Shalom Lappin has a new article up at Dissent. As normblog readers will know, I don't share the view that the Iraq war was 'misconceived'. But Shalom's diagnosis of the present condition of the far left and of a section of the liberal left is very much to the point, and he has an interesting discussion of how this has come about. Here are just a few excerpts:
... [M]uch of what remains of the radical left has aligned itself with extreme Islamic political movements that promote the establishment of religious regimes in Asia and Africa, with the ultimate objective of a global caliphate. In Europe a not insignificant part of what currently passes for the liberal left also expresses sympathy for these movements...There is much more here. Read the whole thing. Shalom concludes by outlining an agenda for a 'new Social Democracy'. This would involve 'supporting the development of effective labor unions in the new industries of the developing world' and 'using free-trade agreements not simply to open up markets to international competition, but to construct a network of social investment and environmental protection that defines the conditions for foreign companies to enter a market'.... London's mayor, Ken Livingstone, pursues a Galloway-lite strategy of courting the MAB and welcoming Yusuf al-Qaradawi, an influential cleric supportive of the Muslim Brotherhood, who was expelled from Egypt for militant political activity (he is now based in Qatar). Al-Qaradawi endorses Palestinian suicide bombing on the grounds that he does not see a distinction between Israeli soldiers and civilians. He calls for the imposition of Sharia law throughout the Middle East and for the eventual creation of a universal Islamic regime. He promotes homophobia and the subordination of women. In the wake of the London bombings in July, putatively progressive newspapers such as the Guardian and the Independent, as well as news and public affairs programs on the BBC[,] ran a steady stream of apologetics...
They [leftists willing to ally with religious extremists] have abandoned labor unionists, human rights activists, democrats, and feminists in Islamic countries, as well as in their own, in deference to their jihadist confederates. For this part of the left, its peculiar notion of anti-imperialism does not so much take precedence over progressive political concerns as replace them.