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See #51 (And I promise never to non-theologize Cromwell again.:>)

Okay. But I'll be casting a baleful Calvinist glance in your direction from time to time.

As to the substance of your posts, I think that as bitter as the English/Irish conflict has been, that Islamists vs. America in the present Mideast is a far more dire situation. You can draw some parallels (like the old Puritan cries against Charles conspiring to recruit the "papish hordes" (to use the contemporary terms) of Ireland to subdue his English subjects and allow him to ignore Parliament. But the level of fundamental conflict was between rival Anglo-Saxon peoples and their respective Christian religious factions.

In the conflict with the Mideast, Islam under secularized dictators like Saddam or Wahabbists like the Saudis are in conflict with America militarily, economically and religiously. Add to that that Islam has a fundamental hostility to human rights, any other religion and democracy.

So Cromwell doesn't help us that much. Iraq is what Don Rumsfeld called an 'unfamiliar war'. He was right. Very different than any of the wars fought by Western nations before. Classic Orientalism under a conquering Islamic barracks religion vs. the civil values and human rights of the free West.