[Bush2000]

Splendid. Really, George Bush on his most inarticulate day couldn't have said it better, given that most of the truly great ideas in human history are borrowed from the past.

Except we're not talking about "great ideas" here. We're talking about ideas that have resulted in massive tolls on human life and property.

I'll never understand why American so-called isolationists adopted that word. Whever words are imported from England, misunderstandings inevitably arise.

Regardless of the term's origin, it has come to mean ignoring international events -- wars, economic embargoes, tariffs, etc -- because they don't have immediate consequences to us.

Anyway, when we tried to follow George Washington's advice--also spottily and hypocritically at times--more people in the world admired, even loved, us as a People and the concept of our country; the Vienamese, the Koreans, the Chinese, Africans, Indians, Arabs--people on the street all over the planet harbored no ill will towards us.

All of those nations also weren't threatened by our trade prosperity. Likewise, as someone else pointed out on this thread, they weren't worried that we could deploy ships, planes, and tanks on their soil within a few hours. Your analogy has no relevance within the framework of the modern world.

Our intervention in WWI led directly to the resumptions of hostilities in WWII.

Wrong. WWII was caused by a failure to completely neuter Germany's munitions capabilities and ignoring it when it did happen.

And Pearl Harbor was just one of many instances of collateral damage in the American Progressive's 100 year jihad to uplift the masses of the world with free markets and easily obtained birth control.

That statement is positively one of the most ignorant things I've heard in a long time. It doesn't even deserve a response.

And yet, even then, the Elites still payed lip-service to our founding document and actually went through the ritual of a declaration of war. It's really astonishing how willing the American People have been to become mameluks for their progressive Elites--who despise them far worse than any foreign agressor. Fascinating. And depressing.

I'm beginning to suspect that your Prozac prescription has run out...

[LaBelleDameSansMerci]

May I commend to you this quotation from Ridin' Shotgun in post #326:

"...Professor Harry Elmer Barnes in his pamphlet, "The Struggle Against the Historical Blackout' said this, about that: 'If world policy of today (1951) cannot be divorced from the mythology of the 1940's, a third world war is inevitable...History has been the chief intellectual casualty of the second World War and the cold war which followed. In this country today, and it is also true of most other nations, many professional historians gladly falsify history quite voluntarily'...."

I find it fascinating that every American myth can be--in fact must be--torn apart except the myth surrounding the loss of the Republic and the rise of Washington DC as the Other Evil Empire. I use the word "evil" because shout as we may on this forum, literally billions of people on the streets of the world cheered Osama Bin Laden. This would have been unthinkable in 1901 when the USA generated the most hostility among the power elites in the Old and Ancient World--NOT among the man on the street.

I suppose the reason that myth is still sacred is because it serves the purposes of both the Police/Welfare State AND trans-national corporations.

Why, precisely, was the USA involved in stripping Germany of it's military after WWI? Why didn't we strip England and France of their military? Oh. That's right. They "won". Had we kept our noses out of this clash of Imperial powers--you know, simply do what George Washington advised us to do-- the Nations of Europe could only have fought Germany to a draw. The peace treaty drawn up would not have put the burden of "guilt" for the war solely on Germany's shoulders. Only America's late entry and emergence relativley unscathed gave England and France the energy to shove that poison pill down Germany's throat at Versailles.

Hitler becomes a housepainter in Munich without Versailles--without America's entry into WWI. At that, all Woody wanted to do was "make the world safe for democracy". Shoeless George wants to vanquish "terrorism" and "evil" itself.

Result? Just as the Republic disappeared in the 20th Century--The United States Empire will not exist in 2101.

Have fun. You can tell your grandchildren that if only we had killed a few more "evil" people, if only we had set up a few more non-governmental agencies to spread the good news of consumer capitalism. if only we had exported more dailsy-cutter "freedom" and more tomahawk "democracy", more shopping malls, if only we had done more to everybody and for everybody, then everybody would be like us.

If he asks you: "Who are 'We', grandpa?" you can always tell him to lay of the Prozac....