Will my children, too small now to understand Iraq, take me seriously when I tell them one day what powerful men, whom their father once believed in, did to this country? Heavy thoughts for someone who is still a conservative despite it all. It was a long drive home.
For most of the 20th Century, arguably, America never saw itself as THE central-axis of the world, despite the Pax Americana that followed the second world war. The Republic was small and against the odds, and other Nations had financial, economic and military power - and willingness to exercise them.
It was only during the Reagan years that American ascendancy took on an ideological imperative - we are Number One.
As a consequence of this ideological hubris, some people were able to pen something called, "The Project for a New American Century", a doctrine and viewpoint that probably obviated its attainment.
Today, we suffer the consequences of the failure of that vision, and its attitudes of political complacency (outsourcing of everything), superiority (inevitability), and self-reference (domestic and international partisanship), of the way it blinded the media, even, in the pre-war run-up and co-opted the military officer corps.
Niall Ferguson may be right. Hard times are ahead.
Despite this, all is not lost in Iraq -- just those who were trying to achieve the wrong things have "lost". The problem is that righting that situation will not encourage them to keep their heads down, so yes, Rod's children do have to worry.
sullylink
