{"id":547,"date":"2006-09-22T21:18:48","date_gmt":"2006-09-23T02:18:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/?p=547"},"modified":"2006-09-22T21:22:02","modified_gmt":"2006-09-23T02:22:02","slug":"confusion-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/2006\/09\/22\/confusion-2\/","title":{"rendered":"confusion…"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I’m thinking about this war [the one in Iraq]. I doubt that any American alive in 2003 [outside of the White House] had any question that we were going to war for any reason other than 911 and the Terrorist attack on America. The stated reasons were Weapons of Mass Destruction and ties to the Terrorists. Gradually, we learned that there was another Agenda – spreading democracy by force [eg Operation Iraqi Freedom, the Bush Doctrine]. A month ago, President Bush said that the War in Iraq was the the decisive ideological struggle of the 21st century<\/strong><\/em>. I’ve been thinking about that statement every since then.<\/p>\n\n\n
i·de·o·log·i·cal<\/strong> (\"\"\"\"d\"\"–\"\"-l\"\"j\"\"\"\"-k\"\"l, \"\"d\"\"\"\"-) 
adj.<\/em> <\/p>\n
    \n
  1. Of or relating to ideology.<\/li>\n
  2. Of or concerned with ideas.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n

    I’ll admit to never understanding President Bush’s speeches when I read them. But this one is more obtuse than usual. It was popular in the past to see the Cold War as a struggle between ideologies – Democracy versus Communism. It was also used in World War II – Democracy versus Fascism. I’m not sure that either usage really worked. Both were more about power than ideology, but I get the point. I don’t even get the point here. There were no Weapons of Mass Destruction. There were no ties to Terrorists. Right now, there’s an Iraqi government of sorts – one we put in place, but they elected. The battle with Saddam Hussein’s dictatorship has been over for literally years. We’re not fighting Terrorists – at least not the ones we went to fight. The fighting in Iraq at this point seems to be about two things – they’re fighting us because we’re in their country and there’s fighting between two Islamic Sects for control of the country – a Sectarian Civil War.<\/p>\n

    What is the decisive ideological struggle of the 21st century<\/strong><\/em>? At least on paper, our ideology for America is Democracy and Freedom [something that’s being severly tested at this point]. The ideology of the people fighting us and each other in Iraq has something to do with religion – something of a Theocracy for Iraq. Is the ideological struggle Democracy and Freedom versus Islamic Theocracy? Are we in Iraq to fight to the death with Iraqis about Democracy versus Islamic Theocracy? Is that what he’s talking about? Because, if that’s what he’s talking about, they’re right. We’re at war with Islam.<\/p>\n

    But maybe he means something else and I just don’t get it… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    I’m thinking about this war [the one in Iraq]. I doubt that any American alive in 2003 [outside of the White House] had any question that we were going to war for any reason other than 911 and the Terrorist attack on America. The stated reasons were Weapons of Mass Destruction and ties to the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-547","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/547","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=547"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/547\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=547"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=547"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=547"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}