Were Irish Catholics and Northern Irish Protestants attacking each other fighting over autonomy and

[Attorney in Texas]

land or were they seeking promote Catholicism and Anglicanism by their bombs and bullets?

Does anyone believe ISIL's beheadings and its blowing up of the Russian passenger plane and its terrorism in Paris were an effort to promote Islam?

The current "war against Radical Islam" phony theme pushed by the Republicans and appropriately rejected by President Obama (and candidates Clinton, Sanders, and O'Malley) is addressed today by the New Republic in The GOP’s Obsession With ‘Radical Islam’:

The deadly attacks in Paris last week, followed by the second Democratic primary debate over the weekend, reignited a Republican obsession, unique to the Obama era, with the claim that U.S. leaders can’t defeat jihadi terrorism unless they identify the perpetrators with highly prescriptive language.

This obsession arose after the George W. Bush presidency precisely because Bush and his security advisers recognized the humane and strategic value in avoiding anti-Muslim incitement. As a Republican, Bush was able to mostly keep a lid on the kind of rhetoric his party now espouses unapologetically.

Republicans specifically claim, without a shred of evidence, that referring to ISIS fighters as “radical Islamic terrorists” isn’t just nomenclature, but a strategic prerequisite to vanquishing them.

[Brickbat]

1. Either way, we accepted a lot of their refugees during the Troubles.

[Spider Jerusalem]

11. Not so much?

The USA had unrestricted immigration at the time of the Irish famine, which is probably what you're thinking about. It wasn't so much "accepted" as "there was no immigration process apart from 'show up' and there were open borders". There weren't any refugees during the Troubles (which started in 1972 or so, probably; Bloody Sunday and the rise of the IRA).

[snagglepuss]

2. Does anyone believe ISIL's beheadings is... an effort to promote Islam? YES

Though promote is too gentle a word, coerce, subjugate would be better.

It's stated goal is to create an Islamic caliphate and to impose conversion of those who do not embrace their kind of Islam i.e. Shias, Kurds, Hazaris, Christians etc and to ethically others like Yazidids.

These are their stated goals and this is what they have carried out so of course their actions are to "promote" Islam.

[smirkymonkey]

7. However, the more we have been hearing about the lives these terrorists lead, they

hardly sound like devout muslims. It has been reported that many of them don't go to mosque, read the Koran, or even know very much about the religion. They drink, take drugs and smoke. How can they claim to be so pro-islam while ignoring so many of it's commands?

[snagglepuss]

15. It's their Islam in the same way Iran has it's own Islam which differs

from Saudi's Islam etc, etc.

[smirkymonkey]

17. Don't they all forbid living like a drunken slob who has no knowledge or

respect for their religion?

[snagglepuss]

19. Respect for their religion is a loaded term. Many Muslims believe that leaving Islam is

a sign of disrespect that deservers the death penalty. knowledge of Islam is also a loaded term because Wahabi clerics in SA and Shia clerics in Iran who hand down death sentences for adultery and "sorcery" lay claim to being knowledgeable about Islam.

[Attorney in Texas]

9. A caliphate is a governmental unit. The creation of a caliphate is the promotion of the caliph and

regional autonomy of the caliph within the caliphate.

The creation of a caliphate in an area that encompasses parts of Syria and Iraq does nothing to promote Islam except as it is secondary to the enforcement of the rules of that caliphate in that boundaries of that caliphate.

During the American revolution, most of the 13 original colonies has an established religion:

CONNECTICUT - Congregationalist
DELAWARE - No establishment clause
GEORGIA - Church of England
MARYLAND - Church of England (originally established as Catholic refuge)
MASSACHUSETTS - Congregationalist
NEW HAMPSHIRE - Congregationalist
NEW JERSEY - No establishment clause
NEW YORK - Church of England
NORTH CAROLINA - Church of England
PENNSYLVANIA - No establishment clause
RHODE ISLAND - No establishment clause
SOUTH CAROLINA - Church of England
VIRGINIA - Church of England

These 13 colonies were not created to promote the Church of England or the Congregationalist church any more than the caliphate is created to promote Islam. Religious freedom is pat of the autonomy issue -- YES -- but the promotion of any particular faith is not the goal of forming the new government unit.

[snagglepuss]

16. Really what are you smoking? The purpose of the Caliphate is to impose

Sharia and Islam, killing those who do not accept their brand of Islam. And it's not just the living, ISIS destroyed priceless ancient ruines because the Islam deplores idol worship. ISIS didnt level the Temple of Bel because it didn't like the decor, they levelled it because of their religious beliefs. And the Sauds do the same things with ancient shrines to various Islamic holy men.

To compare this barbarity to the 12 colonies is beyond the pale.

[Attorney in Texas]

18. A Mullah, an Imam, or an Ayatollah can impose Islamic law. A Caliph acting within his Caliphate

is the governmental extension of idea in that it includes a geographic region which falls under the governmental rule and regulation of a governing body lead by a Caliph.

ISIL's goal is not a secret agenda. ISIL's goal is to set up an Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (that's what ISIL stands for -- it is an acronym of the English translation of ISIL's name). When some people refer to ISIS, they are referring to Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, a slightly different translation. The difference is that Levant is a term for a region along the eastern coast of the Mediterranean that covers an expanse from southern Turkey to northern Egypt. ISIL is a bit more accurate than ISIS because ISIL's ambitions extend beyond Iraq and Syria and into the broader regional area formerly referred to a the Levant, but ISIL is arguably a bit more offensive because the Levant is a somewhat antiquated term that has imperialistic origins (but, frankly, who cares about offending ISIL?).

ISIL does not want to establish religious groups outside of Iraq and the Levant -- it wants to establish terror cells to help fight its terror campaign to set up a caliphate in Iraq and the Levant. ISIL wants to practice its religion in Iraq and the Levant, but it also wants to raise taxes in Iraq and the Levant, and exploit the natural resources (mainly oil) in Iraq and the Levant, and regulate trade in Iraq and the Levant; in short -- ISIL wants to be the government in Iraq and the Levant.

ISIL does not want to practice or spread its religion in the US or France or Russia; ISIL wants the US and France and Russia out of Iraq and the Levant.

This is not different than what the IRA wanted or different from what the 13 colonies wanted. The fact that there were religious goals (alongside economic goals, and political goals, and social goals) mixed in with the motives of the IRA and the 13 original American colonies does not change the fact that the main goal was a political goal and not a goal for promoting the wider adoption of any particular religion.

Finally, I never compared the barbarity of ISIL with the 13 colonies. What I said was that both ISIL and the 13 colonies were fundamentally involved in political (not religious) revolutions, and each scenario has or had religious autonomy mixed in with the more general goal of complete autonomy. Neither ISIL nor the 13 colonies were fighting to impose their religion beyond the geographic boundaries they claimed, but both ISIL and a majority of the 13 colonies did -- in fact -- seek to impose a specific religion within their boundaries (but this fact did not convert what was essentially a governmental fight into a campaign to promote the wider adoption of a religion).

[KamaAina]

3. Well, there is an ethnic component to that one as well

the Protestants are mainly Scots Irish, that is, ethnic Scots who were shipped over to Ireland by their colonial masters the English, while the Catholics, like their brethren in Eire, are, well, Irish.

[Warren Stupidity]

4. Depends on when they were fighting.

That conflict goes right back to the horrendous bloody civil wars in what eventually became the United Kingdom, and had its roots in religious divisions in the kingdom. The more recent versions of the Irish civil wars were more ethnic and cultural and political, but religion was part of that. Religion did not however provide the ideological underpinnings of either side in the modern era. It does for Isis. They are not socialists or nationalists or communists or fascist or anarchists. They are Islamists. Radical, violent Islamists, and there is no honest way to separate their religion from their ideology or their actions. That does not condemn all Muslims or Islam itself, it is simply a fact about Isis and their particular version of Islam.

[Downwinder]

5. Remembering past election cycles, Nixon with Vietnam and

Reagan with Iran, I can't help but wonder who is dealing with ISIL.

[TexasProgresive]

6. The troubles in Northern Ireland were and are economical.

Great Britain planted settlers from mostly Scotland upon the best land. GB built heavy industry in Belfast which only hired the ethnic Scots. Strife was encouraged to keep the natives under water. It has little or nothing to do with religion.

[smirkymonkey]

8. Yes, my understanding was that it was mostly ethnic, political and economic and

had very little to do with religion, however since they were all the same "race" the way that they identified each other was as "catholic" or "protestant".

[TexasProgresive]

12. I've always referred to the 2 sides a Scot and Irish.

The descendants of the original Scottish settlers thing of themselves as Scot and British. If Scotland ever secedes from the UK their will be some upset people in Ulster. The funny thing is the people of Scotland consider them to be Irish.

[Attorney in Texas]

14. Agreed. It was a bloody dispute where neither side believed that a car bomb was the best technique

convert others to join their religion.

Why is ANYONE buying into the right-wing talking point that ISIL is using terrorism to promote Islam? This is nonsense. ISIL's motives are political and revolutionary; not religious (except in so far as the geographical autonomy they seek is ostensibly to exercise religious autonomy amoung other types of autonomy within the caliphate they seek to establish).

[H2O Man]

10. Apples and grapefruit.

[Attorney in Texas]

20. Are you calling the IRA or ISIL "apples"?

[H2O Man]

21. Well,

I am Irish. And I like Yoko's book, "Grapefruit." So I'm not sure how to answer ....

[Attorney in Texas]

22. You can probably get away with some vague reference to Matt Damon's character in Good Will Hunting

[H2O Man]

23. True.

But that character never actually played with David Peel at a Woodstock reunion.

[hunter]

13. I've got blood in "The Troubles."

My Irish, Scots, and European Catholic, a few Jewish, and other religious dissidents, they ran away to America in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries to escape persecution or military service.

Same as my wife's ancestors. Her Catholic and Native American ancestors ended up in Mexico and Canada, quite a few of them forced out of the U.S.A. with extreme prejudice. Wrong side of the Battle of the Alamo, etc., all that. Bad Indians, Catholic French and Irish.

My wife's parents were both born in the U.S.A. but her grandparents were treated as "immigrants" simply because her ancestors had had the very good sense to flee the U.S.A. when things got too hot here. Nevertheless one of my wife's uncles is buried at Arlington, killed by the Nazis in the very last days of the war, and one of her grandfathers fought Nazis in the Royal Canadian Air Force.

One of my grandfathers was a pacifist in World War II, pacifism his own family religion. He was given a choice: prison or building Liberty and Victory ships. He built ships. He also got beat up bad by cops for protesting the internment of his Japanese neighbors, with my mom as a child witnessing.

One of my mom's Japanese friends escaped internment. A good Mormon family "bought" their California property and hired the entire family on to work their ranch in Utah. After the war they "sold" this family's California property back to them. But no money actually changed hands. Sadly most West Coast Japanese who ended up in the internment camps had their properties and businesses simply stolen by nasty politically well connected white opportunistic U.S. Americans.

My other grandfather was an autistic spectrum fellow, hopelessly obsessive about airplanes and rockets, and later UFO's. He wanted to fly, bad. The Army Air Force had other use for him. He was honorably discharged after the war a decorated Army Air Force Major. My grandfather never ever ever talked about his World War II experience but you could ask him anything about work he did landing men on the moon for the Apollo project and he wouldn't stop talking. Bits of metal he made are on the moon and in the Smithsonian. Any stories of World War II bits of metal he touched, those stories died with him.