Sharia-for-all

As the reasons for invading Iraq move from eliminating WMD and toppling Saddam Hussein to creating a free Iraq and improving the lives of Iraqis, I give you this analysis from the BBC on the New Islamic Republic of Iraq. Is it possible that we have made things worse for the average citizen there, as well as the region as a whole? Whodathunkit?

Talk about your deja vu. Ever get that strange feeling, when the hairs on the back of your neck stand up straight and every instinct you possess screams fight or flight, with flight winning most the time. That's how I felt when I read the following to posts from Kos and Magorn, both via Daily Kos - Fundamentalist Republic of America & American Madrasas.

The first chronicles a group of congressional aides who dine together each week scouring their bibles for help on such matters as taxes, foreign aid, education and cloning. "They view every vote on the hill a religious duty and compromise a sin..." Most of these aides are future politicians who "have no problem imposing their biblical worldview on every American."
They are evangelical conservatives who acknowledge that this is their goal.

The second piece concerns an evangelical college in Virginia, established in 2001, the stated mission of which is to train and establish conservative Christians in government. As stated by founder Michael Farris, Patrick Henry College was created because home-schooling parents and conservative legislators came to him, separately yet simultaneously, to ask for a way to supply more like-minded youngsters for internship positions. Seems the existing schools in and around the United States did not have enough candidates for the positions available. Look at how successful Patrick Henry has been:

"Patrick Henry is a Christian college, ... where almost all the students {300 in all} have internships, with Republican politicians or in conservative think tanks..Three times a year, the White House chooses a hundred students for a three-month internship. Patrick Henry, with only three hundred students, has taken between one and five of the spots in each of the past five years-- roughly the same as Georgetown. Of the school's sixty-one graduates through the class of 2004, two have jobs in the White House; six are on the staffs of conservative members of Congress; eight are in federal agencies; and one helps Senator Rick Santorum, of Pennsylvania, and his wife, Karen, homeschool their six children. Two are at the F.B.I., and another worked for the Coalition Provisional Authority, in Iraq"

Considering Georgetown is also a Christian college (Catholic), is geographically close, has five times the enrollment and has been in existence since 1789, that is quite an accomplishment for Patrick Henry.

Another astonishing fact is that 85% of Patrick Henry students were home-schooled. Not that there is anything wrong with home-schooling; I've home-schooled kids myself, but major colleges and universities are often leary of accepting such students because they often lack a world view deemed necessary for college life. Obviously not at Patrick Henry, where it seems to be an advantage.

Religious extremist across the globe are indoctrinating their young by educating them in such schools. It has happened in Afganistan and Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Iran and Israel, and it is happening in America; now it seems to be the future in Iraq. In the name of God, what have we wrought.