One of my favorite aphorisms is a line by the economist Thomas Sowell that "there are no solutions, only trade-offs." I also believe that political systems must fit their cultures, and that good laws reinforce the accepted morality. In other words, you cannot effect real change through legislation or decree, unless the one doing so is in a position where his authority extends to fundamental aspects of a culture. I didn't view the Meereen plotline as a waste of time or poor story-telling (many fellow wotmaniacs and rafonauts have advised me to skip Egwene's portions of WoT, rather than complaining about her, or intimated that I would not want to read a book where she has success; in fact, I like the STORY, which is see is a good story, well-told, concerning the actions of a bad person), but I still dislike Dany. It is not that I think she is evil or that I support slavery, but that her cause and her methods are a colossal waste of time, and morally hypocritical. For a conqueror who rules by force to abolish slavery on moral grounds is absurd, since she holds her power in the same way and by the same right that slave owners have authority over their slaves: because they can, and because they have the power to get away with it. Daenerys has no moral basis for rejecting slavery beyond her own distaste for the less appealing aspects of the institution, so she has no real "right" to do away with it. In the USA, for example, slavery was in defiance of the morals and political philosophies to which the nation professed adherence and aspiration. In Daenerys' place, I might attempt emancipation, because that is in accord with my moral code. I have more sympathy with Victorian Greyjoy's disgust at the excesses of open slavery and the distinction he draws between the Iron Way's practice of taking thralls and salt wives, because he is citing an established practice and adhering to a codified tradition. Daenerys is acting on sentimental whims, a trait I consider among the more horrific possible for a ruler or aspiring ruler. Because today those whims and sympathies might be directed in favor of admirable things and tomorrow, at whatever direction her emotions or reactions have newly steered her.

It is similar to Ned Stark's tragic blunder: his desire to spare innocent children Robert's wrath, as he knows the king is more than capable of dishing out retribution for the sins of fathers, might be admirable, but that does not give him the right, as a ruling power, responsible for the maintenance of law and order and the preservation of society, to give out a pass for Cersei's crimes. His duty as a friend of Robert, as a governing official of his nation and as a subject of his king is to bring Cersei to justice and expose her crimes. His moral duty as a human being might be to prevent Robert from murdering Tommen and Myrcella but he has other ways to achieve that, than subverting the entire system of justice, or wringing his hands helplessly as Robert does what he wants (such as in the case of the Daenerys assassination).

Daenerys' arc in Meereen is basically that of a spoiled brat/idealistic teen who hasn't learned about reality and consequences and that other people have their own perspectives which they believe in just as much as you believe in yours.

The writer of the linked article seems to take abolition and peace as inherently and automatically desirable objectives, which skews his views a little out of line with mine, but he still recognizes the underlying principles guiding the story. My view is that Daenerys is incompatible with Meereen, she would be better off leaving it, or else adapting her style of rule. Either embrace blood and fire as the cost of maintaining her power, or resign herself to being a pampered figurehead as Hizdahr steers the administration more in line with Meereenese mores.

Cutting and running might be a disaster for Meereen, but if the war that appears to have started (by the Yunkish, NOT Barristan, whatever the linked author might contend) plays out and Daenerys arrives to turn the tide with Drogon and a new khalasar, she can break the power of the slavers and their allies. With no external pressures, and some better choices for a regency, Meereen could actually remain a non-slave city with her on the march for Westeros with her dragons, Unsullied, Dothraki and free companies. It will be messy and not perfect, but as the writer of the article notes, she seems to have come to an acceptance of her and Meereenese (or Ghiscari) culture being ill-suited for each other. While the writer bemoans this darker turn toward war instead of peace, I view it as an unpleasant reality. Another idea that seems to run through the series is that the Big Damn Heroes need to sacrifice the joys of an ordinary life. Azor Ahai had to kill Nissa-Nissa to temper Lightbringer. Jon Snow had to write off Winterfell and Val. Bran has to give up his dream of knighthood. If Daenerys had embraced the hard choices of being a responsible ruler as the writer seems to have wished for her, it would have meant chaining her dragons up for good, which just goes against the grain of everything the books have been implying or hinting is the "right" thing to do. And of course, there is the one version of the Prophecy where Dany is the Prince who is Promised, in which case her dragons are her version of Lightbringer. If she settles down to plant olive trees in Meereen and wrangle out political compromises to prevent the deaths of innocents, she cannot be the weapon against the dark that she is implied to be.

Melisandre might be all kinds of bad news, but she is not wrong in her view of how the big picture works, merely in her application of those principles to particular cases, as in her already established propensity for misinterpreting prophecies. While Davos was right in forestalling her sacrifice of Edric, war against the Others is still necessary, no political compromise can be reached if all that is said about their implacable hatred of life is true, and the requisite innocents will die to pay the price required to fend them off. They might die because the Princess that was promised had to march off to Westeros to be in position to meet the blows struck by the darkness, and so Meereen is not ruled as firmly and surely, because her iron fist is being used elsewhere. There will be innocents who die because they live under lords who aren't willing to accept the peace and unity of purpose that Jon and Stannis are trying to forge, starting with the wildlings and the northmen. For all that Melisandre says that Jon & Stannis are alike, for all that Stannis seems to like Jon, and Jon finds himself rooting for Stannis, they still butt heads no matter how well they work together. Daenerys' arc (I am hoping) was all about learning that she can't always have things her way, and sometimes she has write stuff off and move on.

The writer appears to be bemoaning her loss of will in pursuing the course of peace and compromise, but I think the lesson was in servicing the bigger picture. The compromises she rejects in her symbolic removal of the tokar and embrace of Drogon are necessary for one course of action, which appeals to her sentimental side. Rather than re-embrace that path as the writer seems to want, I think she has accepted another path altogether, and that neither one is the "right" or "wrong" choice. The important thing is she has to choose to be a warrior or a peacemaker. She can be a good ruler either way, but she has to shit or get off the pot. Whichever way she chooses, in order to be a good ruler, she has to make compromises and sacrifices. Dany is, I think, not so well suited for the sorts of compromises she'd have to make on the path of the peacekeeper queen and Mother of a Nation. People keep comparing her to Rhaegar, and as Barristan tells of him, Rhaegar too would have preferred his version of the quiet life, as a scholar-king and artist but he learned something that led him to take up the sword. From what Aemon says, we can infer that he believed himself to be the subject of the Prophecy, but if it is, in fact, Daenerys, she too has to make the choice her brother made, and take up the sword, instead of the olive branch. Quaithe foretells contradictory courses of action to her, and maybe the represent the ultimate contradictory choice "To have peace, you must make war."