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A quick history lesson: America is no Rome - The tired analogy of imperial decline and fall
The Times (UK) ^ | September 14, 2007 | Gerard Baker

Posted on 09/14/2007 10:53:26 AM PDT by neverdem

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To: VOA

Thanks again.


61 posted on 09/14/2007 4:54:09 PM PDT by neverdem (Call talk radio. We need a Constitutional Amendment for Congressional term limits. Let's Roll!)
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To: redpoll

This personality type thrives where there is a substantial part of the population that is parasitical, that does not have to produce anything in order to live comfortably, the idle rich, as it were.


62 posted on 09/14/2007 5:01:54 PM PDT by arthurus (Better to fight them over THERE than over HERE)
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To: Jedi Master Pikachu

Re: Acts, I always thought, it referred to temple sacrifices.


63 posted on 09/14/2007 5:13:21 PM PDT by Marie2 (I used to be disgusted. . .now I try to be amused.)
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To: neverdem

One of the best arguments I’ve ever read on the Iraq war.


64 posted on 09/14/2007 5:31:09 PM PDT by denydenydeny (Expel the priest and you don't inaugurate the age of reason, you get the witch doctor--Paul Johnson)
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To: Jedi Master Pikachu; x
The Philippines was granted independence after the United States was unwilling to grant the territory statehood and make a bunch of little brown brethren American citizens.
That's a poor expression of the American intention in the Philippines. McKinley had no intention of holding the Philippines other than to rid it of the Spanish. Colonization of Cuba was forbidden by law, but no such law applied to the Philippines. On the contrary, McKinley actively recruited his leadership for the Philippine post-war occupation among people who believed in the power of self-government. They saw the Philippines as a test-case for American ideals.

Unfortunately, those asses, Woodrow Wilson and W.J. Bryan, cut short the McKinley program, which had been upheld by Roosevelt and Taft, and the Philippines degraded into a renewed dependency on U.S. occuptation into the 1920s/30s.

Puerto Rico (I love the old anglo spelling "Porto Rico") was a different baby. There just wasn't enough infrastructure of local powers to anchor working self-government. Sadly, Cuba lost it, too.

65 posted on 09/14/2007 5:52:27 PM PDT by nicollo (you're freakin' out!)
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To: nicollo

“Unfortunately, those asses, Woodrow Wilson and W.J. Bryan, cut short the McKinley program, which had been upheld by Roosevelt and Taft, and the Philippines degraded into a renewed dependency on U.S. occuptation into the 1920s/30s. “

Not quite. What Wilson et. al. did was accelerate the transfer of bureaucratic authority to the Filipinos, which increased the power (and corruption) of Filipino politicians.

What happened next was much more interesting - the Filipinos, specifically Manuel Quezon and Sergio Osmena, very quickly discovered that they could lobby in Washington, and that this was a highly effective venue for Filipino politicians, given that Washington really had no idea what to do about the Philippines.

So Washington essentially handed over policy control to the Filipinos, almost at once. In fact the real argument over Philippine independence was not Fil-American, but a matter of Filipino internal politics. They could have had independence anytime they wanted. Quezon was actually picking his American governors.

The only area that the Filipinos could not affect was American military and foreign policy.


66 posted on 09/14/2007 10:13:18 PM PDT by buwaya
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To: Jedi Master Pikachu

“The Philippines was granted independence after the United States was unwilling to grant the territory statehood and make a bunch of little brown brethren American citizens. “

This was never in the cards, except in the very, very beginning, and only among certain Filipinos, when Philippine politics was in the hands of certain liberal Manila politicians like Pedro Paterno. But these visionaries were soon trumped by the landowners of the countryside, who wanted independence.

As far as I know, no US government ever seriously contemplated fully annexing the Philippines a la Hawaii. Perhaps that had a lot to do with a distaste for little brown brothers.

Later on after the relative failures of independence, by the 1960’s there was a substantial grass-roots statehood movement. I think they managed to sign up just about every Manila taxi driver. But it was a completely Quixotic idea by that point.


67 posted on 09/14/2007 10:24:26 PM PDT by buwaya
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To: neverdem

From the Times? Really? Is this a joke?


68 posted on 09/14/2007 10:35:24 PM PDT by Freedom_Is_Not_Free
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To: goldstategop
(USA)Its the most benevolent country ever known in the history of mankind.

You know, your statement gave me an idea...a make believe scenario, rather!

What/How the World will look like in 2007 without the USofA ?

69 posted on 09/14/2007 10:50:26 PM PDT by danmar (Tomorrow's life is too late. Live today!)
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To: Freedom_Is_Not_Free
From the Times? Really? Is this a joke?

Just click on the source, and you'll get the provenance of the URL. If there was no URL, then it's a vanity, or someone forgot to include it. In the case of the latter, search for the title with Yahoo, Google, etc.

70 posted on 09/14/2007 10:58:14 PM PDT by neverdem (Call talk radio. We need a Constitutional Amendment for Congressional term limits. Let's Roll!)
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To: neverdem

I clicked. I just didn’t think they were a source for anything pro-USA...


71 posted on 09/15/2007 12:23:03 AM PDT by Freedom_Is_Not_Free
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To: Jedi Master Pikachu

Bookmarking.


72 posted on 09/15/2007 8:10:10 AM PDT by RedStateRocker (When the government fears the People= Liberty. When the People fear the Government =Tyranny)
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To: Marie2
Appreciated.

A lot of freepers have the same idea as you. Sort of reluctant to restart eating meat though, and still looking for more freepers' opinions, such as yours.

73 posted on 09/15/2007 11:35:30 AM PDT by Jedi Master Pikachu ( What is your take on Acts 15:20 (abstaining from blood) about eating meat? Could you freepmail?)
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To: nicollo
McKinley was not the American government any more than George W. Bush is. Even less, considering how the executive branch has amassed more and more power.

There were many Americans, government/military officials and otherwise, who wanted to hold the Philippines as long as they could, with little intention of turning the Filipinos into citizens (in contrast to early inhabitants of American territories, Filipinos were not automatically made American citizens, and their immigration to the United States was greatly limited). The French living in Louisiana (Greater Louisiana, if you will) were made American citizens upon the United States purchasing that territory. Spaniards in Florida, the same. Mexicans in the Mexican Cessation and Gadsen Purchase, the same.

The Filipinos did initially push for independence from both the Spanish and the Americans (so did the Cubans and the Puerto Ricans), but a full independence movement was greatly boosted when Filipinos realized that the United States was not about to let them become either American citizens or let the Philippines become a state.

The other wishy-washy point made by Americans was that the Philippines was too far away to be made a state--and yet they were willing to keep the Philippines in territorial status for as long as they could, and even today the Northern Marianas, Guam, and American Samoa are still under American rule. If the United States expected to hold on to the territory, then the territory had the right to push for statehood.

And look at the last two states to enter the Union, Alaska and Hawaii. Hawaii tried for statehood starting 1919 (the Philippines also made at least one push for statehood--which led to the territory becoming a Commonwealth, which also conveniently allowed for the United States to imposed stricter immigration quotas on Filipino immigrants), made at least three attempts (three attempts passed the House of Representatives) before finally becoming a state.

Alaska tried starting in 1916, about 3 years before Hawaiians but with less indigenous support--both didn't get much support from the United States, and again with the Alaska Statehood Act in 1958, and became a state one year later (to be fair, the groundwork for the Alaska Statehood Act began in 1946), cutting off Hawaii to become the forty-ninth state.

It is a very fair statement to declare that the Philippines did not become a state because of American (particularly Southern--that's the history, tough; don't shoot the messenger) ambivalence to letting a huge population of people of non-European descent become Americans. Look around freeperdom today, in 2007. While in a minority--hopefully--that sentiment still exists.


74 posted on 09/15/2007 12:22:55 PM PDT by Jedi Master Pikachu ( What is your take on Acts 15:20 (abstaining from blood) about eating meat? Could you freepmail?)
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Comment #75 Removed by Moderator

To: nicollo
McKinley was not the American government any more than George W. Bush is. Even less, considering how the executive branch has amassed more and more power.

There were many Americans, government/military officials and otherwise, who wanted to hold the Philippines as long as they could, with little intention of turning the Filipinos into citizens (in contrast to early inhabitants of American territories, Filipinos were not automatically made American citizens, and their immigration to the United States was greatly limited). The French living in Louisiana (Greater Louisiana, if you will) were made American citizens upon the United States purchasing that territory. Spaniards in Florida, the same. Mexicans in the Mexican Cessation and Gadsen Purchase, the same.

The Filipinos did initially push for independence from both the Spanish and the Americans (so did the Cubans and the Puerto Ricans), but a full independence movement was greatly boosted when Filipinos realized that the United States was not about to let them become either American citizens or let the Philippines become a state.

The other wishy-washy point made by Americans was that the Philippines was too far away to be made a state--and yet they were willing to keep the Philippines in territorial status for as long as they could, and even today the Northern Marianas, Guam, and American Samoa are still under American rule. If the United States expected to hold on to the territory, then the territory had the right to push for statehood.

And look at the last two states to enter the Union, Alaska and Hawaii. Hawaii tried for statehood starting 1919 (the Philippines also made at least one push for statehood--which led to the territory becoming a Commonwealth, which also conveniently allowed for the United States to imposed stricter immigration quotas on Filipino immigrants), made at least three attempts (three attempts passed the House of Representatives) before finally becoming a state.

Alaska tried starting in 1916, about 3 years before Hawaiians but with less indigenous support--both didn't get much support from the United States, and again with the Alaska Statehood Act in 1958, and became a state one year later (to be fair, the groundwork for the Alaska Statehood Act began in 1946), cutting off Hawaii to become the forty-ninth state.

It is a very fair statement to declare that the Philippines did not become a state because of American (particularly Southern--that's the history, tough; don't shoot the messenger) ambivalence to letting a huge population of people of non-European descent become Americans. Look around freeperdom today, in 2007. While in a minority--hopefully--that sentiment still exists.


76 posted on 09/15/2007 12:30:38 PM PDT by Jedi Master Pikachu ( What is your take on Acts 15:20 (abstaining from blood) about eating meat? Could you freepmail?)
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To: nicollo
McKinley was not the American government any more than George W. Bush is. Even less, considering how the executive branch has amassed more and more power.

There were many Americans, government/military officials and otherwise, who wanted to hold the Philippines as long as they could, with little intention of turning the Filipinos into citizens (in contrast to early inhabitants of American territories, Filipinos were not automatically made American citizens, and their immigration to the United States was greatly limited). The French living in Louisiana (Greater Louisiana, if you will) were made American citizens upon the United States purchasing that territory. Spaniards in Florida, the same. Mexicans in the Mexican Cessation and Gadsen Purchase, the same.

The Filipinos did initially push for independence from both the Spanish and the Americans (so did the Cubans and the Puerto Ricans), but a full independence movement was greatly boosted when Filipinos realized that the United States was not about to let them become either American citizens or let the Philippines become a state.

The other wishy-washy point made by Americans was that the Philippines was too far away to be made a state--and yet they were willing to keep the Philippines in territorial status for as long as they could, and even today the Northern Marianas, Guam, and American Samoa are still under American rule. If the United States expected to hold on to the territory, then the territory had the right to push for statehood.

And look at the last two states to enter the Union, Alaska and Hawaii. Hawaii tried for statehood starting 1919 (the Philippines also made at least one push for statehood--which led to the territory becoming a Commonwealth, which also conveniently allowed for the United States to imposed stricter immigration quotas on Filipino immigrants), made at least three attempts (three attempts passed the House of Representatives) before finally becoming a state.

Alaska tried starting in 1916, about 3 years before Hawaiians but with less indigenous support--both didn't get much support from the United States, and again with the Alaska Statehood Act in 1958, and became a state one year later (to be fair, the groundwork for the Alaska Statehood Act began in 1946), cutting off Hawaii to become the forty-ninth state.

It is a very fair statement to declare that the Philippines did not become a state because of American (particularly Southern--that's the history, tough; don't shoot the messenger) ambivalence to letting a huge population of people of non-European descent become Americans. Look around freeperdom today, in 2007. While in a minority--hopefully--that sentiment still exists.


77 posted on 09/15/2007 12:47:34 PM PDT by Jedi Master Pikachu ( What is your take on Acts 15:20 (abstaining from blood) about eating meat? Could you freepmail?)
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To: nicollo
McKinley was not the American government any more than George W. Bush is. Even less, considering how the executive branch has amassed more and more power.

There were many Americans, government/military officials and otherwise, who wanted to hold the Philippines as long as they could, with little intention of turning the Filipinos into citizens (in contrast to early inhabitants of American territories, Filipinos were not automatically made American citizens, and their immigration to the United States was greatly limited). The French living in Louisiana (Greater Louisiana, if you will) were made American citizens upon the United States purchasing that territory. Spaniards in Florida, the same. Mexicans in the Mexican Cessation and Gadsen Purchase, the same.

The Filipinos did initially push for independence from both the Spanish and the Americans (so did the Cubans and the Puerto Ricans), but a full independence movement was greatly boosted when Filipinos realized that the United States was not about to let them become either American citizens or let the Philippines become a state.

The other wishy-washy point made by Americans was that the Philippines was too far away to be made a state--and yet they were willing to keep the Philippines in territorial status for as long as they could, and even today the Northern Marianas, Guam, and American Samoa are still under American rule. If the United States expected to hold on to the territory, then the territory had the right to push for statehood.

And look at the last two states to enter the Union, Alaska and Hawaii. Hawaii tried for statehood starting 1919 (the Philippines also made at least one push for statehood--which led to the territory becoming a Commonwealth, which also conveniently allowed for the United States to imposed stricter immigration quotas on Filipino immigrants), made at least three attempts (three attempts passed the House of Representatives) before finally becoming a state.

Alaska tried starting in 1916, about 3 years before Hawaiians but with less indigenous support--both didn't get much support from the United States, and again with the Alaska Statehood Act in 1958, and became a state one year later (to be fair, the groundwork for the Alaska Statehood Act began in 1946), cutting off Hawaii to become the forty-ninth state.

It is a very fair statement to declare that the Philippines did not become a state because of American (particularly Southern--that's the history, tough; don't shoot the messenger) ambivalence to letting a huge population of people of non-European descent become Americans. Look around freeperdom today, in 2007. While in a minority--hopefully--that sentiment still exists.


78 posted on 09/15/2007 1:15:14 PM PDT by Jedi Master Pikachu ( What is your take on Acts 15:20 (abstaining from blood) about eating meat? Could you freepmail?)
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To: Jedi Master Pikachu

You’d a better off using the example of Puerto Rico. Luzon is what we wanted. We had to take the whole chain in order to keep the Germans/Japanese from moving in. No way could the Filipinos have maintained their independence in that political climate. As to the racism, the blunt truth is that the more racially homogenous the population, the easier it is to maintain
a common government. The Chinese Exclusion Act was probably a good thing(except that it kept the Chinese men from bringing in wives; an unhappy group they were). China was undergoing a population explosion at the time, and we were in danger of being flooded by a large number of virtual slaves. It was bad enough when “contractors” brought in large numbers of Bohemians” into the Pennsylvania mines in the midst of a depression. But the cultural gap between Americans and Bohemians was small compared with the gaps between Americans and the Chinese.


79 posted on 09/15/2007 1:22:50 PM PDT by RobbyS ( CHIRHO)
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To: what's up
Thank God for President Bush.

Yes, and thank God Gore was not president on 9/11.

80 posted on 09/15/2007 1:52:12 PM PDT by Conservativegreatgrandma (Democrats--Al Qaeda's best friends)
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