Violent protests: the official US view

I am rather amused and intrigued that the US government has now officially endorsed the armed protests of the Libyan opposition.  Of course, those protests are justified against the loony tyrant, but all along and for years, the US has been preaching non-violent struggle by Arab opposition: which has been a recipe for the pro-US dictators to stay in power unendingly.  In Lebanon, the US, in the face of continued Israeli aggression and occupation, has insisted that only the dead and ineffective Lebanese Army be armed and that all other Lebanese groups should disarm in order to facilitate Israeli attacks on Lebanon.  To this day, US officials never stop invoking the one-day-of-violence by March 8 on May 7th, 2008 when they went head on against pro-US Hariri militias.  To this very day, US officials are aghast at that one day of violence.  But they seem to have no problem with the armed opposition to Qadhdhafi and I see no evidence of calls for restraint on the US part, which said those words against the peaceful protesters in Egypt in the hoping of preserving Mubarak.  Of course, the US in fact support armed protests and armed militias when it suits Israeli and US interests: US has armed and funded militias in Lebanon, Palestine, Iraq, Sudan, and Iran (and this in the Bush and Obama administration).