initiative took its name from the space in the area of the great Temple at Jerusalem, in which Jews and gentiles met and engaged each other. And the choice of Paris as the venue for the conference was no accident: la Ville Lumière, with its symbolic status as the home of the Enlightenment and with its modernist La Grande Arche de la Défense, the monument to what the French call laïcité which is almost a perfect cube and which inspired the provocative title of George Weigel’s The Cube and the Cathedral.

With the promotion of the “Courtyard of the Gentiles” Benedict XVI created “a new starting point for dialogue between believers and nonbelievers,” the Vatican spokesman said. And I think we can believe him. So here are a couple of reading suggestions for those who want to learn more about the whole thing:

1. The full text of Pope Benedict XVI’s video message to participants at the meeting.
2. An initial assessment of the initiative, on the part of Cardinal Ravasi, and a conversation with a French intellectual of Bulgarian origin, Julia Kristeva, who has been one of the most dedicated participants in the meeting. Both of the interviews were published in Avvenire, the newspaper of the Italian Episcopal conference.

And here is a video introduction to the initiative from Rome Reports:

~ First written for The Metaphysical Peregrine ~

Trees Have no Dogmas

“ The vice of the modern notion of mental progress is that it is always something concerned with the breaking of bonds, the effacing of boundaries, the casting away of dogmas. But if there be such a thing as mental growth, it must mean the growth into more and more definite convictions, into more and more dogmas. The human brain is a machine for coming to conclusions; if it cannot come to conclusions it is rusty. When we hear of a man too clever to believe, we are hearing of something having almost the character of a contradiction in terms. It is like hearing of a nail that was too good to hold down a carpet; or a bolt that was too strong to keep a door shut. Man can hardly be defined, after the fashion of Carlyle, as an animal who makes tools; ants and beavers and many other animals make tools, in the sense that they make an apparatus. Man can be defined as an animal that makes dogmas. As he piles doctrine on doctrine and conclusion on conclusion in the formation of some tremendous scheme of philosophy and religion, he is, in the only legitimate sense of which the expression is capable, becoming more and more human. When he drops one doctrine after another in a refined scepticism, when he declines to tie himself to a system, when he says that he has outgrown definitions, when he says that he disbelieves in finality, when, in his own imagination, he sits as God, holding no form of creed but contemplating all, then he is by that very process sinking slowly backwards into the vagueness of the vagrant animals and the unconsciousness of the grass. Trees have no dogmas. Turnips are singularly broad-minded. ”

~ Gilbert Keith Chesterton, Heretics, 1905

Don’t Give to France What Is not France’s

The story may be told in different ways. One (and the most likely, in my opinion) is that French President Nicolas Sarkozy, with his popularity languishing at a record low and facing a presidential election next year and a revived National Front, the far right party led by Ms Le Pen, was in need of a political boost. And on Saturday—when the Operation “Odyssey Dawn” started—he got it. Yet, even before the allied forces attacked Libya on March 19, he had said that France had “decided to assume its role, its role before history” in stopping Gaddafi and his “killing spree” against his own people.

Another, which does not exclude the first, is that Nicolas Sarkozy is seeking to secure oil contracts with a future Libyan government and to increase French influence in that strategically vital area.

Yet another is very flattering for the French president: as Lt. Col. Oliver North told Fox News’ Sean Hannity Monday, “What you now have is very clearly an effort now to support the rebel movement in a civil war to get to Tripoli and unseat Moammar Gadhafi—this brutal despot—who has ruled the country for 40 years and killed thousands of people. Nicolas Sarkozy has no doubt about the mission—he is now the leader of the free world. It doesn’t bother him what Putin says or anybody else for that matter. In fact, I’m told that the message he delivered, very straightforward, was: We’re going with you or without you.”

Unfortunately for Lt. Col. North (and the French president), barely more than three years ago, Sarkozy welcomed Gaddafi on the red carpet in Paris, and allowed him to pitch an air-conditioned Bedouin tent near the Elysee. And this is how he used to approach the whole Gaddafi thing at the time:

Mr. Sarkozy also replied to his critics, saying, “It is rather beautiful the principle that consists in not getting yourself wet, not taking risks,” he said, and “being so certain of everything you think while you’re having your latte on the Boulevard Saint-Germain.”
[…]
“If we don’t welcome countries that are starting to take the path of respectability, what can we say to those that leave that path?” Mr. Sarkozy said at a news conference in Lisbon over the weekend.
Jean-David Levitte, Mr. Sarkozy’s diplomatic adviser, recently said that a country like Libya had a “right to redemption.”

But then again, Nicolas Sarkozy, too, has a right to redemption—and many others with him, including Silvio Berlusconi… Yet, one might ask why Sarkozy did not express much support, unlike in the case of Libya, for the recent uprisings which started in Tunisia and spread to Egypt. In other words, why Libya? Some think that this is because the winds of change that swept through Tunisia and Egypt have slowed, and need invigoration, which may be provided by a regime change in Libya. Others think that oil is what makes the difference. I myself, for what it’s worth, wouldn’t want to be too cynical here, but I guess the oil thing is by far the best explanation. This doesn’t necessarily mean that what has been done so far is bad. Not at all. Quite the contrary: something had to be done to stop Gaddafi killing more of his own people. Just please don’t give to France what is not France’s.

On the other hand, and here is something else to consider, as Norman Geras notes, it’s very important to remember that the doctrine of “a responsibility to protect,” which UN resolution 1973 refers to, includes the constraint of right intention (see 4.33 here):

The primary purpose of the intervention must be to halt or avert human suffering. Any use of military force that aims from the outset, for example, for the alteration of borders or the advancement of a particular combatant group's claim to self-determination, cannot be justified. Overthrow of regimes is not, as such, a legitimate objective, although disabling that regime's capacity to harm its own people may be essential to discharging the mandate of protection…

He who has ears to hear, let him hear…