Posted on 11/29/2001 7:05:18 PM PST by IncPen
Lots of nations may perceive American imposition of their standards as universals as a negative. China falls into this category. Serbia as well. Don't laugh at this one, but if Star Trek got anything right, it was the idea of the Prime Directive--non-interference in the development of other cultures. After all, the technologies used against us by Osama and friends are Western technologies that Arabs and other non-Westerners should never have been given access to.
True. Most of the bleating about human-rights that you hear about comes from the left. On the right, it's a condition of doing business with us, which seems fair to me. It behooves us to encourage and do business with people who - for whatever reason - see the world as we do. I'm guessing you're typing on a Windows computer... As for Star Trek, are you joking?
Somehow I have a hard time seeing what those Haitians have given us, for example.
They give us lots of things. Check the label on that coat you're wearing, or your shoes. Stop by and talk to the night cleaning guy where you work, and ask him what he does with his money. I'll give you odds he's sending it to his relatives in another country. I worked in the same building as a Vietnamese man, a janitor. He worked in my building from 11pm to 7am; he slept under a conference table from 9pm to 11pm. He owned two restaurants and three nail salons and was a Million Dollar seller for Century 21. He was putting a son and daughter through medical school and had staked several of his immigrant relatives in business here. Just like they had done for him after he was released from a POW camp (where he was tortured)-- having served as a river guide to the US in the VietNam war. He had no understanding of welfare. Ask him what HE thinks of America.
Anybody who knows anything about politics will realize that food drops in Afghanistan are meant to generate good PR and keep friendly Muslim countries on board with the program. I'm not criticizing realpolitik, I think that's the only way to go in this world, I'm just taking issue with our not being honest about it.
Maybe your history teachers (public schools) didn't tell you about the Berlin Airlift?
This is the clincher...with all this talk of generosity and compassion and the like, where the he!! is it in the Constitution that the U.S. owes other countries a living, or is responsible for educating foreign citizens. Heck, the Federal government has no business having a Department of Education for domestic purposes, for that matter.
Dude: it's self interest. Think on it... who aspires to be the Former Soviet Union? We think we're the best. Don't like it? Move to Afghanistan, I bet land is real cheap there...
Virtually any real estate in the world can be converted into a garden with knowledge, so the poverty excuse is not credible anymore. Exactly what we do decide to teach/make available is important. For example, making the specifications available to all via a public trial of the defendants of the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center was not such a good idea. Wouldn't you agree?
Yours is a false argument. There was no connection between knowledge of the buildings from the trial and the collapse on 9-11.
It was reported just after 9-11 that the FBI had determined the force of a fully-fueled jet hitting the towers was equal to 1/20th the blast at Hiroshima. The purpose of this determination, ultimately, was to use as a prosecution against the perpetrators, if ever caught, the notion that they had used 'weapons of mass destruction'. There isn't a civilian-constructed building in any American city that could withstand such force.
As for knowing what the building is 'made of', it's public information, available to anyone willing to pay for copies at the local building department.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.