I'll leave Ake to answer his own question--not that there's any purple prose in it. Of course not.

Mine for him is:   yet again:    Are you just fine with Gadhafi slaughtering his own dissidents? If not, how will you prevent it?

For Charlie, and other reasonable people this is a start on his answer. I will have a lot more--no time now.   I read constantly everything I can get on the Libyan crisis--whether it supports Western intervention or not.

It's clear to me the only reason not to intervene with everything the rebels have asked for--that is, everything but ground troops, is the fear that the rebels would form a worse regime for Libya than Gadhafi.   Specifically that al-Qaeda would benefit.    On this point, it is clear from my reading that al-Qaeda is the refuge of the desperate.    The way to encourage al_Qaeda in Libya would be to let Gadhafi win--and watch the annihilation of his opposition that would follow.    The bitter survivors would turn to the ideology which sees violence as the solution to problems--that is, to al Qaeda,    The "Arab spring" would be harshly discredited in the cruelest way.


More later.