THE ANTIWAR MOVEMENT CRACKS UP: So far, it’s been such a bust that — as Clayton Cramer notes — even “progressive papers” like the L.A. Weekly are declaring it a failure:

Maybe someone in the peace movement should figure out that not only Bush could stop this war. So could Saddam — by resigning his unelected post and saving his people any further sacrifice. Yet I’ve yet to see one anti-war placard allude to Saddam’s responsibilities in securing the peace.

But talk about quagmires. The peace movement, which promises so much in its scope and energy, itself remains bogged down in a minimalist program of simply and only opposing U.S. military action. That’s hardly enough. . . .

Blocking traffic when 74 percent of the American people support the war, or endlessly whining about CNN’s coverage, or grandstanding as Michael Moore did at the Oscars telling America that a president who currently enjoys (for all the sordid reasons we know) stratospheric popularity ratings is “fictitious,” has much more to do with personal therapy than with effective politics. Continue on that tack and you can pretty much count on another four years of Bush, no matter how ugly the war turns. . . .

Protecting the Iraqi people, as the peace movement rightfully desires, is one helluva lot more complicated than merely shielding them from the collateral damage caused by U.S. bombs. (That is, unless you really believe that America is the “greatest terrorist state in the world,” as is so often repeated on KPFK’s drive-time shows. If your world-view is that facile, then indeed we have little more to discuss.)

Those who chant “U.S. out of Iraq” ought to be prepared, then, to offer themselves as human shields to protect the Kurds against threatening Turkish troops (a task currently in the hands of U.S. special forces). Or as shields to protect the southern marsh Arabs against occupation by the theocratic armed forces of Iran.

That seems about right, as this Christian Science Monitor story on the Antiwar movement’s PR problems notes:

“I just wonder how much Saddam is paying them,” says Charlie Lore, a businessman and former Vietnam protester who got stuck in a crowd of demonstrators in Manhattan last Thursday.

Even those in the mainstream who oppose the war often argue that protests are inappropriate with the conflict under way.

Others wonder if the demonstrators understand the issues driving US military action. Watching a Boston rally that drew an estimated 25,000 protesters last Saturday, Jim Cavan says he supports the war – and questions the critics’ motivations. “I feel like they’re doing it for fashion, and that it’s a throwback to the 60s and that no one understands what’s really going on,” he says. “If you’re going to protest, offer a solution. Don’t just protest for the sake of protesting.”

Meanwhile, speaking of, you know, solutions, Jackson Diehl pointed out last week — in a column that a lot of people, including me, missed at the time:

The Bush administration’s embrace of a democratization strategy for the postwar Middle East has triggered a torrent of scorn from the region’s traditional political and intellectual elites, not to mention regional experts at the State Department and CIA. Less noticed is the fact that it has also produced a flurry of political reforms, quasi-reforms and grass-roots initiatives in countries across the region.

Two days before the war began last week, the Palestinian legislative council dealt a major blow to the autocracy of Yasser Arafat, rejecting his attempt to limit the powers of a new prime minister. This happened by a democratic vote after a noisy democratic debate — which in turn came a few days after President Bush called for a strong prime minister in a Palestinian democracy.

The next day an Egyptian court finally ended the prosecution of the country’s leading pro-democracy activist, Saad Eddin Ibrahim, who had twice been sentenced to prison on trumped-up charges — and whose last conviction prompted the Bush administration to freeze aid to Egypt. Two weeks earlier, Gamal Mubarak, would-be heir to his father, Hosni, as president, announced a plan to end trials of civilians in the security courts in which Ibrahim was sentenced, and proposed an independent national council to monitor human rights.

A week before Mubarak spoke, King Abdullah of Jordan, who has not allowed an election since taking office four years ago and who dissolved parliament in 2001, set a date for parliamentary elections. He chose June 17, thereby ensuring that as the postwar political discussion gets underway, Jordan will be able to point to its own democratic exercise.

Saudi Arabia, meanwhile, has been urging Western journalists to take note of an “Arab Charter” floated by ruling Crown Prince Abdullah, which calls for “internal reform and enhanced political participation in the Arab states,” and a related petition by 104 intellectuals calling for the direct election in Saudi Arabia of a consultative council, an independent judiciary and freedom of speech and assembly. In January, on Abdullah’s order, a host of senior Saudi officials met with a visiting delegation from Human Rights Watch — the first time a Western human rights group had been allowed to visit the country.

These aren’t huge accomplishments, it’s true. But they’re more than the antiwar movement has managed. Meanwhile I agree with Bill Quick’s suggestion:

Wouldn’t it be nice if the first act of the new Iraqi government would be to invite Dr. Ibrahim to emigrate to a place where he could speak, write, and think freely?

You get more freedom with a kind word and a gun, than with a kind word alone.