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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Raymond Duray who wrote (19622)	2/22/2002 5:56:27 PM
From: unclewest	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

I'm not the only one who sees the American response to 9/11 as being venal and vacuous, if not downright deceptive of course Ray...and the 3,000 dead Americans were disinformation too...right?

To: Raymond Duray who wrote (19622)	2/22/2002 6:09:54 PM
From: bela_ghoulashi	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

"The structure is so rotten that any young and enthusiastic foe can push it over." And who might that be? What young and enthused foe has a structure any less "rotten" than ours?

To: Raymond Duray who wrote (19622)	2/22/2002 6:27:26 PM
From: Nadine Carroll	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

Re: The Death of Empires. I never read such specious claptrap. Does this fool know anything of empires? The British empire lasted for 250 years. The Spanish/Holy Roman Empire lasted for over 300 years. The Roman Empire lasted for about 800 years in the west and 1800 years in the east. The American hegemony ('empire' is not an accurate term as we do not actively rule or collect tribute from other countries) has lasted for 50 years, 100 if you want to go back to the Spanish-American war. So what is this writer implying? That our time is naturally up, but we don't know it? That we have been incapable of changing our foreign policy for the last hundred years? That we have impoverished our country through an excercise of military overreach? Kinda flies in the face of the facts, doesn't it? Sheesh. If you want to post criticisms of administration policy, see if you can find some that aren't written by such ignoramuses.

To: Raymond Duray who wrote (19622)	2/23/2002 3:50:05 AM
From: frankw1900	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 281500

The American empire. This is a premise. That there is an American empire. Iis there such an animal? I'm sure someone tackled this, But nevermind. Never hurts to look at a premise if a whole book or even school of argument is based on it. As someone mentioned the US doesn't extract tribute from subject nations or hold subject nations in slavery. I don't think it's even run a proxy war in the last ten years. It's the most powerful nation but that doesn't make it an empire. It has great influence because of its wealth and military power but it's not an empire. Well, because of this last it could be argued that it's like and emptre. An analogy, simile, metaphor, is not the the thing itself. There is no doubt some within and outside the US try and behave like it is an empire by taking advantage of its power and wealth but mostly they seem to come to a bad end. Folk get confused about the US because it's unprecedented; It's the first time the most powerful nation on earth is not an empire. Furthermore, it's a democracy. And furthermore, it's modernist and secularist (except for John Ashcroft). It's also brash and vulgar in many, not all, its manifestations. It gets under lots of folk's skins. It particularly irritates intellectual snobs. And it irritates idealists who despair that a country founded on a document written in such beautiful prose can be so, so, so, inconsistent.! .