Watching the escalating situation in Libya is like watching the American Revolution in our own time, except in fast-forward motion, and without a clear ideal for the end.

Our own revolution lasted for eight years, during which a temporary government was set up under the Articles of Confederation. Our purposes for revolting and our ideals were clearly stated in the Declaration of Independence.

We don’t even know who these rebels are in Libya. We have some idea, yes, but not a very good one. Recently, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was quoted saying, “We don’t know as much as we would like to know and as much as we expect we will know” in reference to these rebels. There is a lot to say about that.

A story recently published in the Washington Examiner stated that recognized Jihadists who fought against the U.S. in Afghanistan and Iraq are now a part of this uprising. Walid Phares, a Middle East and terrorism expert, has stated that the Muslim Brotherhood has ordered their members not to raise jihadist flags in front of media, however these groups purposefully unveil their identities by chanting al Qaeda and other jihadist hymns.

Many rebels have other things to say about their purposes however.

A statement was issued by a new Libyan mission to the U.N. last Wednesday that outlined hopes of the new government to make a constitution, have a free and open economy, free elections, the formation of political parties and freedom of speech.

Many rebels claim they have no ties with al Qaeda, nor do they want them, and they’re asking for arms and financial assistance. Who you believe is up to you.

However the fact still is that throughout the middle east uprising, protesters and rebels have had one clear objective, and that was to get these unfit leaders out of power…and then let someone else figure out how they want their government put together because they sure don’t know. It took the United States years of fighting and some of the greatest minds in our history collaborating before we came close to our ideal government, and we’re still fighting corruption today, especially when it comes to our financial system. These rebels seem to feel that once they get rid of their oppressive leaders that they will be free.

However this is not true. Once you throw a whole government out of order, and you don’t establish some kind of set of rules, you leave yourself highly vulnerable to anyone who wants to take advantage of gaining power, and chaos through people who aren’t willing to put in the effort to figure out what they want. This is not freedom.

What’s going on is a bunch of people thought it would be easy and it would only take a few months to fight off the evils of the world and become a free nation, shining in the sunlight, and without great consequence.

The Libyans have their work cut out for them. They are outnumbered and out-gunned. If they do prevail, which we don’t even know would be a good thing because it could increase the Muslim Brotherhood’s power, seeing as al Qaeda doesn’t want Gadhafi in power, it would be a shame for all their work to go to waste.

So what should the U.S. do in this situation? Well it shouldn’t do what it’s doing now. Currently, we are hoping Gadhafi just leaves. However, considering he has stated he will cling to his post and die a martyr, I don’t see that happening. The U.N. has thankfully taken the responsibility of establishing a no-fly zone, because we certainly don’t have a whole lot of money to fight yet another war. It’s a harsh way of looking at it, but it’s true.

The president has proposed cuts for the rest of this fiscal year not even from the 2010 budget, but from the proposed increases in spending. So spending is still going up. He’s proposed about $30 billion cuts. This country spends that much in three days. If we fight another war, we should be cutting a bit more than that, I really do believe.

It is true that it would be irresponsible to leave Gadhafi in power. It is true that the chance that a country will be thrown into chaos after overthrowing its government is not a sufficient reason to leave them to be slaughtered. But by all that we hold dear, can we please help these people without ruining our own country?