We’ve now had five years of the shrub doctrine. The US military went into Afghnistan with a skeleton crew and relied on the local insurgents to displace the Taliban. Notice I didn’t say defeat! They were displaced in power, but almost none of the leaders were captured and most of the fighters just blended back into the populace to bide their time. The Taliban is now very close to regaining control of the country and there probably isn’t anything the US can do about it. The US then invaded Iraq, and three and a half years later, people are dying at a faster rate than ever, and we are spending over $2 billion a week!. All this from a country that didn’t even have any big weapons.

Now Iran continues it’s march to developing nuclear weapons, and North Korea has reportedly conducted it’s first nuclear test. So clearly the strategy of preemption has not been effective and with the struggling economy that has resulted from all the corruption and financial cronyism, we have no hope of getting enough strength to actually make preemption viable. Thanks to the disastrous escapade in Iraq, the US military is no longer taken seriously as a detterent. The policies of the republicans in recent years have been a complete and utter failure. We have not been attacked on American soil but terrorists can afford to bide their time. If we maintain our current direction we will surely create enough new enemies that at some point we will almost certainly be attacked.

On top of all this the Christian-Fascists running the show right now have repeatedly demonstrated that being a bible thumper does not make you ethical, moral or righteous. Their foreign policy seems geared toward bringing on the end of the world because they believe in biblical prophecies. Now that religious leaders have demonstrated that they are not fit to be trusted with political power, maybe it time to let some secular leaders to take a shot at it. We need leaders who believe that we should live a good ethical life now, taking care of the world and preserving it for future generations.