As a follow up to Blood and Treasure on the miserably likely scenario that the US Democrats go for a "militant democracy everywhere" candidate against a peace-with-honour Republican in 2008, read this lengthy article by Peter Beinart. It is about as coherent, and as artfully-written, a defence of a pro-war left-liberal position as is likely to be found; that it is also unhesitatingly anachronistic, riddled with holes, and rests upon a highly tenuous analogy should be no surprise. (This, from, Eric Alterman, deals with its more questionable political assumptions. None of this is going to win me prizes for speedy blogging, but thanks to Dariush over in Lenin's comments boxes for pointing them in my direction.)