(Untitled)

[khaibitneter]

So the pope came out today and said that, and I paraphrase, "America has done more harm to itself with the torture of the Iraqi prisoners, than Al Qaeda ever did with planes

Comments

[toonworld1982]

One of the saddest parts is that even the principles we were founded on were pipe dreams and lies. I mean they sounded good on paper, but most of the founding fathers did not follow their own words, they just signed a piece of paper to make themselves look good and get a piece of history.

same as always

[eagle4031]

It’s a conflict of Principles/ideals versus actions. You said we were founded on good principles, but just like today our actions sucked during our founding too, we just chose to forget about it. Our nation was founded on genocide. GENOCIDE. There was a whole nation of free living people here before us that were wiped from the board, because there was a large piece of land that someone thought God ordained us to have and nothing would stand in our way. We don’t remember that as a nation though, some individuals might remember it, but as a whole we have chosen to forget the blood we spilled. Today is no different, except that we have more power. We do what we want, when we want, and no one and nothing will stop us. All the while we try to hold up and hide behind principles that we cannot and have never actually maintained. We might mean well (or maybe we don’t) but it doesn’t change that we are and always have been hypocrites. We say this and do that (and don’t think twice about it). It’s always possible that our next

Re: same as always

[khaibitneter]

True. But the thing to remember is that, compared to the people of the time, we were the most forward thinking, revolutionary country on the face of the earth.

But now, there are at least a dozen civilized countries that kick our ass in civil liberties, care for human beings, intelligent governement, and generally being decent human beings.

What happened to us. We used to be cool.

Re: same as always

[khaibitneter]

However, I will not disagree that the genocide of the native americans was unnacceptable, to say the least. In fact, it was one of the things that led me to the thought "Why do we suck so much?" which led me to this post. The true catalyst was the pope's comment, and watching "The Last Samurai", which featured both the slaughter of indians and samurai. Both struck chords in my head.

Re: same as always

[eagle4031]

I believe the real "problem" lies in the fact that America doesn't necessarily suck more than the rest of the world, rather we just have done more sucking in recent memory. Look at what Britain and France did to Africa, for instance, and what the Japanese did to the Chinese, the Chinese did to the Mongols . . . The Spanish Civil War was nothing honourable, either. The Australians have been driving the Aboriginese (sp) into extinction much in the same way we've been doing to the Natives, here, for that matter. What it comes down to, in my opinion, is that nations are in and of themselves corruptive concepts. No societal unit larger than a city, or even a city-state, I say.

- C. Jay Wrong