I found Farish Noor's column on the recent US elections A cowardly vote from the 'land of the brave' troubling for many reasons.

The general tone of his column reflects a sentiment of frustration directed at two levels. The first is his frustration towards the US electorate who had the audacity to elect back into office for another four years an odious president in Farish's eyes - that is held ransom by a 'clique of business-security-military interests' and for their ignorance at the great harm their country is doing beyond its borders all in the spirit of 'foreign adventurism'.

The second is his frustration at US foreign policy in general and the double standards that it practices leading to its de-legitimisation as a source of democracy and democratic values.

What I find troubling is that Farish seems not to have taken the trouble to understand why the American people voted the way they did and because of this, his readers are left with a piece of invective that is neither novel nor instructive.

The first (of many) and perhaps the most glaring of his omissions is his total disregard of the effect of Sept 11 on the psyche and thinking of the American people. In fact when comparing the predicament of Britain in the 1940s to that of the US today, he says that 'the USA's current crisis has more to do with the indirect results of America's foreign policy during the Cold War and its incessant meddling in third world affairs, mostly in countries deemed too remote and unknown to the collective American imagination.'

Did he forget the Sept 11 attacks or does he indirectly blame US foreign policy for these attacks?

It is amazing that in an election where the threat of terrorism played such a large role, Farish fails to even mention the fact that the US had experienced its worst loss of life in a single day on its own soil during the Sept 11 attacks.

Given that he is an intelligent man, I cannot think that Farish forgot about the attacks. Rather, my suspicion is that it was more convenient for him to ignore the attacks and its impact to bolster his own arguments which we have read rehashed in its many variants over and over again in the past few years.

In his choosing not to discuss the impact of the Sept 11 attacks on the American electorate, Farish has failed to put himself in their shoes. It is easy to call American a 'paranoid nation' when one can so easily brush aside the impact psychological and emotional - of passenger planes flying into two of your most recognisable landmarks (the Twin Towers and the Pentagon) and fortuitously missing a third (the White House, presumably was the target of the downed fourth plane).

How would Malaysians have reacted if something similar happened to us in our own country? (If MAS planes had crashed into the Petronas Twin Towers and Putrajaya, for example.) How 'paranoid' do you think we would have been in the aftermath of such an event?

Secondly, Farish failed to take into account that there was a vigorous debate happening in the US in regards to its foreign policy especially in terms of the war in Iraq. It was a salient issue in the presidential debates and a salient issue throughout the campaign.

The intensity of the opposition towards President George W Bush and his war in Iraq was commonly shared by many activists who campaigned vigorously against him on this very issue. (I'm sure that Farish has watched Michael Moore's Farenheit 9/11 as did many Americans.)

While it is true that the average man-in-the-street wouldn't be able to distinguish the intricacies of US foreign policy since the end of World War II, most of them would have at least some opinion about the war in Iraq. Furthermore, the debate among the intelligentsia who did know something about US foreign policy was lively, to say the least.

Thirdly, Farish failed to understand or explain the salience of 'moral issues' during this election. US foreign policy was not the 'only game in town'. Issues such as abortion, gun-control and gay marriage (one commentator labeled these issues as God, Guns and Gays) took centre stage for many of these voters.

In fact, more voters cited moral issues as the most important voting issue for them trumping both the economy and the war on terror (most voters saw this as being linked to the war in Iraq).

Farish's perspective that the voters should have kicked Bush out of office because of his 'adventures' in Iraq fails to take into account the importance of this domestic dimension of the election.

Hence, his criticism that the American electorate is focused on the bogeyman of the 'Islamic terror threat' rings hollow. (Indeed Farish's whole notion of terrorism being linked with Islam in the minds of the American electorate can be questioned. In the three presidential debates, not once was terrorism used in conjunction with Islam and not once was there was Osama bin Laden mentioned in the same breath as Islam)

Farish criticism that the 'American mass media remains unique in its near-total neglect of the developments across the rest of the globe' can leveled squarely back at himself the fact that he is ignorant of the dynamics of domestic politics in the US. (Would it be worse if Farish was aware of these dynamics but choose to ignore them, again out of convenience to bolster his invective?)

His ignorance of the dynamics of domestic politics is further revealed when he said that the elections were 'not only a victory for Bush personally, but also for the companies, corporations, think-tanks and foundations aligned with the far right in the USA'.

This begs the question what is the exact relationship which Farish posits between the Moral Majority, the American Enterprise Institute, defence contractors and oil companies?

And I won't even go into Farish's gross oversimplifications of international relations when he writes 'that from Latin and Central America to Africa, Asia and the Arab world, the whole planet has been relegated to the secondary status of America's backyard. (Policed, at times, by its domesticated poodle, the United Kingdom, when the sheriff is not at home.)'

What will the French and African peacekeepers in many parts of Africa say to that?

Lastly, his assertion that the 'American voter will always rush to the ballot box to cast his lot with the next authoritarian leader, whoever he may be' denigrates the free choice of the American electorate as well as the vibrancy of the American democracy.

While there remain flaws to the system, to call the current president or any US president elected in the future, an authoritarian leader requires a leap of faith that most intellectually honest commentators would not be able to make.

Farish and other readers of malaysiakini would do well to read the column by James Wong - Bush wins, Osama loses where the latter at least attempts to analyse some of the reasons more of the American electorate choose Bush over Senator Jon Kerry.

My fear for Farish is that his strong, emotive feelings about US foreign policy has narrowed his otherwise broad vision to dissect and analyse issues in a manner that is insightful and enlightening. This is certainly not healthy for Farish nor for his readers.