You will have noticed that these quotes are not in need of quotation; either one of them could have been said, and indeed their suggestions are implied by, any one of the two “experts.”

"We've got a very difficult situation created by this embrace of the so-called Arab Spring. And that's not getting better. It's getting worse. The carnage for the people of Syria is horrific, and it's quite frankly too little, too late to reverse a lot of that."

"As international support for Obama's decision to attack Syria has collapsed, along with the credibility of government claims, the administration has fallen back on a standard pretext for war crimes when all else fails: the credibility of the threats of the self-designated policeman of the world."

Mr. Chomsky and Mr. North both advocate for the de facto preservation of the Asad regime, and in an equally incoherent way, propose solutions that do not sustain it.

To be fair though, they opposed an incoherent policy. Three of Barack Obama’s ministers of defense disagreed with his actions towards, although one would be more apt in saying against, Syria--as well as both of his secretaries of state and the former director of the C.I.A. The strategy was to number one, disown and reproach the Asad regime for its systematic destruction of the (one should refrain saying “his” or “its”) Syrian people, and provide weapons to vetted opposition groups, implying that the objective, which must’ve been justifiable in some sense, was to aid the cause of regime change. Two, it was to participate in a campaign against the Islamic State (IS), al-Qaida, and their affiliates beginning in Iraq but with airstrikes crossing the border, (and now recently an effort being built for the liberation of Raqqa from IS) which, in spite of the disgusting euphemism of “collateral damage,” has actually accomplished saving lives in the cases of, for example, the Yazidis who were trapped on Mt. Sinjar, and the elimination of dozens of key Bin Ladenist commanders. Three--and this is where the compass begins spinning--the permitting of a 100 billion dollar windfall to the Iranian regime, passed along to pro-Asad Shiite militias in Syria. This is in addition to allowing the Russian air force to destroy the same opposition groups the U.S. spends money to fund and protect (which then are absorbed by the wildly better financed Jihadists, who face very little challenge from the regime or its allies). What is the aim then? Who are the beneficiaries? There is a dearth of official justification for this position which reminds one of history’s most stupefying phrases, commanding the U.S. to “stay the course.”

So then, there are two reactions to this incredibly ill-planned policy, espoused by the aforementioned pundits. Mr. Chomsky opines to improve the situation in Syria, complete resignation must occur. Such defeatism has been championed by American liberals, who unfortunately are not as eloquent as their hero.

"Syria is spiraling into real disaster, a virtual suicide. And the only sensible approach, the only slim hope, for Syria is efforts to reduce the violence and destruction, to establish small regional ceasefire zones and to move toward some kind of diplomatic settlement. There are steps in that direction. Also, it’s necessary to cut off the flow of arms, as much as possible, to everyone. That means to the vicious and brutal Assad regime, primarily Russia and Iran, to the monstrous ISIS, which has been getting support tacitly through Turkey, through—to the al-Nusra Front, which is hardly different, has just the—the al-Qaeda affiliate, technically broke from it, but actually the al-Qaeda affiliate, which is now planning its own—some sort of emirate, getting arms from our allies, Qatar and Saudi Arabia. Our own—the CIA is arming them. We don’t know at what level; it’s clandestine. As much as possible, cut back the flow of arms, the level of violence, try to save people from destruction. There should be far more support going simply for humanitarian aid. Those who are building some sort of a society in Syria—notably, the Kurds—should be supported in that effort."

Let alone the fact that every “regional ceasefire” has been broken, most often by Putin and Asad (as well as the Iranian militias; their thugs the Shabiha--the “ghosts”--must have sent their robust political delegations to the wrong meeting)... Let alone that Asad has proven time and time again that the only solution he will accept is a total transformation of Syria from a Hobbesian back to a Kafka-esque state, and that a significant portion of Syrians would rather die than return to that life (and would likely die, in a much slower and unimaginably painful way)... Let alone the fact that Asad’s oil purchases make up the largest segment of ISIS’ budget... Let alone that the only support to the Kurds which will effect change is necessarily of the military kind... Let alone all these holes and, to put it mildly, misconceptions--Chomsky, in his proposal that we have to “reduce violence and destruction,” most ridiculously explains this phenomenon... with itself. He says that the main problem in Syria is the violence, no shit--and that this violence can only be stopped with the stopping of violence. Please. If we are to conduct an honest and serious assessment of Syria and U.S. policy, we must at least come up with a less juvenile diagnosis. Let’s take him up on this though, if it is in fact a “suicide”, if, because of a chaotic intersection of external and internal factors, the country is put is a state of grave danger and its destruction is now a force out of Syrians’ control, is the appropriate response to engage in “talks”? If someone tells us that they will kill themselves, do we send a therapist or an ambulance? The therapists themselves tell us to do the latter.

Forgive me for this simplification, but Mr. Chomsky’s shameful opinion begs for some pigeonholing. He says that we fuel the fire, and in a way this is true, because “we,” the U.S., certainly do little to quell it. More guns means more bullets means more deaths; there’s nothing false about this claim, but it is unbelievably childish. This should be met not only with the admittedly lazy reply that there will be and has been destruction even without U.S. interference, but that we can choose who will be its recipient. Some mangled, distorted version of this has been sputtered up out of the Obama administration's drooling mouth, through the policy of throwing weapons at certain groups and then resigning. To end intervention, which will occur anyway (just in an awful and short termist form), is to forfeit the lives of millions of current and future generations of Syrians to the most reactionary elements imaginable. This cannot be emphasized enough: we have the luxury, the obligation and the burden of being a state whose policies are not commanded by a cabal of gangsters (although we have our share, as the comfortable life of Mr. North indicates) but built and formed by a congress who, to some extent, are influenced by Americans. Nothing can not be done in neutrality.

Speaking of the old dog, Oliver North provides a much more desirable target, especially since Mr. Chomsky has not aided in the support for psychopathic dictators. However fulfilling, though, we must not think his position much different from the liberal angel’s. He advised the U.S. to “fight to win or [not to] fight at all.” Mr. North has equally indefensible and confused strategies:

No safe havens – anywhere – for those waging war against us. This doesn’t require landing the 1st Marine Division or the 82nd Airborne in Syria but it will oblige our next president to directly arm the Kurds and build a coalition of Sunni Arabs [e.g., Egypt, Jordan, Turkey, UAE & Saudi funding] to destroy ISIS in Syria. Without a safe haven to recruit, train and transmit vicious propaganda, suicidal jihad will become much less attractive.

To have “no safe havens anywhere” one must have not only the first but all six marine divisions in Syria. Unless “the Kurds”--which range from federalists and anarchists to ethnic separatists and commandos with a passionate nostalgia for Stalinism--are hiding tens of thousands of more soldiers, complete security in Syria, a country 71,498 square miles, will take a little more than the supplying of “arms”. North denounces (a word I’m getting quite sick of) the Baathist state, yet fails to draw any connection between the perpetuation of civil conflict, the future of Syria or the “radical Islamists” that he abhors, to Asad. North’s cohorts are often associated by the modern left with ideas of regime change, particularly concerning Iraq, but a closer inspection, rather, any inspection, reveals that he desires nothing of the sort. He represents the era of proxy war, of puppet regimes, of “containment”. He symbolizes the era in U.S. Empire that is stomach-churningly called the “Cold War,” a conflict that burned the third world through the active and direct thwarting of democracy, not the disposal of dictatorship. Oliver North goes on to lambast Obama’s failed policy of managing ISIS indirectly and is right in doing so, but unfortunately, does not extend his argument to the Asad regime--ISIS’ parent and lifeline.

Mr. North drags along with him an idea that has won the heart of liberals and conservatives across America, his evaluation of the “so-called Arab spring.” First and foremost, to be able to address it, to be able to destroy it, I think he needs to follow his own rule and call it what it is: a spontaneous and genuine expression of the desire for freedom, and the response to a method of governance that eventually, inexorably will birth the conditions which precipitate its collapse. To their credit, this is something that most liberals will concede, yet will follow with a but and proceed, as they look down their noses, to bury the principles of democracy along with the corpses of the revolutionaries. These, unfortunately, are the more articulate, intelligent liberals; there is a large population, if not a majority then a loud minority who espouse the belief that intervention in Syria on behalf of democracy is cultural imperialism--the statement that it is literally imperialism must be dropped because no one, not even the most pompous, machiavellian neocon, claims Syria Americana (Syria of America).

I proudly admit that it would, in one way, be “‘us’ imposing ‘our’ values on ‘them.’” The “us” are all who wish freedom and for civil society to flourish in Syria, a community that is today, to the western world’s shame, made up almost exclusively of Syrians. The “our” are those which recognize totalitarianism to be the most egregious affront to humanity, an immoral and undesirable form of authority as well as an insane, impractical and disastrous one. The “them” are the people who reject these principles, and whose ideology not only involves coercion, terror and violence as the means to power but ultimately as the objective itself.

As Tarif Jaber, a leader member of the Syrian-American Engineer's Association, an advocate for Syrian democracy and an ex-pat himself, said to me, “Venezuela can opt out, Denmark can opt out, Germany even can opt out...but America leads the herd...what happens when it stops?” The U.S., simply by existing, radically affects the international scene. Every decision, every veto, every action, every non-action effects change in the real world. Much of “our,” if I may indulge in some collectivism, history has been a demonstration in all of the havoc America is able to wreak--it certainly is a frightening and should be a more humbling, capacity to possess--why not pursue something good.

One must preempt the cynical and glib response, that the U.S. is incapable of accomplishing just things, and its corollary that it should stay out of foreign politics save the libertarian kind. You need only look to Rwanda, to Bosnia (until “we” did intervene and put a stop to genocide, albeit after watching the slaughter of tens of thousands of innocents) and to Syria. This is a world without a policeman, this is the righteous anarchy you desire. If this is what Americans truly want, I suggest that we stop whining about the plunder of humanity by dictatorship and accept that the violation of human rights not only will but should become gotten used to, "normalizes" (to coin a phrase) everywhere except in our beloved nation. I surely hope that what follows those words is an awakening, throttling jet of vomit.