Jonah Goldberg is a tool. (That's not very nice, is it?)

The Doughy Pantload, as part of National Review's neverending war on pluaralism, is writing about Canada again. My favourite part:

They’ve bravely contributed to the war in Afghanistan, where 2,300 troops still serve, but refused to join the effort in Iraq, believing that jihadists would honor such fine distinctions. That was awfully nice of them. Too bad nice has nothing to do with it.


Um, actually "nice" didn't have anything to do with it. Basic politics did. Jonah would probably agree that a Democratic Administration, even a hawkish one, wouldn't have instigated the drive to attack Iraq preemptively. Similarly, the previous Liberal government (unlike the opposition Conservatives who supported the US mission at the time) came to agree with the majority of its voter base (and with the majority of major Western governments and their voter bases) that occupying Iraq looked like a bad idea built on flimsy intellectual and security foundations, and declined to share in the glory.

Retrospectively speaking, the Liberals' decision wasn't so much "nice" -- either in the "sensitive to the terrorists" way Jonah means it or in the more general sense of doing the responsible thing within the international community -- as "not totally imbecilic". Not something to which Jonah can relate.