10/15/2005: Monk protection

[Elspode]

Originally Posted by mlandman

re: radical Christian right: I assume your point is that US policy overseas re: the war in Iraq and 'blowing stuff up' is based on the radical Christian right, who wants to eliminate Islam in the name of Christianity, somehow indirectly has controlled our armed forces --- but I don't see it.

Let me just say that I'm pretty sure we wouldn't have been quite as quick to go around blowing up non-Muslims in today's sociopolitical environment. I don't think we're directly conducting a crusade, per se, but it is more than a little curious that the war was conducted and continued despite us having found out that the entire alleged reason for conducting it in the first place was a mistake.

I also find it curious that Bush panders so obviously to the Christian Right, alludes to his actions being guided by God (Jehovah, to be precise...not some other deity, but The One True Deity (tm) ). He is a self-proclaimed observant Christian, a religion whose main purpose is to essentially sort out everyone on Earth by making sure they are aware of the Great 50/50 Choice, (they like to refer to it as "Free Will"), wherein the masses of the unwashed and unrepentant can avail themselves of Jesus' mercy by accepting him as their Saviour, or burn in eternal anguish...and they're more than happy to achieve this evangelistic imperative through whatever means necessary.

I'm thinking that there is a large number of people here in the good old USofA who would be real cool with a Christian theocracy, and that is real scary. I think some of the vanguard of that fetid governmental philosophy are already in power, so if there's an element of "who cares if they're dead, they're only a bunch of Muslims" to our foreign interventions of late, it is probably par for the course.