Reply #16: Something Like This?

[DrFunkenstein]

"It's critical that we recognize the conditions that are breeding this virulent new form of anti-American terrorism. If you look at countries stretching from Morocco through the Middle East and beyond...broadly speaking the western Muslim world...what you see is a civilization under extraordinary stress.

A combination of harsh political repression, economic stagnation, lack of education and opportunity, and rapid population growth has proven simply explosive. The streets are full of young people who have no jobs... no prospects... no voice. State-controlled media encourage a culture of self-pity, victimhood and blame-shifting. This is the breeding ground for present and future hostility to the West and our values.

Our goal is not to impose some western free market ideology on the greater Middle East. It's to open up a region that is now closed to opportunity, an outpost of economic exclusion and stagnation in a fast-globalizing world.

These countries suffer from too little globalization, not too much. Without greater investment, without greater trade within the region and with the outside world, without the transparency and legal protections that modern economies need to thrive, how will these countries ever be able to grow fast enough to provide jobs and better living standards for their people? But as we extend the benefits of globalization to people in the greater Middle East and the developing world in general, we also need to confront globalization's dark side.

We should use the leverage of capital flows and trade to lift, not lower, international labor and environmental standards. And in the Middle East especially, we need to be sensitive to fears that globalization will corrupt or completely submerge traditional cultures and mores. We can do these things."

Guess who said it.