Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Hockey hair
Celine Dion
Speedo wearing Quebecois with back hair
Skunk beer
Zap Rowsdower (google him)
Loverboy
Festive Molson-fueled seal clubbing parties
One Olympic gold medal in ice hockey in the last 50 years (we have 2, bwaahahahaha!!!)
Bland, wooden TV anchors
Curling matches on TV
Crash Test Dummies
And last but not least...
Ed the Sock!
But I love Canada, anyway. My wife and I brought in the New Year at a hot spring resort in BC, and had a great time drinking bubbly in the steaming water while snow fell on our noses, with the Canadian Rocky mountains all around us...
All in all a very good tri to defend the indefensible.
Clever!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Auntie Freda
Fact is, that any nation which has been busily engaged in killing people
(mostly civilians, con-combatants, women, children, old folk, babies)
SOMEWHERE on this planet every single day for the last half century
really should have a good look at itself !
"Mostly" non-combatants? Do you have sources to back that up? You make it sound as if the US went on a campaign to specifically target civilians with the goal of terrorizing the population into surrender. That hasn't happened since basically WW2.
For places like Vietnam, you will have to admit that the Viet Cong is at least half to blame?
And ponder - how many of those victims posed the slightest possible threat to the USA - Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, all those tiny Central American countries, Iraq... ?
We'll touch on "cold war politics" below.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Auntie Freda
Whilst trying to nominate that one day in fifty years when America was not brutalizing SOMEONE, SOMEWHERE - do take into account all those tyrannical regimes that have been set up or supported
And all the dirty tricks campaigns, assassination attempts, covert operations, deposing democratically elected governments like Allende in Chile, "renditions", kidnappings, secret prisons, torture ....
Wonderful how you so easily set up the scenario: "In the past 50 years..."
I cannot make excuses for cold war tactics. They are what they are. It was a battle between giants. During that time, the United States and the Soviet Union were engaged in a battle for the world. Perhaps you forget. The United States basically supported anyone "not communist" and the soviets anyone who were "communist." Proxy wars a plenty. Support for this or that side in a conflict. Looking back with 20/20 hindsight we may be able to evaluate whether those fears were justified. I'm much too young to remember what it was like living back then, but I DO know from history and from talking to those who lived it that the fear was real - the Soviets could have steamrolled across Europe at any time. Nuclear war was an ever-present specter. It affected people's lives at the time, their perceptions, and of course, policy. Maybe YOU would have handled things differently..... but unfortunately (or maybe, fortunately), that's not the case.
They key thing is, however, that the United States rarely CREATED the conflict. It typically threw its weight behind one side in a conflict - the side that was NOT on the "Soviet" side. And let's be real. Many many many of the conflicts the US got involved in were NOT "home grown" movements. They were Soviet or Chinese backed. Would Vietnam have lasted so long without the Chinese? Would the Latin American conflicts ever have erupted if not for Cuban and Soviet backed leftists?
AND, again, EVERYTHING The US had its hand in, it was with the implicit or complicit support or knowledge of the rest of the "Western World" governments. Again, we willingly did the dirty work, and the rest of the "free world" was content to let us do it. Australia included.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Auntie Freda
Yeah, I know. 'It's not us, it's our government'.
But can the American people hide behind that line and still claim to be the "world's greatest democracy".
Part of being as large as we are with a military as strong as ours is that some things WILL be out of "our" collective control.
Perhaps we should rephrase our tag line: "World's greatest democracy for our size and strength."
We'll let Finland tout extoll its superior democratic virtues with its homogenous population (ideologically AND racial) of 6 million. I'm sure town hall referendums in towns in Idaho with a population of 5000 are remarkable examples of "democracy in action" rarely seen in Atlanta, Miami, or New York..... but.....some of us just have much more to think about and deal with, ya know?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Auntie Freda
TIme after time they elect warmongering lying clones and then wash their hands and say "not our fault".
Did the Germans or the Japanese not share some collective blame ?
They sure as hell had to wear the reparations.
The problem is that some of the more egregious stuff was done covertly - CIA type stuff that the people have no knowledge about until much after the fact.
If we follow the timeline of US history post WW2, we have but a few ACTUAL wars: Korea (AKA American warmongering?), Vietnam and related incursions (started by America, of course), Grenada (I'll give you this one - it was silly), Gulf War 1 (American expansionism?), Bosnia etc. (American bloodthirst?), Iraq II (AKA George Bush's war of convenience).
Sometimes, as in the latest election of George Bush for a second term, the "War" wasn't really the motivating reason why people voted or didn't vote for Bush. Domestic policies will ALWAYS trump foreign policy when people make their presidential picks.
But then again, how long was war mongering Howard around in Australia?
As for the Japanese, perhaps you've heard the term, "to the victor goes the spoils?" Their payment of reparations had nothing to do with assigning collective blame to the people.... but because we COULD charge reparations.
Really though, Auntie F, Americans are well aware of the righteous indignation that non-Americans have towards us. WE are actually our most fervent critics. Most of what you know about why you hate us.... WE'VE told you.
We're also well aware that we're "damned if we do, damned if we don't," so forgive us for taking the vast majority of "world opinion" with a grain of salt.
"You entered WW2 too late." (Why should we have entered at all? That's war mongering. Our PEOPLE didn't want to go to war).
"You didn't do enough to stop Rwanda genocide" (Why should we interject our military THERE? We'd end up killing innocent people --- see Bosnia/Serbia).
The problem is the WORLD wants to dictate when and how the United States exercises its military power, and gets pissed when it doesn't get its way. NO country would allow that. Try that with the Russians and see how far you'll get. Also, don't expect the United States to make apologies just to make you feel better. China doesn't apologize. Russia doesn't apologize, Britain doesn't apologize.... no nation or civilization "apologizes" unless they have to (Japan, Germany).
Possibly because you can't fool all of the people all of the time. Only about 25% of them, it would seem. The fact remains that virtually everything that this adminsitration has done on any front has collapsed into miserable failure. Any failure is newsworthy. Total failure is newsworthy in and of itself. Reporting on this administration's failures is a sign of addressing reality, not of any bias. It is the rah-rah right-wing disinformation media that have cornered the market on bias...
No, no not all!!! Both sides have conered the market on plain out and out lying and spinning the real truth. The liberals have their own misinformation, as do the right wing fanatics who follow Bush like a cow to be milked.
I'm much too young to remember what it was like living back then, but I DO know from history and from talking to those who lived it that the fear was real...
This post does at least attempt to make something cohesive and coherent out of a turbulent time, but it is suffused with the idea of cutting America a break to the point of becoming a whitewash. Mistakes were made, and bad decisions were arrived at on the basis of imperfect information. With time, most people can forgive those sorts of things, tragic and sometimes sloppy as they might have been at the time. But this does not wipe away the persistent patterns of excess and exploitation nor an on-going tolerance of and support for brutal injustice that came along with underlying policies of protecting US commercial and political interests at all costs. No hindsight is necessary here. The bulk of it was readily apparent at the time. Communism and the fear of Communism were used to justify unwarranted actions then, just as terrorism and the fear of terrorism are used to justify unwarranted actions now. Same old dogs, same old tricks, just a different lexicography. Bad guys = Communists one day, bad guys = terrorists the next. We'd be better off as a nation in recognizing and adopting some of the humility that our past mistakes actually warrant. It would help make us a little less likely to repeat some of them in the future...
This post does at least attempt to make something cohesive and coherent out of a turbulent time, but it is suffused with the idea of cutting America a break to the point of becoming a whitewash. Mistakes were made, and bad decisions were arrived at on the basis of imperfect information. With time, most people can forgive those sorts of things, tragic and sometimes sloppy as they might have been at the time. But this does not wipe away the persistent patterns of excess and exploitation nor an on-going tolerance of and support for brutal injustice that came along with underlying policies of protecting US commercial and political interests at all costs. No hindsight is necessary here. The bulk of it was readily apparent at the time. Communism and the fear of Communism were used to justify unwarranted actions then, just as terrorism and the fear of terrorism are used to justify unwarranted actions now. Same old dogs, same old tricks, just a different lexicography. Bad guys = Communists one day, bad guys = terrorists the next. We'd be better off as a nation in recognizing and adopting some of the humility that our past mistakes actually warrant. It would help make us a little less likely to repeat some of them in the future...
I won't go as far as to say the threat of Soviet expansionism is the same as the threat of terrorism, or that the two are being used "in the same way." The Soviets actually HAD the capability to subjugate Europe and annihiliate the United States.
It's not whitewash. There's a line drawn somewhere. If someone tried to trump the cause of war in the US in the early days of WW2, crying out about the scourge of Nazism and German expansion, would we roll our eyes and say, "warmongering. You're just trying to justify war through the trumping up the threat of fascism??"
I would venture that with respect to things done in the name of fighting communism, leaders of the time SERIOUSLY thought that communism and Soviet expansionism was a VERY real threat, and not just something to exploit for economic or business interests. It was a case of ideology pre-determining policy. No matter what the conflict, if communism or the Soviets had their hands in it, so to would the US on the other side (and vice versa with Soviet policy).
The terrorism thing is a whole different animal. "Fear of communism," had been and has been used much more exploitatively to steer DOMESTIC policy for business interest ("Oh no! Universal healthcare is SOCIALISM!"), rather than influence the public on foreign policy, which has followed a pretty consistent and steady path up until the fall of the Soviet Union... at which point the proxy wars pretty much stopped.
There ARE blatant exceptions throughtout the period: Shah of Iran, United Fruit Co., etc. Again, however, CIA covert actions. The people cannot be held responsible for things that officially never happen.
We feel blowback, still, from short-sighted Cold War policy (arming the Mujahadeen, friends one day, foe the next) that we would THINK our current policy makers can learn from with regards to their terror policies, but I don't think they're smart enough. Smart people tend to not become politicians.
TRI - I've posted pretty much those same sentiments quite a few times in quite a few Forums in recent years.
YOURS is the most calm, reasoned, rational response to date.
By a country mile.
Whilst I do not resile from my basic position ( I don't think you'd expect me to ),
you have certainly provide food for thought on some issues.
Of course, you have done so just at a time when I am up to my armpits in REAL-world stuff but
BE ASSURED, I shall return to the fray - soon.
The United States Government has been terrorizing foreign civilians and installing 'friendly" governments for almost 200 years to protect American investors from the risk inherent in overseas investment. The victims pay most of the price of Empire. Always has, always will. Maybe we should be used to it by now.
Better yet, we should stop protecting American investors overseas investments and let them take the real risk inherent in investing in somebody else’s country. After all an investor can keep his money in this economy and receive government protection here at home.
why do americans believe they are the greatest country in the world?. they dont even crack the top 15 in any kind of rating that matters. maybe its the 12000 murders a year. maybe its because the government sends young people to die to enforce the will of the corporations. maybe its the healthcare. you peolpe need to come out of your media induced coma and wake up because your country is in serious trouble. stop believing its your god given right to rule the world. ever think of why people attack you?. canada is very similar and no one attacks us. there is a whole side of the story that your not being told . its not religious fanatisism its that people in t
those countries don want to be occupied and exploited, can you blame them?
remember the british? when you drove them out what did you call yourselves? terrorists? insurgents?. remember one mans terrorist is another mans partriot. change your foreign policy this war on terror can never be won.
Well, at least all of your countrymen don't have the same attitude toward the U.S.
America: The Good Neighbor
by Gordon Sinclair
A Canadian Television Commentator.
"This Canadian thinks it is time to speak up for the Americans as the most generous and possibly the least appreciated people on all the earth. Germany, Japan and, to a lesser extent, Britain and Italy were lifted out of the debris of war by the Americans who poured in billions of dollars and forgave other billions in debts. None of these countries is today paying even the interest on its remaining debts to the United States. When France was in danger of collapsing in 1956, it was the Americans who propped it up, and their reward was to be insulted and swindled on the streets of Paris. I was there. I saw it. When earthquakes hit distant cities, it is the United States that hurries in to help. This spring, 59 American communities were flattened by tornadoes. Nobody helped. The Marshall Plan and the Truman Policy pumped billions of dollars into discouraged countries. Now newspapers in those countries are writing about the decadent, warmongering Americans.
I'd like to see just one of those countries that is gloating over the erosion of the United States dollar build its own airplane. Does any other country in the world have a plane to equal the Boeing Jumbo Jet, the Lockheed Tri-Star, or the Douglas DC10? If so, why don't they fly them? Why do all the International lines except Russia fly American Planes? Why does no other land on earth even consider putting a man or woman on the moon? You talk about Japanese technocracy, and you get radios. You talk about German technocracy, and you get automobiles. You talk about American technocracy, and you find men on the moon-not once, but several times-and safely home again. You talk about scandals, and the Americans put theirs right in the store window for everybody to look at. Even their draft-dodgers are not pursued and hounded. They are here on our streets, and most of them, unless they are breaking Canadian laws, are getting American dollars from ma and pa at home to spend here.
When the railways of France, Germany and India were breaking down through age, it was the Americans who rebuilt them. When the Pennsylvania Railroad and the New York Central went broke, nobody loaned them an old caboose. Both are still broke. I can name you 5000 times when the Americans raced to the help of other people in trouble. Can you name me even one time when someone else raced to the Americans in trouble? I don't think there was outside help even during the San Francisco earthquake. Our neighbors have faced it alone, and I'm one Canadian who is damned tired of hearing them get kicked around. They will come out of this thing with their flag high. And when they do, they are entitled to thumb their nose at the lands that are gloating over their present troubles. I hope Canada is not one of those. Stand proud, America!"
Here is a reprint of an editorial from a Romanian Newspaper that was circulated by the US Forces Command Public Affairs Office. The language is occasionally awkward due to translation, but the meaning is unmistaken.
An Ode to America
Why are Americans so united? They don't resemble one another even if you paint them! They speak all the languages of the world and form an astonishing mixture of civilizations. Some of them are nearly extinct, others are incompatible with one another, and in matters of religious beliefs, not even God can count how many they are. Still, the American tragedy turned three hundred million people into a hand put on the heart. Nobody rushed to accuse the White House, the army, the secret services that they are only a bunch of losers. Nobody rushed to empty their bank accounts. Nobody rushed on the streets nearby to gape about.
The Americans volunteered to donate blood and to give a helping hand. After the first moments of panic, they raised the flag on the smoking ruins, putting on T-shirts, caps and ties in the colors of the national flag. They placed flags on buildings and cars as if in every place and on every car a minister or the president was passing. On every occasion they started singing their traditional song: "God Bless America!".
Silent as a rock, I watched the charity concert broadcast on Saturday once, twice, three times, on different TV channels. There were Clint Eastwood, Willie Nelson, Robert de Niro, Julia Roberts, Cassius Clay, Jack Nicholson, Bruce Springsteen, Sylvester Stalone, James Wood, and many others whom no film or producers could ever bring together. The American's solidarity spirit turned them into a choir. Actually, choir is not the word. What you could hear was the heavy artillery of the American soul. What neither George W. Bush, nor Bill Clinton, nor Colin Powell could say without facing the risk of stumbling over words and sounds, was being heard in a great and unmistakable way in this charity concert.
I don't know how it happened that all this obsessive singing of America didn't sound croaky, nationalist, or ostentatious! It made you green with envy because you weren't able to sing for your country without running the risk of being red chauvinist, ridiculous, or suspected of who-knows-what mean interests. I watched the live broadcast and the rerun of its rerun for hours listening to the story of the guy who went down one hundred floors with a woman in a wheelchair without knowing who she was, or of the Californian hockey player, who fought with the terrorists and prevented the plane from hitting a target that would have killed other hundreds or thousands of people. How on earth were they able to bow before a fellow human? Imperceptibly, with every word and musical note, the memory of some turned into a modern myth of tragic heroes. And with every phone call, millions and millions of dollars were put in a collection aimed at rewarding not a man or a family, but a spirit which nothing can buy.
What on earth can unite the Americans in such a way? Their land? Their galloping history? Their economic power? Money? I tried for hours to find an answer, humming songs and murmuring phrases which risk of sounding like commonplaces. I thought things over, but I reached only one conclusion. Only freedom can work such miracles!
There may be alot about this country that is wrong. But there is much to be proud of. America's heart is in her people. We may fight amongst each other, but during times of crisis, this country has an ability to come together like no other, extraordinarily so in my opinion.
To read more about why our country is so great go here:
Note to the mods: This website publishes articles specifically for sharing and reprinting. I used it purposely in order to avoid copyright infringement. Thanks.
I wish a segment of Americans would realize our diversity is indeed a source of strength and innovation for us, and not something to be feared...
Why are Americans so united? They don't resemble one another even if you paint them! They speak all the languages of the world and form an astonishing mixture of civilizations. Some of them are nearly extinct, others are incompatible with one another, and in matters of religious beliefs, not even God can count how many they are.
I wish a segment of Americans would realize our diversity is indeed a source of strength and innovation for us, and not something to be feared...
Why are Americans so united? They don't resemble one another even if you paint them! They speak all the languages of the world and form an astonishing mixture of civilizations. Some of them are nearly extinct, others are incompatible with one another, and in matters of religious beliefs, not even God can count how many they are.
Diversity is strength only when accompanied by cultural and linguistic assimilation.
Multicultural diversity for any culture is tantamount to sounding the death knell--just ask the Romans.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
