Comparatively, there's a ton to love about the US, but that does not mean we are perfect. I love it enough to want to improve it, which is not only sensible and just, but patriotic, imo.
Thank you, I thought that was an honest and balanced post. In the very normal human desire to feel good about oneself, to be right, to fight the Good Fight, one of the hardest things for people to come to terms with is the linkage between the twin motivations of National Interest and Sense of Values.
Machiavelli so frowned upon by the Knights of the day, as an absolute affront to Chivalry, understood with utmost clarity that the pursuit of both Interest and Morality was sure to welcome Hypocrisy. If you will, Hitler and the Dalai Lama are at the opposite ends of an orbit, and in between is a balancing act comprising multidimensional shades of grey - color it any way you want.
In the “new world order”, the ultimate boundary we and our enemies need to transcend is our/their Ideology. This is the long term challenge to Political Values and Moral Imagination.
For the great majority of mankind are satisfied with appearance, as though they were realities and are often more influenced by the things that seem than by those that are.- Niccolo Machiavelli
"know the enemy and yourself and in a hundred battles you will never be defeated” - Sun Tzu, about 2500 years ago. |
