Gaddafi doesn’t seem as bad only because you have never seen published photographs of his atrocities. Extrajudicial killings, torture, public executions, political repression, and elimination of dissent. Lots of horrors that I guess are okay as long as the trains run on time.

We also don’t know what a Libya where NATO didn’t intervene looks like. It’s not unbelievable that the civil war would’ve resulted in the same result but with a much higher body count.