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I guess that is the danger of a country like Afghanistan. They have a generation of people now who have known nothing but war and hardship. It is a difficult thing to alter the characteristics of people who have been conditioned to exist by means you and I could never understand. And when you look at the political map of Afghanistan it becomes obvious how many tribes and cultures are trying to blend within the borders, each with their own view and desire to prevail.

You know, many successful cultures are successful because of the contribution of women. The Muslim culture has many pockets of oppression of women. I mean, how respectful is it to women when you marry them off at very young ages and believe that sexual mutilation is normal. Or when the culture exists with barbaric attitudes toward the life of others in general. We can't solve all of those problems that are deeply engrained in their culture. It will take a lot of time and there is sure to be a lot of resistance. How we will ever be able to extract ourselves cleanly from that area of the world, I don't know. There are going to be a lot of problems and America will be the first one to be blamed for the failures within those cultures.

America is so unique within the world. This whole idea of melting the world into one world order is so distasteful to me because life as we know it will never be the same. There are more then physical miles between us, and while I wish the entire world would someday be able to live with the comforts America has been used to, I really fear that in order for that to happen we will continue down this road of declining medical care and challenges to our civil rights. I think our forefathers would be rolling in their graves if they saw what America is going through today.