Can you be American and wrong?

I should have said 'Who would object to the idea of freedom except someone who wanted to be free of Americans rather than free like Americans? And who would object to the idea of prosperity except someone who thought that American prosperity was preventing rather than helping a more equitable distribution of wealth throughout the world?'

yes

were you living in Japan at the time?

According to the BBC, the US public were mostly against the idea of apologising to China (although massively more Republicans than Democrats were against apology).

The form the Bush apology finally took -- a Chinese word which expresses regret without admitting any guilt -- is dealt with in a second article, and a third reports speculation that behind the scenes it was realpolitik that ended the standoff: Bush pledged to China not to sell arms to Taiwan.

Quite frankly, I don't know why Schroeder is apologizing for Herta Daeubler-Gmelin's comments. It isn't as if other people (including not a few of us Yanks" aren't thinking "Shrubya=Hitler." I don't even understand it in the wishy-washy I'm-running-for-Chancellor-and-I-want-votes way; wouldn't the Germans who'd be offended not vote for Schroeder anyway? Besides, that such a thing came from a German gives it a little bit of ooomph (who better than a German to sniff out a Nazi).

As fer the American attitude, none other than Shrubya summed it up best -- "Who cares what you think?"

You mean like Shrubya's Dad, and Ronnie Raygun? (Or were you locked in a closet during the Eighties?)

I think it's closer to the truth that Chimpco is extraordinarily thin-skinned.

Complaints about military funding seem to me unfair - having settled on the State of Israel's existence and location it seems to me that the international community had an obligation of sorts to make sure it could defend itself. So in that sense Israel is an example of the US doing the right thing for once in its "nation-building"

It's also true of course that as well as being democratic, Israel is also the only Middle Eastern state which actually does have dangerous frightening nuclear weapons.

Oh, and there's also a strain of opinion in Europe and elsewhere which is anti-Israel because the Israelis are Jews - was this what your question was angling towards? I personally think European anti-semitism is more or less a spent force (Russian anti-semitism is by all accounts very much alive and kicking) - that unpleasant side of the European mind is focussed currently on "immigration" aka "asylum seekers" aka (generally) muslims. The European left, which opposes this growing anti-immigration, anti-Islamic feeling, has found itself more and more in a pro-Arab position, which isn't the same as an anti-semitic one.

I think Israel would use nuclear weapons in a conventional war, yes, in certain circumstances. I don't think they would use them as a first strike though. I didn't say in my post that I thought the US' anti-proliferation stance was wrong, so questions about the other states' nuclear stances aren't really relevant. I think anti-proliferation is a great idea and wish it had been applied to Israel before it got the bomb.

(For the record, I have no idea about Syria. I think Iraq and Iran would not use them in a first strike situation, except possibly against each other if the other didn't have the bomb. I think both would use them in a conventional war.)

National identity *is* the big question of Europe - it was the first place to invent the nation state and it's currently trying collectively (via the heroic boredom of the EU) to find a way to de-invent it. Multiculturalism and pluralism, whether Europe likes it or not, is its "blowback" - the unintented consequences of its Imperial adventures a century ago. I optimistically think that Europe will manage the transition. I can't make comparisons to the US because I've never been there and to assess big cultural questions like approaches to 'freedom' I think you need to know a place quite well.

You might be right about continental anti-Semitism, I don't know. The impression I get is that attacks on Muslims here take the form of attacks on individuals which have a racial motive - assaults, beatings, etc. - rather than the vandalism of synagogues, graveyards etc. which is typical of European anti-semitism. (I think there's a lot of confusion as well re. people's political position on Israel. On the one hand pro-Israelis can say anti-Israelis are anti-semitic. On the other anti-semites can say oh no I'm just anti-Israel.)

One of the problems with the Rest of the World is that the institutions for the representation of its views as a whole (from the UN to al Qaeda, with the EU, and the govts of of China, India, Russia, Nigeria, Brazil, etc etc down to Zimababwe, Burma, North Korea etc all in there) are so flawed. US impatience towards same has produced awful results — war crimes, not to put too fine a point on it — but the scepticism is hardly unjustified, even if the reliance on disastrously wrongheaded tactics of better information-gathering (haha the CIA) has been a catalogue of nearly unmitigated grimness.

ts: winning the argt in yr head vs winning the argt in the room vs winning the argt in the world

*ps I' m not saying Momus was doing this, and yes I know it's revealing of an isolationist mindset => but I think the mindset is
a. a lot less surprising/shocking than some people seem to, and
b. shocking or not, the Theory of American Exceptionalism is a significant political reality that *has* to be addressed by those who wish to oppose it: reality in the sense that the America polity-at-large is not about to toss it to one side, and reality in the sense that the theory has genuine historical basis to it

This may be apocryphal, but I remember reading of a congressman (or possibly senator or some such) standing up in a debate on increasing the teaching of foreign languages in American schools and saying "If the American language was good enough for Jesus Christ it's good enough for me". That isn't just quoted in a Quayle/Dubya laugh-at-the-stupid-American-politician way (though partly, obv), but also because it is revealing of what you mention. I also recall a study which showed that the majority of American teenagers couldn't even locate Mexico on a world map - or was it Canada?

The problem is that American has been hurt and therefore sees itself as the injured victim, and therefore righteous. America's (eventual) entry into two World Wars was decisive => righteous and victorious. Afghanistan has been presented as a victory (despite completely failing in the stated objectives) => righteous and victorious. I suspect that limited publicity is given to why much of the Islamic world (among others) resents and even hates America, so the other side of the coin is unsurprisingly underrepresented.

America is now starting to say that it will decide which countries are good and which bad, and the rest (UN included) had better support them or face the accusation of being on the side of Evil. America will then choose which countries to attack and/or destabilise, and the rest had etc. In practical terms, what are they risking? How many countries will want to stand up against America? Even if they are so inclined, is Iraq the issue? Do they want to be on Saddam's side, to join the Axis Of Evil? If there is war against Iraq, and if the US wins (both probable, I think), and if the replacement regime is seen as an improvement, if only while we're all still watching closely, we have victory and righteousness yet again - and, almost certainly, a feeling of 'bring on the next one'. Simultaneously, resentments fester and grow in many areas.

If the terrorism (the downside) can be contained and minimised, this is a recipe for America to take control of much of the world, in the guise of benevolence as well as self preservation (with a played-down dash of righteous vengeance). It worries me a great deal, less because I would see American control of some of these regions as a terrible thing (not that I'm in favour of it, by any means) than because I start thinking about where the reaction might come from, and how severe it might be.

the main weakness in it as prophecy is that it treats america as a monolith, culturally and interest-wise, when it's not => and because the process being imagined will exacerbate internal conflicts rather than cool them down (one significant difference between european imperialism 150 years ago, where class conflict was "exported" and thus in the short-term diminished, even neutralised at home, and this emergent neo-imperialism, is that the latter is actively intensifying social separations at home, in economic terms particularly....)

I don't see this as prophesying the next decades, but the next months, maybe a couple of years. There is a momentum there, and Bush will I think try to ride and sustain it. It can't last terribly long, and the consequences could be nasty, both from internal cracks opening (especially if the government is not careful in its choice of enemies), from terrorist reaction (and maybe guerilla action within any occupied/subdued nations), and perhaps from turning other countries into active enemies. Someone at work the other day made dramatic sounding noises along the lines of "We haven't heard much from China lately - they'll explode soon and go stomping across the world," which slightly smacked of Yellow Menace nonsense, and I don't see China as likely to start looking externally, let alone "stomping across the world" any time soon, but serious American expansionism could provoke any of quite a few different nations.

I still think that a lot of this currently unsettled state will go by the wayside when fuel cell technology kicks in fully. We are on the brink, and though nothing will happen overnight, a transformation from power via oil to power via hydrogen will thoroughly transform strategic, economic, social and environmental considerations in a number of different ways for America and the world as a whole. Not least of which: if oil is no longer needed after a certain point and OPEC's power as an economic bloc is reduced to nil or near it, where will that leave the Middle East in general? That said, I think that overall transformation will take at least two decades, possibly more -- it all depends on how quickly fuel cell supply infrastructures are set up and how swiftly the switchover occurs (or is mandated to occur).

where is the manpower for this policing activity going to come from?
UN troops? (requires sanction of UN; co-operation of other powerful nation-states, complete with interests trade-off)
Troops of friendly allies? (requires major interests trade-offs, esp. in ref. respect of norms of international law)
Troops of puppet regimes? (this solution has historically been the direct producer of most if not all anti-US activity not directly emanating from the former communist bloc) (The arming of said regimes = the arming of anti-US forces years if not weeks down the line)
Security forces paid for and controlled by global megacorps (cf RoboCop => this option is not yet online in the real world, in the sense of widely discussed or explored politically, though it's pretty much what I meant by evolution of requisite global orgs... calling such orgs "America" seems to be me to be stretching the word hugely too far, unless you insist that "America" *already* equals the world in economic terms... )
Partial mobilisation of US youth (!!!!)

It's true that there's a major spasm of can-do-ism animating American politics at the moment, and that that has tremendous momentum, which its politicians are unavoidably caught up in, some no doubt cynically.

As for policing, this would be more of an issue in the longer term, or if America overextends itself. The numbers needed depend on so many factors, not limited to: how cruching the victory and how much opposition is left; how many countries this is necessary in; what international support can be gathered; the strength of the presumably temporary replacement regime; the general feeling in the defeated nation. Forces can come from all the sources mentioned, but the only way that major expansionism is feasible is if they can replace Saddam (to take the immediate example) with a new regime which is seen as better or at least not worst by Iraq, and Iraq believes in (or is at least willing to suspend disbelief for a while in) better things (for instance free elections, greater prosperity for the majority) to come. Then American resources (not a vast amount needed, in terms of their budgets) can be funnelled into local forces. If these feel part of a brave new world for the nation and are paid well in local terms, they can sustain the new American-installed and -sympathetic regime: that is the extreme case - I'm trying to suggest that there are scenarios where very little direct US military involvement is required.

I am not trying to say that I am convinced that this is what will happen, nor do I want to start making guesses at how far all this might go, how fast, or for how long: what I'm saying is that this is a direction I see as very plausible for the immediate future, and I think it is a dangerous one in the medium term, and unsustainable in the long term.

of course it all depends what you mean by control: in ref.my defn, let's just say that at no stage in its 20-odd years of presence in vietnam did america establish anything REMOTELY RESEMBLING control, even over the increasingly frantic succession of puppet leaders it sponsored

haha i just realised what the unspoken word in this discussion is!! "i'm under japanese influence and my honour's at stake!!"

True, Mark, though I wasn't looking that far ahead - I was talking about the interim regime with promises of eventual free elections. That is a different matter, and can last quite a long time.

Well, the US never managed to win the war in Vietnam: there is no superpower to oppose them in Iraq, so I don't see it as terribly similar.

This is funny bc I was just listening to Jonanthan Shwartz's American songbook program on WNYC, and he was going off bc he feels that all Americans are apoligizing (but I guess that this would be to eachother) and that it doesn't mean anything. So, he wants some true consequence, like the moment you apoligize you are *shocked* electrically and then will suffer pain for up to 72 hours... putting the recontrition back in the apology... Actually, today he is rare form, he followed this treatise with a call to more orchestrations for the tuba... No more mere symphonies for the piano and violin, he wonders why the tuba is so overlooked...

Interesting development: Jesse Helms, who's unilateralist and proud (there's no question about whether or not the U.N. is irrelevant to him) calls Schroder's bluff: Helms "said that if Schroeder wins re-election and does not show a more constructive attitude toward dealing with Iraq, ``then the U.S. Congress must seriously consider moving U.S. forces out of Germany and stationing them on the territory of other NATO allies who do support the United States...''

Does NATO exist for anything beyond ceremonial and training purposes anymore anyway?

For about the last twenty years. Thank heavens he's finally standing down.

From my studies at college, slavery was to the U. S. Civil War what democracy-in-Irak is to Shrub's war. Lincoln didn't want to lose half the territory he was in charge of (cf. Franz Josef Habsburg, 1914), and Southerners were understandably reluctant to pay taxes to build railways, etc. in the North-East and West (Simplified but True).

Yes, sigh shes a Quebecois, but shes residing in Las Vegas or something wacky so they could detain her in area 51 pretty close to those spaceships and we could all be happy.