Well done, President Obama.

[drham3rd]

Our main problem is that we assume too much about other countries and then when we get involved, we find out our assumptions were wrong e.g Vietnam, Korea, Iraq, etc.  We are always assuming that our way of life and our morals are superior to others, thus we think we should "help" others gain those same things.  We never really study the history of the country, we never really try to understand their way of life or their morals!  We need to stop assuming other countries see things like we do..our experience tells us they DON'T!!!

[Pa Pa]

Our main problem is that we assume too much about other countries and then when we get involved, we find out our assumptions were wrong e.g Vietnam, Korea, Iraq, etc.  We are always assuming that our way of life and our morals are superior to others, thus we think we should "help" others gain those same things.  We never really study the history of the country, we never really try to understand their way of life or their morals!  We need to stop assuming other countries see things like we do..our experience tells us they DON'T!!!

You are correct, we often then other countries will have similar ideas of right and wrong. But that has never been the same with maybe the exception of the civil war, only because we were the same people. Even then we ripped this country apart. My great grandfather, 3 times removed fought with Lee and was with his at Appromaddox. Now we have an enemy who wishes to enslaves others. They are still killing Americians, kidnapping and selling girls, driving Christians out of their homes and killing them...unspeakable evils. Trust me know one hates war that those who wage it, and I pray we do not have to wage it again. But alas, I fear that it is the natural state of man until Christ comes.

Bill Lee

Atlanta, GA

[yjacket]

Somewhere along the road we made a couple of interesting discoveries--first, that nasty situations overseas have a way of affecting us over here sooner or later; and second, that when certain key economic partners are at peace, our own prosperity and standard of living tends to increase dramatically.

 

When was this?  WWII, well 1st off Germany never attacked the US.  2nd, Japan attacked the US b/c we had an oil embargo against them.  3rd.  Roosevelt signed the Atlantic Charter months prior to any attack which picked a side for the US.  Was it WWI?  There is every indication that had the US stayed out of WWI a peace treaty would have been worked out and seeing as Germany wasn't completed defeated at that time it wouldn't have been on such harsh terms for them.  The German people would have never been so desperate to elect the Nazis to rule over a ruined country had the peace treaty terms not been so harsh.  So in effect, one can make a very serious and good claim that had the US stayed neutral, Hitler would have never come to power and the Holocaust would have never happened.  Was it Korea? Was it Vietnam?  Was it Kosovo?, Iraq I, Iraq II?  In every single case of war over the past 100 years, had the US stayed neutral much bloodshed and tears would have been avoided.  Only twice in the past 100 years has the US actually been attacked and in both cases the attacker had a reason for attacking and a significant portion of that reason was because the US was meddling in another part of the world.

 

 

Conservatives aren't against domestic welfare that provides for basic living necessities.  They are against redistributionist schemes because they tend to view Keynesianism as voodoo science.  By contrast the theory behind "put a freakin' HUGE army somewhere, and more often than not, the miserable little third-world thug next door is going to calm down in a hurry" is pretty straightforward.

 

That is news to me; conservative sure doesn't mean what it used to mean.  Domestic welfare is redistribution of wealth, to call it anything else is to completely misunderstand what it does.  And you belie the point. . . . if there is a miserable third-world 2-bit thug, why does the US even care?

 

Have we forgotten what our forefather's taught us??

 

"Wherever the standard of freedom and Independence has been or shall be unfurled, there will her heart, her benedictions and her prayers be. But she goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own. She will commend the general cause by the countenance of her voice, and the benignant sympathy of her example. She well knows that by once enlisting under other banners than her own, were they even the banners of foreign independence, she would involve herself beyond the power of extrication, in all the wars of interest and intrigue, of individual avarice, envy, and ambition, which assume the colors and usurp the standard of freedom. The fundamental maxims of her policy would insensibly change from liberty to force.... She might become the dictatress of the world. She would be no longer the ruler of her own spirit...."

 

You do realize that with Estonia, Georgia and Ukraine that for hundreds of years, up until the earlier 20th century they were a part of the Russian empire?  Let them sort it out, see the quote from John Quincy Adams above.

 

I don't think the Vietnamese loved Ho Chi Min, some did, some probably fought for him without knowing what they were getting, some probably fought for him just for independence.  Again it is irrelevant.  See the quote from J.Q. Adams.

 

It is a very sad state of affairs, the US only has vestiges of its past.  People are duped by Fox News, CNN, and other various media outlets who serve the military industrial complex.  Their aim and goal is to get more and more money for their toys, wave the flag and make it look like they are the saviors of the world.  The US is on the road to despotism, a warlike culture that is never satisfied; I weep for my country.  It was a  marvelous shinning example to the rest of the world a truly exceptional nation.  Now it is no better than the rest of the European countries.  At some point, the facade of strength will come crashing down.