Ayn Rand, the novelist, once said, "We can evade reality, but we cannot evade the consequences of evading reality." Every American should keep this in mind. Ignorance is not bliss. It is extremely dangerous.
This is so true. Most everyone evades reality all the time by fantasizing, rationalizing, or just plain refusing to think. Making an effort actually think takes energy. The use of reason, logic and common sense to come up with a critically thought out result was shit canned with the advent of the government school system. One of the great literary examples was Scarlett O'Hara's phrase, "I'll worry about that tomorrow." Procrastination is a form of evading reality. So is excessively watching television or reading novels. Or alcohol. Or taking drugs. Or spending too much time playing video games or hanging out on Fascistbook.
The reality so many are trying to evade, of course, is their very life, the only thing any of us really have. The most dangerous evasion of reality, however, is the delusion, shared by liberals and conservatives alike, both Democrats and Republicans, that America is a special country, which, because of its power and size, has a moral obligation to lead the world and shape it in our own image. Of course that is one thing that can happen when you don’t use your reason, logic and common sense. You come up with beliefs that are straight out of Wonderland.
The United States is not a special country. We are a lucky country. Anyone fortunate enough to have been born here knows that it isn’t something WE did. I had no say in where I was born. We owe our size and prosperity to our ancestors. Those ancestors were a rough-and-tough bunch and about as politically incorrect as you can be. And yes, they conquered the choice parts of the North American continent. The did bad things to do so that we can’t turn back time to fix. The Trail of Tears comes to mind. They left the frozen tundra for Canada and the deserts for Mexico.
But our size and our power give us neither the moral right nor the ability to rule the world. If we do not shed this delusion, we'll follow the path of all previous empires and collapse sometime in the new century. Let’s look at ourselves realistically. And if we do look at our selves realistically you can see that we are in the midst of collapsing as a country and a nation.
Our military power is mainly nuclear, and nuclear weapons are suicidal. We have not won a real war since 1945. We had a stalemate in Korea and an actual defeat in Vietnam. Admit it. The Gulf War amounted to a destroying the expeditionary force of a 3rd World country. It is no great military feat for 1,200 advanced fighter jets and attack helicopters along with A10 Warthogs as well as 600,000 troops and a fleet of modern ships to drive 200,000 draftees out of Kuwait, where inhabitants had neither air support nor cover. We should be proud.
We've become a nation that deludes itself with hype. We called that a great victory, and we conveniently forget that a truck bomber drove us out of Lebanon. The barefoot soldiers of a Somali warlord drove us out of Somalia. We have since taken to using million dollar missiles to blow up aspirin factories in the Sudan and some tents and outhouses in Afghanistan. And in the process of doing so, making more and more people of the world hate us because of the relatives that died while attending a wedding.
The war against Yugoslavia was a failure. We bombed a little country of 10 million souls. Their army, however, emerged unscathed. And we drove out the people we intended to protect. In the end, Russian diplomacy saved our face. Now our own inept diplomacy has American troops sitting in armed compounds for an indefinite period of time and with no hope of solving the political problems, close to the border of Ukraine and in the waters of the Mediterranean Sea.
If we continue to pursue American dominance, we will create our own opposition. Oh wait, we have already done that. And continue to do so every day an American bomb is dropped on the head of some innocent child somewhere in the world. What we have to do is recognize that the rest of world is not going to accept American rule or our immoral morality. Frankly, I don't think that we have either the ability or the real incentive to impose it. At least I hope not.
We’re too busy selling off our weapons of war to countries that use them for nefarious purposes so that the military industrial complex will have to refill the military armories. Oh, and in some cases, we don’t even sell them. We’ll just leave them behind like Chairman Xiden did in Afghanistan leave hundreds of thousands of M4 MACHINE guns in the hand of the Taliban while banning the manufacture and sale of them in the United States to our own citizens. And here I thought the Taliban was supposed to be made up of terrorists. But, no, the “powers that be” treat the protesters of January 6th as if they were terrorists even though NONE of them came armed to the so called “insurrection”.
When the control freaks running the government are terrified of losing a single pilot, then we better not tangle with a country that will kill our soldiers by the thousands. If we're scared to death of a terrorist, then we'd better not tangle with people who have the willingness and the ability to deliver a nuke on Los Angeles or San Francisco. But hey, who would think that Russia, or China or even North Korea would ever think of doing something like that?
We have too many academics and journalists in the so-called foreign-policy establishment that are nothing but mindless dolts following a script handed to them by the military industrial complex. Most have no experience in either war or diplomacy. They live inside their heads. They read garbage. They write nonsense. But it's the reality outside their heads that can kill us. And then there is Chairman Xiden…should I say any more??
We must do better. I’m not going to apologize for what our ancestors did because I had no part in it. Can you imagine a world where we aren’t trying to make other countries be like us? We are arrogant to think we should.
I want to live in peace with America minding our own affairs. We have too many problems that need to be addressed and we need the resources here. Our homeless population and our veterans need help.
Peace through strength is appealing to me as I believe most patriotic Americans citizens think the same way.
We have a mess. People in power who not only hate our constitution but those who have trusted them to do the next right thing.
You’re right. I have no problem with anything you’ve pointed out.
I pray for Lord to keep us safe. I pray for those who hate me because Jesus told us we must. Somehow it makes it better. Just a little bit.
My feeling is that we are ass-backwards since about maybe 30 years after the war with England! Really, really stupid, arrogant, and murderous, not to mention thieving and homicidal generally.
We'd do well to try living a PEACEFUL way, and bring back personal sovereignty, healthy food, clean water, and manufacturing right here at home...
It's like we choose the most obscenely wrong choices ON PURPOSE! Daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaamn. I think those "in charge" need to be DIScharged. And the nukes should GO.