As Americans we need to set a supreme example to the rest of the world. As I tell my kids, "are you setting the best example you can?" We need to ask this of ourselves on the world stage. What does the rest of the world say about us? How about when we travel, when we talk to others? We need to make the best choices we can. Sure we are going to make mistakes, but I think U.S. foreign policy has been due for a revamp since World War II.
If you are not American, what do you think about our country? Please comment, or send a video response. Tell me what you and/or your country does to set an example to the rest of the world too. I truly want to start a dialog on this subject. Tell your friends to login and comment too.
Throughout the world we will all have different cultures and view-points. We should at least be able to trade goods and be cordial to one another. The original United States experiment in 1776 seemed to work well until the greedy bankers got involved in 1913. Maybe somebody can recommend a way to rid us of this evil. I want to be free again.
If you are American, please comment and tell me what you think. What do you think our society has done. Do you agree we have problems with our foreign policy? What are your views on the people who control this country? What about the gap between the rich and the poor, our borders, the SPP (www.spp.gov), and more?
"Donald Rumsfeld said that his mission in the War Against Terror was to persuade the world that Americans must be allowed to continue their way of life. When the maddened King stamps his foot, slaves tremble in their quarters. So, standing here today, it's hard for me to say this, but 'The American Way of Life' is simply not sustainable. Because it doesn't acknowledge that there is a world beyond America.
Fortunately, power has a shelf-life. When the time comes, maybe this mighty empire will, like others before it, overreach itself and implode from within. It looks as though structural cracks have already appeared. As the War Against Terror casts its net wider and wider, America's corporate heart is hemorrhaging. For all the endless empty chatter about democracy, today the world is run by three of the most secretive institutions in the world: the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, and the World Trade Organization, all three of which, in turn, are dominated by the U.S. Their decisions are made in secret. The people who head them are appointed behind closed doors. Nobody really knows anything about them, their politics, their beliefs, their intentions. Nobody elected them. Nobody said they could make decisions on our behalf. A world run by a handful of greedy bankers and CEOs who nobody elected can't possibly last.
Soviet-style communism failed, not because it was intrinsically evil but because it was flawed. It allowed too few people to usurp too much power. Twenty-first century market-capitalism, American-style, will fail for the same reasons. Both are edifices constructed by human intelligence, undone by human nature.
The time has come, the Walrus said. Perhaps things will get worse and then better. Perhaps there's a small god up in heaven readying herself for us. Another world is not only possible, she's on her way. Maybe many of us won't be here to greet her, but on a quiet day, if I listen very carefully, I can hear her breathing". -- Arundhati Roy, "Come September"
If you can be told what you can see or read... then it follows that you can be told what to say or think. Defend your constitutionally protected rights
