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Whatever one thinks of the merits, this and the immigration kerfuffle is undermining US prestige abroad as well as dividing the country. It's resulting in declining US moral authority. There are good and bad ways of dealing with issues. The way both these issues are being handled is damaging. Added to the sorry US record on civil liberties, human rights, and the rule of law since 9/11, the US has declined in soft power immeasurably.
Iraq, Katrina, financial meltdown, spectacular growth in inequality, big decline in social mobility - it all adds up to a global view of the US as a big, powerful but weird country with a failed social and economic model. We're the Land of Limited Opportunity.
What really did it for me, Dan, was Vietnam, where we confronted a peasant army with the world's most powerful force as though that was honorable — and then had to withdraw ignominiously with out tails between out legs. That wiped out the victory of WWII, which itself was tarnished by Dresden, Hiroshima, and Nagasaki.
Yes Tom, but Vietnam was during the Cold War, and didn't necessarily diminish our reputations in the eyes of Cold War allies. Our economy, rising standards of living and opportunity were still the envy of the world.
Now we look like a backward banana republic predator state - nothing for anyone to imitate except looters.
Iraq, Katrina, financial meltdown, spectacular growth in inequality, big decline in social mobility - it all adds up to a global view of the US as a big, powerful but weird country with a failed social and economic model. We're the Land of Limited Opportunity.
God that's depressing. What's even more depressing is that I can't quibble with it at all.
Yes Tom, but Vietnam was during the Cold War, and didn't necessarily diminish our reputations in the eyes of Cold War allies. Our economy, rising standards of living and opportunity were still the envy of the world.
Yes, but this began the loss of respect for America which preached one thing and did another. This was the start of the slippery slide that has been picking up speed.
It's also leading to an increasing perception of America as a rogue state that imposes a double standard, one for its elites and another for everyone else. even tourism to the US has declined.
One of the things about the Vietnam era might have been the rise of the "military industrial complex".
Perhaps here is Plato warning against this:
"Concerning arms, and all implements which are for military purposes, if there be need of introducing any art, or plant, or metal, or chains of any kind, or animals for use in war, let the commanders of the horse and the generals have authority over their importation and exportation; the city shall send them out and also receive them, and the guardians of the law shall make fit and proper laws about them. But let there be no retail trade for the sake of money-making, either in these or any other articles, in the city or country at all."
http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/laws.8.viiii.html
rsp,
(PS: you should never have turned me on to this classics site at MIT buddy, I cant put it down... ;)
11 comments:
"Protecting" the franchise maybe???? ;)
Whatever one thinks of the merits, this and the immigration kerfuffle is undermining US prestige abroad as well as dividing the country. It's resulting in declining US moral authority. There are good and bad ways of dealing with issues. The way both these issues are being handled is damaging. Added to the sorry US record on civil liberties, human rights, and the rule of law since 9/11, the US has declined in soft power immeasurably.
Iraq, Katrina, financial meltdown, spectacular growth in inequality, big decline in social mobility - it all adds up to a global view of the US as a big, powerful but weird country with a failed social and economic model. We're the Land of Limited Opportunity.
What really did it for me, Dan, was Vietnam, where we confronted a peasant army with the world's most powerful force as though that was honorable — and then had to withdraw ignominiously with out tails between out legs. That wiped out the victory of WWII, which itself was tarnished by Dresden, Hiroshima, and Nagasaki.
"a big, powerful but weird country with a failed social and economic model."
Hard to argue against that Dan....
rsp,
Yes Tom, but Vietnam was during the Cold War, and didn't necessarily diminish our reputations in the eyes of Cold War allies. Our economy, rising standards of living and opportunity were still the envy of the world.
Now we look like a backward banana republic predator state - nothing for anyone to imitate except looters.
Iraq, Katrina, financial meltdown, spectacular growth in inequality, big decline in social mobility - it all adds up to a global view of the US as a big, powerful but weird country with a failed social and economic model. We're the Land of Limited Opportunity.
God that's depressing. What's even more depressing is that I can't quibble with it at all.
I blame the Republicans.
Yes Tom, but Vietnam was during the Cold War, and didn't necessarily diminish our reputations in the eyes of Cold War allies. Our economy, rising standards of living and opportunity were still the envy of the world.
Yes, but this began the loss of respect for America which preached one thing and did another. This was the start of the slippery slide that has been picking up speed.
It's also leading to an increasing perception of America as a rogue state that imposes a double standard, one for its elites and another for everyone else. even tourism to the US has declined.
Tom,
One of the things about the Vietnam era might have been the rise of the "military industrial complex".
Perhaps here is Plato warning against this:
"Concerning arms, and all implements which are for military purposes, if there be need of introducing any art, or plant, or metal, or chains of any kind, or animals for use in war, let the commanders of the horse and the generals have authority over their importation and exportation; the city shall send them out and also receive them, and the guardians of the law shall make fit and proper laws about them. But let there be no retail trade for the sake of money-making, either in these or any other articles, in the city or country at all."
http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/laws.8.viiii.html
rsp,
(PS: you should never have turned me on to this classics site at MIT buddy, I cant put it down... ;)
Looks like Plato thought we should run it as a highly regulated non-profit... rsp
Matt (PS: you should never have turned me on to this classics site at MIT buddy, I cant put it down... ;)
Right. They had a lot of it figured out millennia ago.
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