The world view really is a battle between the hard edged skeptics and the soft edged optimists - I'm thinking of how some Islamist faction in the Egyptian presidential election is standing up a 'moderate' as a candidate after their hardline choice was disqualified - and the optimists view this development as a positive sign viz the so called Arab Spring and the skeptics like myself view it as a game, a charade - something along the lines of the Islamists know the military is probably going to try and rig or steal the election and so putting up a putative moderate will make it more likely the West listens to their pleas of an injustice being done against them - I'm guessing the game goes something like that - regardless, I'm confident the putting up of a would be moderate does not mean at all that the Muslim Brotherhood etc etc are about to adopt Western norms - far from it, is what I'd say.
We see the same conflict between skeptics and idealists when it comes to 'negotiations' with Iran - hard edged bastards like myself look with a very jaundiced eye at these negotiations believing Iran, knowing Obama will not attack, is merely trying to keep Israel at bay long enough to make a strike by them pointless or impossible - whereas the idealists seem to actually think they're walking the world towards a new enlightenment.
