Sometimes I like to read an article I don't have to think too much about. I'm not that smart of a guy anyway. See if you don't agree with most of this. And Kev I don't think this has nothing to do with you or the military. I saw this on the TCU board.

http://www.lewrockwell.com/reed/reed128.html

Why the US Government Is Hated All Over the World

by Fred Reed


Something is wrong with the United States. I think most of us have noticed it. There is a mortal rot in the country, made manifest by many little rots that are hard to integrate mentally yet are, I think, somehow related. The change is grave, accelerating, probably irreversible, and fascinating. Things are not as they were.

The United States is the most hated country on the planet, followed by, to the extent that there is a distinction, Israel. So far as I know, there are no other contenders. You can say “Who cares?” as many will say, or “Screw’em if they can’t take a joke,” or “I’d ratherh be feared than loved.” All very droll. Still, it is an interesting datum. No country ever lives up to its own PR, but there was a time when America was widely admired. Now, almost universally, it is seen as a rogue state. And is.

This carries a price. The US consulate in Guadalajara is part fortress, part prison, with barriers and cameras and bars and rentacops, and they take away a woman’s lipstick if she is going to enter. Maybe a country that fears lipstick needs to think. The French consulate around the corner is wide open, like all others that I know of. The French, Chinese, Japanese and so on aren’t hated.

(1) The US government now lives in its own, strange, insulated world.

(2) The United States is the most militarily aggressive country on the planet, followed closely by Israel. I am aware of no other contenders.

Some of this combativeness is obvious – attacking Iraq for no good reason, occupying Afghanistan, threatening Syria and Iran, attacking Lebanon by proxy, bombing Somalia, putting troops in the Philippines to hunt Moslems. The US is also looking for trouble with Venezuela, threatening North Korea, moving to “contain” China (Doesn’t a container need to be bigger than its contents?), embargoing Cuba, pushing into Central Asia, increasing the military budget, and pushing NATO ever closer to Russia. (How stupid can you get? Very. Stay tuned.) And the Pentagon now has Africom, African Command. Africa is now America’s business.

(3) Powerful domestic hostilities grip the United States. Maybe you have to be outside of it really to see it. I live in Mexico. You can go for…well, five years and counting, without hearing angry talk about this or that group. In America, women hate men and men are getting sick of American women. Blacks hate whites hate Hispanics. “Affirmative action” engenders intense hostility that doesn’t go away. It isn’t the normal friction found in any country. It is serious antagonism quashed by federal force.

And the black-white-brown thing has very real potential for getting nasty. This we don’t talk about.

(4) A curious state of fear prevails in America, but it is a governmental creation, a calculated manipulative Disneyland. Perhaps soon we will have Terror Mouse.

Recently I was in Washington. Everywhere there were the artificialities of fear. The steel pop-up barriers in the roads, the stop’em-bombs steel poles on sidewalks, the endless warnings to report suspicious behavior on loudspeakers in the subway. The searches of everything, the metal-detecting doorways even on buildings of county governments, of schools. (Schools, for Chrissakes. What is wrong here?) And of course the confiscation of shampoo at the airport. This is nuts.

(5) The bullying of people entering the US. Any country has the right to determine who enters. Fine. If you don’t want them to enter, don’t give them visas. If you issue a visa, try to be courteous.

Violeta had a visa, issued by the consulate, both times when we went to the US. Still she got bullied by the border Nazis. It was ugly. I am obviously not a Mexican, but I get the same hostile questioning as to where I am going, why I was in Mexico, and so on. It is none of their business where I go in my country. Or shouldn’t be, but there are no limitations on governmental powers now. A friend, married to a Mexicana, again with a visa, got separated from her, and both got abusive questioning. She came out crying.

America was not like this. Now it is.

Compare this with the real world. I land in Beijing – evil commie Beijing, right? Maybe twenty seconds to see whether my visa was valid, clonk of stamp, thank you, no baggage search, into a taxi. Vi and I land in Paris, en route to Italy. Glance at passport, yep, it’s a passport, no stamp, no nothing, on we go. Italy didn’t even look at our passports. Grown-ups.

I am not ashamed of the United States. It is a hell of a country. Been there, done that, loved it. In two weeks in DC with Violeta, although she is clearly not American, she was everywhere, always, treated with perfect courtesy and friendliness, whether on Cap Hill or Farmville, Virginia. Americans really are good folk. The government isn’t. It’s the gravest problem we face, both internationally and domestically.

(6) The Constitution really is going away, or has gone. It never did work as well as it should have, but few things human ever do. Habeas corpus is dead, right to an attorney, congressional right to declare war – it’s not even worth listing the list. Joe iPod in the burbs doesn’t care because it doesn’t affect him, yet. Git them Hay-rabs, ain’t no draft, plenty sushi. Urg.

(7) The increasing, detailed, intrusive regulation of life, the national desire for control, control, control. Everything is the business of some form of government. Want to paint your shutters? The condo association won’t let you. Let dogs in your bar? Never. Decide who to sell your house to? Racial matter. Own a dog? Shot card, pooper-scooper, leash, gotta be spayed, etc. Have a bar for men only, women only, whites or blacks only? Here come the federal marshals. What isn’t controlled by government is controlled by the crypto-vindictive mob rule of political correctness. This wasn’t always in the American character.

Add the continuing presence of police in the schools, the arrest in handcuffs of children of seven, the expulsions for drawing a picture of a soldier with a gun. Something very twisted is going on.

How much of the public knows what is happening, or even knows that something is happening? I don’t know. But I don’t think that it’s going to go away. In ten years it will be an entirely different place with the same name. Almost is now.

May 21, 2007

Fred Reed is author of Nekkid in Austin: Drop Your Inner Child Down a Well and the just-published A Brass Pole in Bangkok: A Thing I Aspire to Be. Visit his blog.

He makes some interesting observations, but not alot of sensible correlations, let alone causal connections. He sort of shows that it may be true, but he never really does say "Why the US Government is Hated All Over the World".

Endzone2 Wrote:(2) The United States is the most militarily aggressive country on the planet, followed closely by Israel. I am aware of no other contenders.

Remember Iraq's invasion of Kuwait? After a decade long war w/ Iran? How about China's aggession toward Taiwan, and Nepal?

Quote: Some of this combativeness is obvious – attacking Iraq for no good reason,

DOH! Already we're at opinion. Not any good facts, but opinion.

Quote:occupying Afghanistan, threatening Syria and Iran, attacking Lebanon by proxy, bombing Somalia, putting troops in the Philippines to hunt Moslems.

US interests have been attacked in many of these regions, but somehow it's the US that is "the most militarily aggressive." Once again, is the US hated? Maybe some proof here. Why? Because the US fights back? Eh, sort of the cart before the horse.

Quote: The US is also looking for trouble with Venezuela,

Says the guy from Venezuela.

Quote: threatening North Korea,

Says the guy from North Korea (who stole a bunch of US secrets)

Quote: moving to “contain” China (Doesn’t a container need to be bigger than its contents?),

Huh? Does "contain" mean buy all of our consumer goods from them, and start looking at their auto manufacturing too?

Quote: embargoing Cuba,

Ok, you got us here.

Quote: pushing into Central Asia,

Ever hear of MS13?

Quote: increasing the military budget,

This is a reason?

Quote:and pushing NATO ever closer to Russia. (How stupid can you get? Very. Stay tuned.)

What??

Quote:And the Pentagon now has Africom, African Command. Africa is now America’s business.

That wasn't a problem when Bob Geldoff told us it was our business. That wasn't a problem when we're told that the AIDS crisis was our business. That wasn't a problem when we're told that South African diamond mining is our business. That wasn't a problem when were were told the Hutus and Tutsis were our business. But now we're hated for it.

Quote:(3) Powerful domestic hostilities grip the United States. Maybe you have to be outside of it really to see it. I live in Mexico. You can go for…well, five years and counting, without hearing angry talk about this or that group.

Apparently angry talk about Americans doesn't count.

But, this is horse****. Remember the racist comments toward African soccer players in Italy and Spain? Check out what Puerto Ricans say about Dominicans. How about how the Japanese feel about Koreans (and everyone else!). Or India and Pakistan. Ever hear of genocide in Rwanda, Darfur, Cambodia, Tibet, East Timor, etc.

Quote:In America, women hate men and men are getting sick of American women. Blacks hate whites hate Hispanics. “Affirmative action” engenders intense hostility that doesn’t go away. It isn’t the normal friction found in any country. It is serious antagonism quashed by federal force.

Alas, he comes so close to the real problem: the political left. The press and news media exaggerate and even fabricate this friction, and the rest of the world buys it. If they hate the US it's because they are presented a false image of the US. The author cites it here, and evidently believes it.

Quote:And the black-white-brown thing has very real potential for getting nasty. This we don’t talk about.

Are you kidding? We talk about it all the freakin' time. It's fodder for the news industry. They cut their teeth on the civil rights movement of the 1960s. Unfortunately, they have sales quotas to meet, so they increase the hype when there is no news to report.

Quote:(4) A curious state of fear prevails in America, but it is a governmental creation, a calculated manipulative Disneyland. Perhaps soon we will have Terror Mouse.

Recently I was in Washington. Everywhere there were the artificialities of fear. The steel pop-up barriers in the roads, the stop’em-bombs steel poles on sidewalks, the endless warnings to report suspicious behavior on loudspeakers in the subway. The searches of everything, the metal-detecting doorways even on buildings of county governments, of schools. (Schools, for Chrissakes. What is wrong here?) And of course the confiscation of shampoo at the airport. This is nuts.

True to some extent. Once again, the political left casts fear and creates problems...it doesn't solve them it lose power. Look at the political leanings of the teachers of those schools, and the urban centers that have mass transit. Hmmm.

But, did the author go to Middle America? Did he venture beyond the East Coast to see the vast center of the country? Try a county fair in Iowa, or a public school in South Dakota. Try to find a pop-up barrier in Savanah, Jackson or French Lick.

Quote:(5) The bullying of people entering the US. Any country has the right to determine who enters. Fine. If you don’t want them to enter, don’t give them visas. If you issue a visa, try to be courteous.

Violeta had a visa, issued by the consulate, both times when we went to the US. Still she got bullied by the border Nazis. It was ugly. I am obviously not a Mexican, but I get the same hostile questioning as to where I am going, why I was in Mexico, and so on. It is none of their business where I go in my country. Or shouldn’t be, but there are no limitations on governmental powers now. A friend, married to a Mexicana, again with a visa, got separated from her, and both got abusive questioning. She came out crying.

America was not like this. Now it is.

Fair enough. This is an embarassment. But how does it compare to the machined gun guards in Rome. What do you find in Liberia or the Congo? How about Chechnya? Take a tour of Kashmir...

Quote:Compare this with the real world. I land in Beijing – evil commie Beijing, right? Maybe twenty seconds to see whether my visa was valid, clonk of stamp, thank you, no baggage search, into a taxi.

Yeah right. You think you have the freedom once you get into China to do what you want? They have things clamped down pretty well there. It's easy to put on a friendly front, but it's hardly the status quo. Like it or not, the US doesn't really have alot of torture camps where we throw our dissidents.
Seems to me that what this guy is saying is that people hate the US b/c they are selfish. Treat them right, who gives a damn about the citizens.

Quote:I am not ashamed of the United States. It is a hell of a country. Been there, done that, loved it. In two weeks in DC with Violeta, although she is clearly not American, she was everywhere, always, treated with perfect courtesy and friendliness, whether on Cap Hill or Farmville, Virginia. Americans really are good folk. The government isn’t.

So if Americans are good people, why doesn't the rest of the world know that?

And if the American Government is really that bad, why do people keep coming here? Why aren't they lined up outside of China's borders? Or Russia? Or Venezuela? Or Finland?

And once again if you're in the Government you'll get lambasted in the press if something, anything goes wrong. Read the editorials after 911, hell read them now, the US government is blamed for those events. Even if it wasn't some plot by the Bush White House, it's their fault b/c they didn't nab the terrorists, and only the terrorists w/o encroaching on anyones rights or freedoms.

Quote:(6) The Constitution really is going away, or has gone. It never did work as well as it should have, but few things human ever do. Habeas corpus is dead, right to an attorney, congressional right to declare war – it’s not even worth listing the list. Joe iPod in the burbs doesn’t care because it doesn’t affect him, yet.

That's funny. The rest of the world doesn't give a damn about torture and work camps in N Korea or slavery in Brazil, doesn't give a damn about forced abortions in China, doesn't give a damn about rape in the Sudan or kidnapping and sex traffacking in Thailand, doesn't give a damn about genocide in Darfur...but the US isn't perfect so they hate us?

Quote:(7) The increasing, detailed, intrusive regulation of life, the national desire for control, control, control. Everything is the business of some form of government. Want to paint your shutters? The condo association won’t let you. Let dogs in your bar? Never. Decide who to sell your house to? Racial matter. Own a dog? Shot card, pooper-scooper, leash, gotta be spayed, etc. Have a bar for men only, women only, whites or blacks only? Here come the federal marshals. What isn’t controlled by government is controlled by the crypto-vindictive mob rule of political correctness. This wasn’t always in the American character.

Look to the left.

Quote:Add the continuing presence of police in the schools, the arrest in handcuffs of children of seven, the expulsions for drawing a picture of a soldier with a gun. Something very twisted is going on.

Look to the left.

Quote:How much of the public knows what is happening, or even knows that something is happening? I don’t know. But I don’t think that it’s going to go away. In ten years it will be an entirely different place with the same name. Almost is now.

Then point to the root Mr. Reed. Plenty of Americans want to reduce/eliminate government invasion. We'd love to reduce the taxes that are there to pay for the forms and red tape we have to go through. But we're called "intolerant", "backward", "sheep", "miscreants", etc when we try this. It's the press and news media that carry forward the very agenda you are lamenting.

Most Americans hate this same stuff too, only teachers, journalists and bureaucrats keep inching along taking one small piece at a time, all the time cheered on by the statesmen of these other countries who then claim to hate us and they blame it on the people who fought against these atrosities.

Be honest, and point at the real problem. Don't detail a few facts, then do an about-face when the conclusions make you uncomfortable. Don't hint at the "Why" and then shirk away b/c it's not what you'd prefer.

Dr. Torch I do think that article is oversimplified. But the feds are into EVERY aspect of American culture--even dictating to food processors the size that the holes must be in the swiss cheese.

And BTW, why can't I buy a lawmower like the kind I used back in the 70's and early 80's. I didn't have to hold that stupid bar to start the lawn mower or keep it going. Also, the old style lawn mower had a throttle control. Man I loved to jack that sucker all the way up to full and hear my Briggs & Straton engine roar. There wasn't much those old fashioned law mowers couldn't get through. Now, lawmowers just have one speed slightly above idle. This is way too much government intervention.

i agree with endzone2 and the writer on a lot of items in this article. im not really going to get into the anti-americanism aspect because it is more complex than the writer lets on. however, he is spot on in comments on the constitution. the constitution is no longer the basis for our political society, but rather a tool to be disposed of when inconvienent to one's agenda. habeas corpus and congressional war powers are just a few "inconvienent" notions....misuse of the commerce clause and amendments 2, 4, 5, 8, 9, 10, and 14 are also dangerous.

Apparently the writer has never visited Africa. I think it would be needed if he's going to say we're the most "warring" nation. ...at least that's what I detected.

While not universally true, the vast majority of anti-american sentiment comes from wealthy leaders who need a scapegoat for the ills of their people in order to maintain their power. It is the oldest political game in the book, and we write big checks in return.

It works here in the US as well. All you have to do is find a common enemy to blame (the left, the right, the whites, the blacks... whatever) and you get power.

Myth, Power, Value is alive and well. (inside Rice joke)

Endzone2 Wrote:Dr. Torch I do think that article is oversimplified. But the feds are into EVERY aspect of American culture--even dictating to food processors the size that the holes must be in the swiss cheese.

And BTW, why can't I buy a lawmower like the kind I used back in the 70's and early 80's. I didn't have to hold that stupid bar to start the lawn mower or keep it going. Also, the old style lawn mower had a throttle control. Man I loved to jack that sucker all the way up to full and hear my Briggs & Straton engine roar. There wasn't much those old fashioned law mowers couldn't get through. Now, lawmowers just have one speed slightly above idle. This is way too much government intervention.

Sure, I agree. But what you're talking about didn't necessarily start w/ the government. It started w/ litigation, often frivilous litigation. Someone threatens to sue, not because your lawnmower is dangerous, but because they "think" it could be safer.
Read this article and see how this attitude cuts both ways and hurts everybody (new, innovative start up companies, and established companies)
http://www.inc.com/magazine/20050701/dis...-gass.html

Of course the government tolerates lawsuits like this, and that's part of the mindset that is a problem, but that mindset doesn't start w/ the government...it starts w/ hype on the local 6 o'clock news, and teachers who won't let kids play tag on the playground.

Hambone10 Wrote:While not universally true, the vast majority of anti-american sentiment comes from wealthy leaders who need a scapegoat for the ills of their people in order to maintain their power. It is the oldest political game in the book, and we write big checks in return.

It works here in the US as well. All you have to do is find a common enemy to blame (the left, the right, the whites, the blacks... whatever) and you get power.

Myth, Power, Value is alive and well. (inside Rice joke)

good post, now if the media would only start giving this point of view some air time on the subject. What would Al Sharpton do when exposed, in the post-Imus world?