Quote Originally Posted by Sanlmar View Post

Our involvement always ends badly and does little more than make matters worse.
This seems like one of those things people say without really thinking very hard about how things could have actually gone differently, and been much worse. Who knows how shitty the world would be right now if we hadn't gotten involved in the ME and created the petro dollar. The first half of the 20th century was pretty brutal, and all else being equal the 70 years since have been relatively quiet and prosperous and peaceful. Maybe we should be giving ourselves a pat on the back for that, and not just assuming everything wrong in the world, especially the Middle East, is our fault and would have been better if we hadn't gotten involved.