Brooks' diagnosis

Ignoring all the evidence, David Brooks blindly parrots the argument that the US invaded Iraq in 2003 "to install democracy" ( What's the big idea? , G2, 19 May). An October 2003 Gallup poll found that only 1% of Baghdad residents believed that establishing democracy was the main intention of the US invasion. Fully 43% said the invasion's principal objective was Iraq's oil reserves. Ian Sinclair London • If Brooks' diagnosis of our ills is based on human irrationality, why is his prescription that we give way to the forces of unreason rather than fight them? Labour should be socially liberal, economically egalitarian (after the insights another of your list of influential books, The Spirit Level ) and forget about the communitarian nonsense of people such as Brooks and, for that matter, Glasman . Philip Badger Barnsley, South Yorkshire