Originally posted by javaContour:
...We should learn from previous civilizations such as the Greeks or Romans that wielded much power. When the culture becomes obsessed with self above others, my rights, others be damned, the civilization begins to rot from the inside and becomes easily defeated from the enemys of that culture....
TB
If anyone has a half-year to read the unabridged 3 volume version or a couple of months for the abridged version, pick up
The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon. Some of the parallels between the Roman Empire of yesteryear and what the US is going through today is frightening and full of foreboding, to say the least...
Back to the chase, though.
I'm skirting a number of issues when I say this, but in response of all the EVIL and HORRID things that the US is doing to a multitude of countries around the globe on a daily basis:
Better us on top of the pyramid than someone else, becuase we are a HELL of a lot more benevolent than most other countries that populate this planet.
Wonder what things would be like if #2 or #3 were in charge today? Go to Tienamen Square in Beijing, China and ask that question. Go to any corner or Russia or any of her one-time satellite states and ask that question, at the same time trying not to get mugged, shot, extorted. If you want to lodge a complaint about environmental misuses, check out the oil fields of Azerbaijan and the environmental wasteland that the USSR created along the Caspian Sea during their tenure there. Check out any manufacturing town in mainland China and place your fingers on a standing stone or rock column and see how deep the soot and ash is on things.
Yes, the US lacks in certain areas, but as the whole package is taken into consideration, we are by FAR and AWAY the best country to live in, bar none (excluding Costa Rica, Switzerland and New Zealand, which I've got soft spots for all three for various reasons
).
Things generally are heading the wrong direction, in terms of ethics, morals and values here in the U.S. We've been allowed the luxury of being "soft" for far too long, and it shows in the gross obesity and laziness that is becoming epedemic among certain segments of the population, our blatant ignorance of others outside the borders of this country, to the hand-outs that so many expect simply because of their "condition" (usually self-inflicted due to the choices made in life).
I see far too many people these days that instead of shouldering their burdens and dealing with them in an intelligent and straightforward fashion, they spend all their time trying to place that burden on someone else's shoulders and then when called on the carpet for it, they crassly make excuses and try to lay the blame somewhere else.
I honestly feel that living in the US is a PRIVELIDGE, though many I know and talk to feel that it's a God-given right due to being born on the right side of the Pacific, Atlantic, or Rio Grande. Not only this, they have the outrageousness and sheer audacity to step all over this privelidge daily in their irreverance and comments to the past and present sacrifices that our Armed Forces make/have made, their blatant disregard towards this country's heritage (be it the flag, the US Constitution or the legal system), their puddle-deep political, social and economical views passed off as self-proclaimed expert advice and commentary (though it was freshly obtained from watching Oprah, CNN and hitting the headlines on the front page of USAToday), and finally their total stated lack or care of which direction that this nation is heading in (as long as their financial and social interests are served, of course).
I'm describing a number of people known to me; some liberal, some conservative, some card-carrying Democrats, some card-carrying Republicans. In the final review, they pretty much all carry the arrogant and overbearing nature of individuals brought up without an instilled respect of themselves, others around them, and most of all, without respect for something greater that allows them their little peculiarities in spite of themselves:
This COUNTRY.
There is much to dislike about the US today, no doubt. There is much that needs work, but none more than the attitudes of a great many of the citizens that populate this country. I respect and love this country like many here; also like many here that's why I'm so critical for or against certain actions and policies that this country makes.
I was once asked by a Sociology college professor in a small Italian restauraunt in Norman, OK over a couple of carafes of wine what precisely would it take to change my warped conservative views. This man was spouting many of the old standby's: environmental abuses, rape and abuse of overseas labor, political corruption, firearm abuses, Big Business taking over the World, etc., etc.
My answer?
Given that this conservative has helped clean up roadsides of trash for a number of years in civic organizations, actively takes part in the voting process, has personally given up a backpack of food to a starving family hitchhiking on the outskirts of the industrial sector of Leon, Mexico, after talking to them at a pop stand for about a half-hour and finally, quit a job due to a stand over business ethics, I said it would take a liberal that would get up and act for once instead of *****ing and moaning about things. After swallowing that bitter pill, all I got out of him was an "Oh".
I have thought about it. A lot. It's individuals that, through their own self-imposed high standards, ethics, values and beliefs that can collectively make or break this country and what it is. It starts and ends there. My above rejoinder aside, it has nothing to do with being conservative or liberal. It simply takes people who care and who will act.
