Navy ready to launch first strike on Syria

[branford]

42. Isn't that analysis just a little too black and white?

You have no argument from me that Assad, and his Hezbollah and Iranian allies, are viscous thugs. However, the rebels, many of whom are Al Qaeda-linked Islamist terrorists, are no better than Assad, and quite possibly much worse.

I'm not yet ready to trade innocent American and allied lives simply to trade one very bad regime for another.

If a critical mass of the opposition even remotely shared our values, we probably would have already had boots on the ground to oppose Assad. However, until the rebels start to look like Quakers and secular humanists, rather than Al Qaeda, we should be far more circumspect about military action.