Hala,
Thank you for proving the point I made in my follow up comment.
1 and 2 – You are factually right, and I agree on the basic premise. However, you go on to make distinctions between “true stands” and others. Alas, politics remains about opportunism as much as principle, so pardon me for not looking a gift horse in the mouth.
3- this point is moot; I did not even make any argument that invites such comparison. You’re welcome to court controversy, but I won’t bite.
4- Here we go again. That tired dead horse has been beaten far too much; For one, the theory you propose has been debunked successfully by Tony at Beirut2Bayside. However, as in all lies, there is a grain of truth that your opposition to Siniora is missing, and it lies in the affair of the Danish embassy and Fatfat’s link there. For another, Yes, Geagea is a criminal, but so is Berri, Assad… They are all criminals, and Aoun betrayed his followers who are still in Syrian jails. Talking about half the facts will get you nowhere fast.
5-6- I do not understand this point; We have always been an emigrant society. Hariri had his faults, but at least he offered scholarships, hence helping to raise the profile of the Lebanese in the diaspora. He is no less “feudal” than the others.
7- I am not advocating that. RFT…AA, please.
8- thanks for the “effort made by the Free Patriotic Movement to educate”… Now how about leading by example? What with this alliance with a the most sectarian group of all, one that calls itself “party of God”? I can understand the political need for it, but that denies the FPM any secular claim.
9- The threat of civil war comes from the miscalculations of all; it takes a few to dabke. And in this regard, I do not see how peace-inducing can be actions like cutting roads, occupying downtown, and forcing people to “strike”.
We’re all in this mess together; each side’s partisans have done a lot for Lebanon, but they also have done a lot against Lebanon. No one is a saint, Aoun no less or more than the others. No one has a claim over God, Hezb’O no less or more than the others.
