Liberal or Conservative Test

[N-Man]

A true world government would work exactly the same as a national one but on a bigger scale. That is a silly question... why not ask the same exact thing about natives in American Samoa?

American Samoa has its own government, afaik... I just don't really understand. Okay, suppose we do it like in Samoa, and all the countries under the world government also have a government. This is just adding a layer of bureaucracy. What good does it do?

Sure. But a true world government (on some level) well might survive somehting like that. A world controlled by american domination wouldn't.

Heh... everything dies someday, not to sound morbid :p

Its then legal force, which gives it higher moral ground. And the UN would never act unless it is clear that force (the absolute last resort) is necessary... which is good. Force isn't a very effective tool and its use should be avoided whenever possible.

Having delegates of Khadaffi, Assad, Mugabe and the whole damn pantheon tell you something is right does not, repeat does not give it higher moral ground. Who do you trust more:

Bush + Blair
Bush + Blair + Khomeini + Iron-Fist Fujimori, Super President of Peru... okay well he's gone, but you get the idea. Considering that a vast number (possibly a majority) of governments do not even represent the wills of their people, how can you claim their approval is "higher moral ground"?

So you don't feel proud about anything that has ever happened in America's history?

Considering I'm not American, that's pretty appropriate dontcha think? :p

History is too convoluted for pride. Pride about people and acts who under different circumstances wouldn't even be part of your country; I'm of course talking about national pride, I realize I may have been extending that to all sorts of pride in my haste; but once again, political entities are too frail and volatile to feel proud of. I'm proud of the accomplishments of mankind and of mankind itself, but, I'm sorry, the fact that I'm vaguely related to certain groups of people doesn't accentuate my feeling of pride towards them.

No, I'm saying that if he'd lasted Napoleon would have turned out to be identical to them. He already was, really... just with a nicer law code and trappings of "freedom" to make the people who supported the recently ended Revolution happy.

But the nicer law code made all the difference, my good man! And besides, he couldn't have lasted. Remember: the Empire conquers, then crumbles.

It is true that in Africa Britain and France were pretty halfhearted in their attempts at democracy. In some places they DID try, but they left far too soon. In India though... that was different... it was obviously prepared for democracy as they actively saught it out and succeeded in getting their goal. There WERE some bloodbaths, though. I remember a History Channel show on a massacre where British troops slaugtered some protesting civilians in India that helped bring tensions to a head. Don't delude yourself to think that the British were somehow nice and not brutal... they had a nice side, but to many natives of most conquered nations they saw just the brutal one. Sure, it wasn't as bad as Congo or Indonesia, but there were incidents. Imperialism is rule by force... the Indians wanting democracy wasn't exactly something the British welcomed or expected...

I certainly exaggerated here also, but the fact is that in the end there was no genocide of any sort and everything turned out for the best.

My point about the British empire wasn't really that things turned out well for the conquered peoples, but rather that it did for Britain proper. It's just a way of saying, even if America engages in outright empire-building, it doesn't mean it'll get assaulted from every direction by bloodthirsty freedom fighters.