27th April 2004, 11:06 AM
Quote:Did you know that the middle eastern countries have more money going in and out of it than any other country in the world? And yet they dont build roads for their towns or update thier hospitals which are still using the same equipment from the 60's. It's because all of that money goes in to two or three pockets and is used to make their palaces larger. It's a rediculous state of affairs. The entire middle east region is corrupt and coreless, it only stays afloat because of war and hate for other countries. You may want to sound all PC and love your neighbor and that's fine, we need more of that. But tell it to them, not us. The only thing we care about is buying the oil off them. They are a world based on war since the begining of time and it will not stop until one religion is king there.. and anyone who practices something else is either dead or dying. Then you'll see peace in the middle east; and then you'll see it crumble to its hollow core.
Massive and not completely true overgeneralization. Many Arab nations ARE spending a lot on improvements... roads, schools, airports, etc... they have the cash so they can and do. Oh, sure, a lot of it goes to the sheiks... but there's just so MUCH money that they can afford to spend good sums on improvements. As much as they should? NO, probably not. And they should be considering the future more -- in 50 years the oil will be mostly gone and they'll either have to adapt, somehow, or go back to living in tents...
As for the war there, both sides are obviously not moving and SOMETIME they'll have to have some kind of 'peace'. They don't have to like eachother, of course (witness the Greeks and the Turks, they still dislike eachother after thousands of years but haven't really fought since the founding of Turkey in the 1920s...), but some kind of peace IS possible. It just takes both sides to make some sacrifices. When they are ready to do that, it will come... unfortunately, that might take some time.
But your assertion that only one religion can ever be dominant is wrong. Witness the US! So many hard-line religious types and they spend most of their time not attacking each other but other groups... despite numerous differences.
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Okay. We do things right. That's why America is on top. That's why Americans are the wealthiest, happiest people in the world. We're productive and creative. We're not perfect but we're closer than anyone else is. We do things the way they should be done. The nations who are closest to America are those that emulate our way of doing things the closest.
Then, on the other side of the coin, you have, to paraphrase The Onion again, "6000 year old civilization now a 'developing nation'". They do things wrong. They fuck up more than we do. Their way of doing things doesn't work. That's why they're poor and pissed off.
Now, I know you have a deep-seated resentment for America, and the military and capitalism, and how we sometimes get ahead by stepping on others. Get over it. That's the way people do things. That's human nature. There will always be winners and losers. America is very much a winner in the grand scheme of things, and unlike you, I don't feel the slightest bit of guilt about it. The people who hate America claim to hate us because we're belligerent and unilateral, and to some extent, that's correct. But the real reason we're disliked is because you and I live like kings, while people in other nations can't feed themselves. You and I live like kings because we're priveleged and lucky enough to live in the greatest nation in the history of the world, and we do because our nation plays the great game and wins far more often than not. People in other nations dislike us because we win in this game, and even more because they lose. They are jealous of our lifestyles and our riches, and at the same time they envy us for having them. Their societies are ancient and look every bit as old as they are. Those people were not lucky enough to live here. Some of those people want to destroy America's greatness rather than try to build their own. These people are stupid. These people are our enemies, and they will not win, because they play the game all wrong. Hopefully they will realize their futility sooner as opposed to later and cut the bullshit. These people need to look at what America does, and has done. They need to see exactly how this nation and it's people operate, and do their best to imitate it to the letter. If everyone did, this world would be so much better off.
Happiest? Entirely subjective, and you aren't exactly a good arbiter to be deciding that! Most peoples would say they are happy, I think...
Other than that. Look, it is obviously true that we are the most powerful nation in the world. But with power comes responsibility. Running around blowing people up will get us NOWHERE. If you think that we are impregnable, that it's impossible that our power could ever fall (though it'll almost certainly take quite some time), go as the British if they thought in even the 1940s that their empire would begin to dissolve within the decade... or how about Rome?
Oh, sure, we're still really strong. But as things like Iraq and Afghanistan prove, not to mention Rwanda, Haiti, Kosovo, Iraq ('91), Bosnia, etc, etc... our power alone will not meet what our goals should be!
I, as I have said many times before, am a strong supporter of peacekeeping... sure, we can't be the world's police everywhere, but since we have the power I'd say it's our responsibility to try our best to do that. Overthrowing governments? That should not be done much and only with international support.
I just cannot understand how you can think that we should not care about the rest of the world. It makes absolutely no sense especially given the lessons history keeps giving us. Iraq is a PERFECT example! If we'd waited for the UN to do its job Sadaam may well still be there but he'd be like he has been for years now... without much power and being forced to cooperate with the UN. Oh he was a terrible leader but it's not our job to destroy governments... and when we do we BETTER BE READY. In Iraq we were utterly unprepared for reconstruction and it shows, very painfully.And when mixed with Bush's idiotic hatred for the UN... it made a bad situation infinitely worse. Oh, Bush asks for foreign troops.. but think about it. What sane, powerful (to differentiate it from weak 'allies' we have like Poland and Bulgaria) nation would send its men to fight and die in a nation for NOTHING? And that's what Bush is offering France, Germany, Russia, Spain... nothing. A very, very small piece of the contracts pie. No say in the political side. Essentially nothing. Why in the world would they ever agree? It'd be a monumentally stupid decision for one like that... now the weak nations I can understand, they want to stay on the US's good side... but France and Germany? They are doing what is best by staying out without a strong UN mandate in Iraq.
Oh, and how people like you keep attacking the UN when it is so blatantly obvious that it succeeded brilliantly in the sanctions and inspections of Iraq during the time between the wars is completely beyond me.
About why we are hated. Jealousy? Well yes I'm sure that's part of it. That certainly is a major human emotion. But that would only provide some of the hatred... our actions provide the rest. And when we act like we have the last three years, anyone in most of the rest of the world (and particularly the Middle East or the anti-war parts of Europe) who DOESN'T hate America must not care much about politics, because we have followed a set of policies that have destroyed all of the world's goodwill and turned it into a fierce hatred. I just don't see why you can't see that being fiercely hated is a BAD THING! It causes very serious problems for our policies, creates insecurity, and when it gets really bad fans the flames of violence against us. We cannot simply occupy the world, you know! As Iraq (and Afghanistan) proves we can't even reform one nation's government when it's bad... yet you want to not just make even more nations hate us even more but probably attack them TOO? It'd be a nightmare that I don't know if we could escape for many, many years... people who think like you are probably the greatest long-term threat to global peace there is.