I’d just like to add that if you often wonder about true democracy and diplomacy, you should read Nelson Mandela’s “Long Walk To Freedom”.
That book changed a lot of my views on how to solve problems. No matter how strongly you feel about something, there is someone that feels just as strongly against it. It is the ability of mutual tolarance that will lead to peace.
i applaud your faith in diplomacy, and your championing of a great man…but let’s not give people the idea that the south africans, particularly the hard core afrikaners , came to the table of their own accord…a lot of countries, including the us, had to get off of their complacent tushes and bring strong protest and economic sanctions to bear on south africa to help get the parties to sit down and talk (you see, all that ‘divest in south africa’ stuff happened while i was in college, about the same time that the shah’s iranian students were at my university staging demonstrations against the shah 😉 )…and there was a lot of unfavorable publicity about the atrocities perpetrated in the townships by the south african government, not to mention the political prisoners such as mandela…although i noticed your listing as south africa, i would not have brought any of this up until you opened the discussion…i say again, although i am not prowar, i think i am tired as an immigrant of hearing countries, including the one of my birth (italy), whining about the evil americans and the horrible things that they have done, while taking american money hand over fist as they scurry to hide the far uglier skeletons in their closets…so while we discuss the war, let us leave out the antiamerican rhetoric, and talk about how, outside of force, we are seriously going to get saddam, or the terrorists, to bow to outside pressure and come to the table and talk…do you seriously think all these suicide bombers are going to say, gee you are right, what was i thinking? reason only works with the reasonable…why haven’t all the socalled peaceful muslims banded together to toss these terrorists out? i am not being contentious, i am simply still waiting for a reasonable answer….