Via Greg Hengler, we’re a little late on the “ending the slaughter” part, no? As of last month, the death toll stood at 70,000 and counting. He says we’ve been “active.” What sort of body count would “inactive” have produced?

Needless to say, this is sonorous nonsense. We had no “moral obligation” to end the slaughter in Congo, even though the death toll is many, many, many times greater there than it is in Syria. O’s careful here too to lard up his “moral obligation” pronouncement with lots of qualifiers, from emphasizing that western intel has only perceived, not verified, chemical weapons attacks to noting that the U.S. has had unhappy experiences with wading into Middle Eastern sectarian disputes over iffy WMD claims. (Watch to the end or you’ll miss him boasting about Bin Laden and Qadaffi knowing that when he says something will get done, it gets done. Is that right? How are those Iranian nuclear negotiations coming?) If I had to guess, I’d bet that the next stage of our “moral” intervention in Syria is bribing various Islamist factions within the rebel ranks to unite behind some sort of quasi-secular leader so that the White House can claim that Syria’s on the “right track” and therefore it’s safe to start finally arming them in earnest. We got the same basic shtick during the Libyan intervention and you know how well that’s turned out. But hey, Qadaffi knows now that he meant business and that’s what’s important.

Exit question: What would a government that’s “representative of the Syrian people” even look like? Two-thirds Muslim Brotherhood, say, with a dollop of even nuttier Salafists? If so, we’re in luck — that’s roughly what the command structure of the rebel army looks like. Onward to victory.