Like most conservatives opposed to our Libya intervention, I’ve been asked a lot lately how it feels to be aligned with a hard Leftist like Dennis Kucinich. It feels better, I think, than I if I found myself on the same side as al Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood.

Contrary to the assertions of Max and other Arab Spring enthusiasts, those of us who oppose U.S. intervention in Libya are not isolationists and we despise Qaddafi as much, if not more, than Max does. In point of fact, a few of us actually complained loudly when the Bush administration airbrushed Qaddafi into a U.S. ally and capitulated in a U.S.-Libya settlement premised on a moral equivalence between Qaddafi’s anti-U.S. terrorism and President Reagan’s retaliatory attack on Tripoli. We thought it was disgusting to find the U.S. secretary of state schmoozing a terrorist thug with American blood on his hands.

But we also recognize that al Qaeda, its affiliates, and its Islamist allies are incorrigibly anti-American and have killed many more Americans than the detestable Qaddafi has. We don’t see any good reason to support Qaddafi’s opposition unless and until the pro-interventionists satisfy our grave concerns that he will be replaced with something even worse. Don’t lecture us about supporting Qaddafi. We’re not supporting Qaddafi — in contrast to the U.S. officials and administrations that supported Qaddafi from 2003 into 2011 despite knowing full well that he was, every second of that time, a died in the wool terrorist murderer of Americans.