"All nations are tempted--and few have been able to resist the temptation for long--to clothe their own particular aspirations and actions in the moral purposes of the universe"--Morgenthau, 10.
(trying not to rant)
Now I know the criticisms and issues with the war in Iraq have probably exhausted themselves, but the first idea that came to my mind with this quote was our presence in Iraq. Just read "Rise of the Vulcans" and one can see how much personal and self interest went into the war in Iraq. The Bush administration has been interested in going into Iraq for decades. The justification to go in for the alleged WMDs and to "spread democracy" were not the main reasons for going in (as we all know). I feel that conflicts/policies cloaked in morality tend to hind something bigger (self-interest of those in power). If we acted with such morality, we would be sending in troops to conflicts in Africa, but instead we are focused on the Middle East. With self interest the main guiding principle in our society, it's hard to imagine any politician setting foreign policy that doesn't take into account self interest. What is national interest? Who defines it? The leaders, political and economic, of our country.
Reading this back to myself, this seems quite cynical. But, it's the reality of human nature. If all individuals and societies put God before themselves, then our world be a very different place. In some instances good, and in some instances bad because we have this international trademark war of God and lack of agreement on one's relationship with God. ("the blasphemous conviction that God is always on one's side and that one wills oneself cannot fail to be willed by God also"). Whoever we put first in our live which in part affect our decision making, is part of our interest (in ourselves or in God).
In any case, whatever or whoever guides our interest, it is our job as citizens to recognize the self interest that goes into foreign policy making today as checks, which one can see is obvious when studying IR theory. Yet, we tend to lack this tendency to be active citizens because we ourselves are subject to the forces of self interest. Seems like a never-ending cycle to me....
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Meredith - ranting might be good in this forum. It's only ranting that we can get to making arguments IMHO. When is it not acceptable? When one doesn't take the next step from rant to argument. So rant away but keep processing those rants as you have done in this post.
Among the many questions that popped into my head, here's the one I really want to ask. This might seem trivial but you've hit upon something really interesting. In talking about the Iraq war you argue that the explicit motives weren't really the real reasons for going to war. You write in parentheses "as we all know". Do we know? Or let me put it slightly differently: what does it mean to know something?
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