US-Islamic alliance at UN
The Bush Administration has waged an aggressive fight against abortion, family planning, women's rights and gay rights policies at United Nations conferences, which has resulted in some noxious alliances.
Conservative U.S. Christian organizations have joined forces with Islamic governments to halt the expansion of sexual and political protections and rights for gays, women and children at United Nations conferences. The new alliance, which coalesced during the past year, has received a major boost from the Bush administration, which appointed antiabortion activists to key positions on U.S. delegations to U.N. conferences on global economic and social policy. But it has been largely galvanized by conservative Christians who have set aside their doctrinal differences, cemented ties with the Vatican and cultivated fresh links with a powerful bloc of more than 50 moderate and hard-line Islamic governments, including Sudan, Libya, Iraq and Iran. [...]
"The main issue that brings us all together is defending the family values, the natural family," added Mokhtar Lamani, a Moroccan diplomat who represents the 53-nation Organization of Islamic Conferences at the United Nations. "The Republican administration is so clear in defending the family values." [...]
"This alliance shows the depths of perversity of the [U.S.] position," said Adrienne Germaine, president of the International Women's Health Coalition. "On the one hand we're presumably blaming these countries for unspeakable acts of terrorism, and at the same time we are allying ourselves with them in the oppression of women."
This is why I'm ambivalent about the post-September 11 wave of patriotism. I support the fight against Al-Qaeda and the Taliban. In an ideological struggle between Western democracy and Islamic fundamentalism, I side with the West and consider myself blessed to have born here. But the things I love most about Western democracy tend to be the things that U.S. conservatives hate most about Western democracy. On so many important issues, the Bush administration demonstrates exactly why government dominated by reactionary religious fundamentalists is a really bad idea.
I was curious how the conservative blogger-pundits had responded to this article. Instapundit (with whom I often agree) strangely took it as fodder to criticize leftist apologists for Islamic fundamentalism, while giving no indication whether he approves or disapproves of the Bush Administration policies discussed in the article. Maybe I'm failing to read between the lines. Andrew Sullivan (with whom I often disagree) was more forthright: "Why the Bush administration should want to ally itself with Islamist states in this fashion is beyond me, except pandering to their extremist wing. How can the First Lady champion women’s rights in Islamist countries, while her husband blesses those in America who find such repression of women something to admire and aspire to?"
