For those of us who grew up thinking of American culture as related closely to our own, it is quite hard to come to terms with the fact that there is a very substantial strand to US popular culture that makes it a danger to the entire world, and requires a dedicated worldwide effort at containment and reorientation.
If you have any doubt of that, just read the comments here in the LA Times. We know Perry is an arse, but look at what LA Times readers “think”. And remember the LA Times is at the liberal end of the spectrum, insofar as the US has one.
There are more Americans locked up in jails than citizens of any other developed country. Unfortunately, largely the wrong ones.
Leo
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You are spot on, that is the real state of Scotland. There is no hope!.
Bob @ 14 Jan, 2012 – 12:50 pm (pissing-into-the-wind) said;
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The fascist US society has been long in the making, ever since the day after the end of WWII. Operation “paper clip” translocated more than experts and their body of knowledge, it also exported the NAZI weltanschauung albeit a much more refined and tweaked version. Yanks have learned to camouflage, tool up and paint their face just to go buy a hamburger, or pack of chewing gum, thanks to the years of unstinting Hollywood education.
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+1
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So far as the denials on this thread go, the first step in any solution is identification of the problem, whence the will for cover up, and exceptionalism thereof is greater than the guts to own up, the problem shall take a pernicious dimension that is harder to solve and the perpetuation of the wrongs caused thereof shall bear even more bitter fruit of lost opportunities.
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Given the rabid comments published in the various US outlets and publications, Craig’s assertion holds true. Further, the bad apple principle applied can obtain that the one bad apple will ruin the rest of the apples in the barrel, and render the enterprise of storage of these bankrupt.
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These comments ought to be treated as what they represent; windows into the souls and intent of the Nations/societies/groups, this facet remaining unexploited by the various Muslim countries, cannot continue for ever.
I really can’t abide arm-chair warriors criticising front line soldiers for their supposed unfavourable activities. While I personally don’t think that desecrating the dead is something to be proud of I think this is massively overblown and could be dealt with by education – which in a way the outing forces them to do – but as posted earlier governments want killers in their armies. The real criminals, also posted many places elsewhere, are the politicians.
I also believe we do get very superior over here towards Americans – I’m talking generally now rather that directing at individuals. I lived in metropolitan America for 9 years and found the majority of those I met to be well informed and intelligent. I have no experience of the heartland.
That said, as Craig rightly points out, the US does pose a great risk to world security and there does need to be a concerted effort to fight their exported ‘culture’, political and otherwise.
“I think this is massively overblown and could be dealt with by education”
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Steve, what you miss is that this is not an isolated incident, there have been many. Abu Ghraib/Guantanamo Bay and many others were organised and perpetrated by/at the highest echelons of power within the USA.
“I really can’t abide arm-chair warriors criticising front line soldiers for their supposed unfavourable activities”
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Interesting take on a matter that is against Geneva Conventions, as well as Hague Conventions, in addition to being morally bankrupt and reprehensible.
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The weak arguments forwarded somehow fail to clarify the difference between a troop of gun wielding undisciplined rabble, and professional soldiers. The puerile attempts in playing down the break down of discipline and morale among the US, NATO soldiers, further diminishes the extent of the war crimes that are going misaddressed, in an attempt to make acceptable; war crimes as part and parcel of “war”, and cannot be punished.
I don’t know if I can pass judgement on American people, but American government is most certainly heading, if not already there, towards the Fourth Reich.
“I lived in metropolitan America for 9 years and found the majority of those I met to be well informed and intelligent. I have no experience of the heartland”.
Steve, the trouble with your point of view is that those well informed and intelligent people are represented by a government that behaves like a cross between Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin. How did that come about? Especially since all Americans are continually droning on about how their political system is the best in the world, the best there has ever been, the best there ever will be, and very probably the best that is theoretically possible in this universe.
Incidentally, I have visited parts of America – especially small-town Wisconsin – many times, and my experience was exactly like yours. Kind, decent, mature, honest people who make Christianity like more attractive than I thought it could. But the same problem arises. On the few occasions when I disturbed their serenity by very gently mentioning any of the problems we discuss daily in this blog, their reaction was concern and bewilderment.
But actually, what can even the most decent and determined American do? They have precisely three choices: vote Democrat, vote Republican, or abstain (which third option includes voting for anyone other than a Democrat or Republican). Whichever of those three choices they make, the outcome will continue to precisely the same. Democracy?
Iraq: Link to Obama and the censoring of American soldier abuse and torture .
http://wikileaksleaks.blogspot.com/2011/03/obama-supressing-images-of-us-soldiers.html
Guest – You’re right in that it’s not an isolated incident but I just find it really hard to have a go at guys on the front line. It’s the govt for me.
*
Tom – You’re right, it’s scary what is happening with their politics. Really scary! However, I don’t think that it’s as straight forward as just blaming those who elected them – if that’s what you’re getting at. Many liberal minded people voted for Tony Blair way back when and look how that all ended up although the US govt seem to be taking it to a new level. The problem is the same in both countries in that there is no difference between the parties, just marginally different branding.
Ingo,
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I agree with your first sentence that Britain was ‘exceptional’ at the height of the British Empire. Unlike Britain whose power and expansion seemed to be feudal driven, America relies on her puritanical moralistic values to drive her exceptionalism; analysing ‘Dubya’s’ quotes gets the drift:
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“I’ve heard the call. I believe God wants me to run for President.”
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“My administration has a job to do and we’re going to do it. We will rid the world of the evil-doers.”
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“This crusade, this war on terrorism is going to take a while.”
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In 1900 President Mckinley said, ” “The American flag has not been planted in foreign soil to acquire more territory but for humanity’s sake.”. Even today American political ideology embraces an American mission to promote and defend democracy throughout the world.
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Such reliance on ‘Divine Providence’ for justification has led America down a path of chauvinism, self-interest, intolerance, bigotry, degenerate behaviour and mass murder.
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A notion that virtue, mission and destiny under God by America has damned America, she is blind and dangerous – exceedingly dangerous and I remind my friends and those willing to listen, of her ‘exceptional’ mission:
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“We have it in our power to begin the world over again. A situation, similar to the present, hath not happened since the days of Noah until now. The birthday of a new world is at hand…”
Steve,
I haven’t ever shot anyone, but I have been shot at once, and had loaded weapons waved in my face more times than I care to remember. I have been in the midst of the Sierra Leone and Liberian civil wars. I have almost certainly seen as much danger in my life as those snipers. I am not an armchair warrior.
VeluePlus
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Talking about 4th Reich, Why heading? Actually looking at the US foreign policy today it seems like it is less disturbing and less immoral than 40-50 years back in the height of Cold War. Even including victims of Iraq war it is obvious that current death toll is much smaller than it used to be when US was fighting proxy war with USSR or China all over the world. And domestic policy in the US is not as extreme as it used to be during McCarthyism and it seems that (at least in Internet) people are not restrained from expressing their views even those extremely unpopular with ruling elites.
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Overall it seems that US is much more liberal today (both towards the world and towards its own citizens) as it used to be ages ago.
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The only drawback is the absence of axis of evil. Thus the methods that US used ages ago seems inappropriate today when US still remains dominant and unchallenged superpower. And to add to this worse is to come with rise of China and Cold War 2.
Craig – My comment was a general one and not targeted at anyone in particular. However, from your comments I’m sure that you’ve had a good few scares for sure but to compare your experiences to troops on the front line. Really?
“….compare your experiences to troops on the front line. Really?”
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These bastards went for the job no one forced them into the job. Unlike their poor victims who had no choice but getting shot at and killed/maimed/left limbless with the most sophisticated weapons system money can buy. The bizarre notion of justifying war crimes is yet another gift of US that is giving so much to the world, that is destruction, uncertainty, prejudice, and redefinition of the standards of Evil
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Glossing over the war crimes. Really?
I’m not trying to justify it.
Democracy and Human Rights in Uzbekistan
Lorne W. Craner, Assistant Secretary for the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor
Media Roundtable
Tashkent, Uzbekistan
June 7, 2002
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‘Assistant Secretary Craner: No, I think the agenda remains the same as when I came here in January, which is to encourage democratization and the observance of human rights here. Others, who visit like Colin Powell, like Elizabeth Jones, who is our Assistant Secretary of State for Europe, do the same. And as I noted before, John Herbst does it everyday.
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This is the only country I am visiting in central Asia. But I am going on to a number of other Muslim countries in the Persian Gulf, which also face a threat of fundamentalism. In a number of countries that I will be visiting — Bahrain, Oman and Qatar — they are opening up their political systems, including allowing elections.
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They are beginning to have functioning parliaments, and allowing women in a number of cases both to vote and run for office. They are also granting expanded civil liberties at the same time. And that’s something we want to encourage.’
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Bollocks!
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http://merln.ndu.edu/archivepdf/centasia/State/11112.pdf
Rick Perry may indeed be an idiot defending the indefensible (or maybe in truth acting out of desperation to save a failing campaign). But as for the comments, taking a quick look at the first dozen or so, most of them appear to disapprove of what the soldiers did. The “redneck” minority are immediately criticised by others.
testing
American Barefaced BullShit & Lies…
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hOCH1ECkyio
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I posted the following on the original pissing thread. Maybe it is more appropriate here.
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From Three Against Hitler, by Rudi Wobbe and Jerry Borrowman:
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“Near our home was a shoe store, owned and run by a Jew. Even before 1933 his store windows and swastikas had been painted on the walls and door. But, after the “takeover,” the Nazis demolished his store in broad daylight. They broke all the windows, threw the merchandise onto the sidewalk, and dragged the proprietor and his wife and two children into the street. They started beating and cursing them, all the while calling them dirty names and shouting that they weren’t fit to live among the exalted German, Aryan people. The greatest indignity of all is that after the family was lying in the gutter in agony, the Nazis urinated on them. I was only seven years of age when this took place, but I remember it vividly.”
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http://www.antiwar.com/blog/2012/01/13/duh-winning-hearts-and-minds-edition/
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Vile exceptionalism.
Mark; We have people like you on American blogs….angry, inconsolable souls who bask in the dark ignorance of simplistic slogans.
America’s Last Chance by PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS
Posted by gabriele on January 16, 2012, 5:15 pm
One Against the Empire
America’s Last Chance
PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS
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America has one last chance, and it is a very slim one. Americans can elect Ron Paul President, or they can descend into tyranny.
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Why is Ron Paul America’s last chance?
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Because he is the only candidate who is not owned lock, stock, and barrel by the military-security complex, Wall Street, and the Israel Lobby.
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All of the others, including President Obama, are owned by exactly the same interest groups. There are no differences between them. Every candidate except Ron Paul stands for war and a police state, and all have demonstrated their complete and total subservience to Israel. The fact that there is no difference between them is made perfectly clear by the absence of substantive issues in the campaigns of the Republican candidates.
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Only Ron Paul deals with real issues, so he is excluded from “debates” in which the other Republican candidates throw mud at one another: “Gingrich voted $60 million to a UN program supporting abortion in China.” “Romney loves to fire people.”
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The mindlessness repels.
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/….
http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/01/16/americas-last-chance/
Mary;
I am surprised to find there is a gulf of understanding in that Pond which separates us geographically.
Ron Paul’s brand of Libertarianism has been discussed extensively on American blogs. The disappointment over Obama amongst the Progressive wing of the Democrats, has created a false
image of the man, Ron Paul. It’s true he champions many causes we find neglected, but it
is pot vs kettle.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeffrey-sachs/libertarian-illusions_b_1207878.html
“Yet the error of libertarianism lies not in championing liberty, but in championing liberty to the exclusion of all other values. Libertarians hold that individual liberty should never be sacrificed in the pursuit of other values or causes. Compassion, justice, civic responsibility, honesty, decency, humility, respect, and even survival of the poor, weak, and vulnerable — all are to take a back seat.
When libertarians translate the idea of liberty into the political and economic spheres, they argue that government should operate only to protect personal liberty and not for any other cause. According to libertarians, the sole role of government is to enforce private contracts and to keep the peace so that no one can use force to deprive the liberty of another. In English political theory, this is called the “night watchman state.”
Ron Paul is a member of the far, far right USA republican party, at the end of the day that says it all as to what you will get if you vote “Ron Paul”. The president of the USA doesn`t have the power that so many think a president has!, in fact without the support of all those others elected to office the president has about as much power as you or me!!!. Ron Paul is not the answer to anything, its the system from top to bottom that needs changing.
Shouldnt judge Mark so quickly Ben.
“Shouldnt judge Mark so quickly Ben.”
Mea culpa. My apologies to Mark if I was a trigger-happy American.
Ben Franklin,
Mark is angry and he has every right to be angry. His anger stems from the very knowledge that has so far killed millions of people and specifically children.
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Slogans have never been stock in trade of Mark Golding (note not a pseudonym), he is one of the very few people worth reading.
Mark, Thanks for that video. It is on Brasscheck TV as well
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The very same NYT has admitted that it has deliberately been excluding Ron Paul in an organized media blackout. Shows how the military industrial complex and the USUKIsNATO axis are afraid of him.
“The very same NYT has admitted that it has deliberately been excluding Ron Paul in an organized media blackout. Shows how the military industrial complex and the USUKIsNATO axis are afraid of him.”
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I don’t think so. The military-industrial complex doesn’t let anyone anywhere near the top who isn’t one of their own. I think Ron Paul is controlled opposition. I’m not even sure there is any other kind of opposition, in these dark days.
” he is one of the very few people worth reading.”
Snark? No website or blog i can see.