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

To: Doc Bones who wrote (95433)	4/21/2003 9:43:34 PM
From: Jacob Snyder	Respond to of 281500

<The. U.S. role in ending colonialism is something to take pride in.> What you take pride in, is a myth. The U.S. replaced colonialism with neo-colonialism, after WW2. The reality of power, who makes the important decisions, who holds most of the economic/military/political power, didn't change. And when it did change (that is, when a colony got real independence, and didn't just become a tame client state), it usually took a mass popular uprising. Those uprisings were consistently opposed by the U.S., and continue to be. There are exceptions to this, but that's all they are: exceptions to the general trend. <the West has given hundreds of billions to the poorer countries, and not complained when the local despot pocketed most of it> "Foreign aid" is the paycheck for local elites, paid by the rich neo-colonialist. It isn't supposed to help the poor, that's not its purpose. Its supposed to be "stolen". Its purpose is to reward the local Shah or Pinochet, and those who keep them in power, for maintaining a "good business environment" and "stability". If they can do that, and do democracy too, that's great. But democracy is not "core", not the main job they are paid to do. And certainly, helping the poor has nothing to do with why we give foreign aid, as you ought to be able to tell by the results.