We are the "evil empire" we warned everybody about

the fall will likely be an ugly affair.

I guess he'll be leaving the country after he sobers up.

because we are the root of all evil that is unmitigated by anything good in this treacherous territory we call home.

I'm glad you got that bit of dystopic creative writing off your chest. You have street cred now.

Next inane point?

With your desire to see more dead as a result.

You don't like the hear no evil -- blah, blah, blah, head in the sand responses to your elemental wisdom? What are you, some kind of historian?

so I wouldn't worry too much if I were you. But still, "BUY GOLD!!!"

I see it dying in the next 50 years, after China stops lending us money for neverending wars.

Why do you love the empire so?

What has it done for you?

No concern to you at all for the suffering of the rest of the world? Your only wisdom is to hoard gold? Thanks a lot, bub.

I care about others in the world, I just find this kind of thread a caricature and not really helpful to the plight of others in the world. just a preaching to the choir "rah rah, America evil" kind of boredom thread.

Maybe Afghanistan, where your empire is ruling.

Your so called satirizing is just you making yourself look like an ugly-American.

to calling our country the "evil empire". Would you not admit there is room somewhere between epic self-hate as an American and slavish devotion to all the U.S. military industrial complex does to overreach?

Calling the kettle black is epic self-hate? Realizing the truth is epic self-hate? Not wanting the military to conquer and rule the world is epic self-hate?

You really need to stop think about what you write. You are all over DU preaching this and that, and now we see you are not really thinking, just scribbling.

You and Cheney have the same love for Snowden. You ever think about that sad fact? You and Cheney; two real epic haters.

I guess I am just Cheney's long lost twin.

+

... Ugly American. It was on the tip of my tongue.

gun-free streets, socialist care system or religion-free politics.

People come from all over the world to use it - some are charitable cases. A lot of people here make more than minimum wage (I may think it should be raised but still it's not everyone making it), a lot have paid vacations. There is religious freedom here and people of every religion imaginable or none can follow as they choose.

He's got some points there.

If you think terrorizing and killing people in countries thousands of miles from here with drones piloted remotely on screens by our military here in this country — like a video game — is not the stuff of evil empire, think again.

That kind of stuff creates hundreds of enemies of our country every day those drones kill.

Of course there will be blow back. There is no question of that. How is comes we don't know but denial is not shelter.

And the drones are just our latest. We've been involved in coups, assassinations, occupations and wars continuously since we assisted ex-pat American planters who wanted more acreage in Hawaii in the 1890s in overthrowing the Hawaiian monarchy.

And the coups, assassinations, occupations and wars have continued non-stop since then, all under the guise of spreading liberty and freedom, but really about using our military for corporations to gain access to other countries' (non-white countries) natural resources.

Read "Overthrow: America's Century of Regime Change" by Stephen Kinzer. He lays it all out chonologically. There has not been a time since the 1890s that we haven't been involved in . . . well, evil empire behavior.

Sorry, but it's true. At least our current president has resisted getting involved in new and prime corporate war candidates like Egypt, Syria and Libya where much oil could have been reaped.

Sorry, but your jingoism means nothing to me

I will put my heart into killing the American Empire

It deserves to die

Why do you love the empire? What has it done for you?

on the Internet?

you can do that from Canada

So you know he's legit. Oh wait. Bill Hicks wasn't a policy advisor but a comedian? Oh.......

That's what they look like

My comment about Bill Hicks was and is a non sequitur, not a retort. He sucks.

for retread ideas like this.

And FYI - Bill Hicks might be the most overrated man in the history of this universe and probably most others.

And give that town an enema.

Sid

Sid

People who think the world is a nice peaceful place.... Get real.

So keep your jingoism to yourself.

Some of us have consciences

...if not for the evil USA!

What a crock....without the USA the world would be a MUCH more violent place as North Korea attacked South and China attacks Taiwan and India, and Iran attacks the Gulf States and Saudi Arabia attacks Iraq and Greece and Macedonia get into it, then Russia takes back some old territories, etc, etc..

People died in Iraq fighting for your freedom?

I bet you believe that too

Whatever, dude.

Here's to the freedom enshrined in our Constitution that allows armchair warriors and interwebs rebels to say how much they hate the country that protects that freedom and how much they're gonna work to bring it down.

Woo hoo!

But some people insist on lying to themselves

Your over-wrought hyperbole does not impress.

On edit: Just for the record (and I'm not sure why I'm saying this), I did not alert on the below post.

Now he's gone.

We have not formally colonized any place. Empires colonize. And we are not evil. If we were, we'd have annexed Mexico to take their oil, colonized Venezuela. When we were the only remaining superpower, we didn't do a damn thing to conquer any other land.

trying to recover from this.

you must be kidding.

played a role in the overthrow of other nations' democratically elected leaders (i.e. Chile's Allende, Iran's Mossadeq, etc.
killed god knows how many innocent people in illegal and immoral wars
blackmail other countries into doing unethical and undemocratic actions
help to privatize other nations' resources...

and you say we haven't colonized - we don't need to...we have 700+ bases all around the world

I could go on and on and on and on....

The truth is many on this board who are now so "America, love it or leave it", for some reason took off the rose-colored glasses when Bush was president. Take off the damn blinders...

is absurd.

Why not go back 10 more years and say we need to refight WWII and invade Germany?

Excuse me if I don't have much stock in the Bush administrations denial of involvement. Especially considering the stolen 2000 election and Iraq war.

the deadly repercussions continue to this day...

I don't see this as a thread to bash Obama. He is a hell of a lot better than the last guy and his previous opponents, but we should recognize there are some very powerful adversaries that don't care about anyone but themselves that must be defeated, and things that must be changed if we care about a prosperous country for future generations. As you have probably heard, those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Don't think because this President hasn't orchestrated a coup or lied us into a war like Bush did that things will be hunky dory from now on.

the U.S. is now a force for good in the world. OUR drone attacks are killing innocent people, we are still keeping innocent people imprisoned in Guantanamo without trial....that's under our CURRENT administration! How would you feel if you or your loved ones were locked away, their lives going by year after year in shackles...without the ability to prove their innocence. THAT'S WHAT'S GOING ON NOW!!!

All of those countries have their own governments.

Why exaggerate?

is the birthplace of our current one. Cuba and the Philippines are independent countries, and the main debate in Puerto Rico is whether to stick with being a territory or pursue statehood.

I hear there is a town there that needs an enema.

Enough Canadians would vote to give us single payer health care, gun registration, a vastly reduced military, and much better social policy.

Can we trade them for Texas?

Lets see how the enema goes first. Then we can dither around with the rest.

Sid

And one is a state. One wants to be a state.

An evil empire is one that hangs on, and we could have. Or gives the other areas lesser rights.

You did not write that

Sid

Why do you think it should be beyond criticism?

The pale ales are pretty good too.

Louisiana Purchase, Monroe Doctrine...

the other half is ignorant of america's murderous misadventures around the world: in central america, for example. you see both of those rationales right in this thread. and that, my friend, is the real reason why this empire is doomed. we can't even agree that much of what we've done around the world is in fact pure evil. many prefer to pretend we are benevolent and kindly, despite our many "burdens."

do you think the loved when we were propping up murderous dictators? do you think out ridiculous "war of terror" is creating a bunch of friends? you and rest of the BOG are just ridiculous in your defense of the indefensible.

3) you seem unable to process the possibility that people can criticize a lot of US history without wallowing in hatred.

That people fail to share your hatred of the United States is not a poor reflection on them.

in a nutshell.

who have zero criticisms of the United States's past abuses.

Which is a contradiction in terms.

so forgive me for assuming you were a part of that idiotic group that constantly posts over-heated hyperbole just as you did above. who decided YOU are the arbiter of what is and is not "hatred?"

Quite honestly, this is more over the top in its hatred of the United States than anything bin Laden wrote. Literally.

...and given current statistics on a variety of indicators of health and well-being, we STILL are nowhere near making right our oppression of indigenous people in this country. It may vary a bit from the strict definitions of international law, but to my mind, the failure to meaningfully accept responsibility for prior genocide, and moreover to adequately redress its effect on present-day members of that population, is to perpetuate that genocide.

In all honesty, where I think this OP wanders into error is that it limits criticism to the U.S., rather than to the Western/Developed World at large. Granted at this point the most powerful actor is the United States, but European imperialism is the source of much of the ideology and practice of international economic policy, which effectively facilitates the destruction of many cultures and the ecosystems on which they depend, around the world. The fact is that global economic powerbrokers, almost all of them Western or having adopted Western practices, have complete economic and military hegemony over the rest of the world, with results that are increasingly only describable in genocidal terms.

I don't have time to get into the whole history of colonialism and the various forms of neocolonialism that have arisen over time, but if you are unfamiliar with it (and I don't assume that you are) I would suggest case studies of some former colonies. Either the film or the book "King Leopold's Ghost," which focuses on the Congo, is a good place to start. I would suggest a thorough study of the history and effects of the Bretton Woods institutions (the IMF, World Bank, and what became the WTO). I would suggest a review of structural adjustment programs, bilateral trade agreements, and the legacy of debt in the third world.

Lastly, in weighing whether the U.S. is guilty of genocide, consider the effects that climate change will undoubtedly have on billions of ethnic groups in the regions that will be hardest hit. You may argue that climate change doesn't count, since there is no direct intention to harm these people. At the same time, we are abundantly aware that populations are going to be displaced. We have abundant evidence that many of the poorest and most marginalized members of global society will suffer and die, and indeed many already are (the Arab Spring, the related conflict in Syria, and the conflict in Darfur all have strong links to ecological disruptions brought about by climate change).

Yet we choose to privilege our economic engines, our right to disproportionate resource use and waste generation to maintain our "standard of living" over the lives of these billions of people. To say that we are not choosing to murder them is analogous to saying that a drone operator does not do the killing when he or she pushes the button that drops bombs on strangers halfway around the world. Indirect violence is every bit as real as direct violence.

Is that why you see graffitti all over Latin American countries saying "USA Enemigo del mundo"?

Talked to actual human beings there?

Sorry, but your delusion that people share your hatred is kinda sad if you're resorting to taking graffiti as a sign of the will of the masses. Graffiti is one guy with a spray can.

I am not fully fluent, but competent in Spanish, enough that I worked at my friend's Mexican Restaurant, where most workplace talk was in Spanish...So here's my perspective:

My context is a tiny island off the coast of Honduras. In many respects the folks here don't represent typical Central America; A Caribbean Creole dialect of English is spoken by most island natives, although a majority of the current population is from the Mainland. There is some resentment of America as a global superpower. At the same time, the American lifestyle is also admired and sought after, and in that sense America is glorified.

At the same time, the people seeking to identify with America and share in its "standard of living" complain about empty nets and wonder where the fish have gone (fishery decline is a huge problem in the Caribbean). They sell burgers, fries and coke to tourists and they can take a quick ferry to visit the Kentucky Fried Chicken on the mainland, but they complain that their native foods have become so expensive that they can no longer afford to prepare them. They complain about the problems of crime and violence, and wonder why things are so unstable. They complain about the loss of self-sufficiency and the erosion of small-scale industries that supported them, such as the coconut industry; while at the same time they take jobs which carry them across the ocean on trade barges. They see more and more of their land being bought up to build fancy resorts and condos, more and more of their streets filling up with casual tourists, more and more of their natural resources being co-opted and destroyed for lazy eco-tourism that destroys the very landscape it purports to honor. Many people on the island see these connections; many more do not; they are on the subsistence level and they only want their lives to get a little better; and aspiring to be "American" is one way they dream of doing that.

I live in one of the poorest and least healthy counties in America. Conditions here literally rival the third world, with people lacking basic things like running water and indoor plumbing. Yet I see people here voting against their own interests because they identify with the wealthy and the dominant all the time. So when I see the same among poor Latinos and Mexicans abroad and at-home, I don't assume that their love for America in any way removes the oppression and dispossession they suffer under American economic and foreign policy.

I'm not sure the hundreds of thousands dead would agree with your assessment.

empirical reseach.

http://www.americasquarterly.org/gringo-stay-here



Sorry to disappoint, but haters are a minority.

I won't argue with your graph, or the article, which I skimmed (I'm grading). My research is in the region. My experiences are different. But then, I work with leftist and indigenous communities, not middle class Latin Americans, with whom I've have very little in common. The younger generations, like ours, don't remember the wretched decades of the past. They don't remember what their grandparents and parents experienced, as a result of deluded, violent US policies.

If they did, as your article so astutely pointed out, they would make precisely Taverner's point.

What happened up through Poppy Bush was truly awful. Stomach-turning stuff.

The end of the Cold War benefited Central America moreso than it did Eastern Europe, imo. After the US stopped its "oppose Communism regardless of the body count" policy due to the death of Communism, things got a lot better down there.

What strikes me when traveling there is how much Central Americans dislike people from other Central American countries and especially Colombians.

Was with a local guy in Costa Rica, along with a couple from Georgia. Guy from Georiga starts talking about Mexicans and "illegal immigrants" and sounding like a complete racist asshole, because he was a complete racist asshole. I'm feeling really embarrassed, thinking the Tico would be offended at the obvious bigotry towards Latinos. Instead, he says "I know. We have the same problem with the Nicaraguans. They come here, and they steal and kill people."

I still think there is an issue with the power and influence of the MIC that cannot be ignored and needs to be diminished. Another Bush type administration could happen.

You see what they're capable of at their worst. So, once they sober up, they're more appealing than when they were drunk, but ya still gotta be cautious.

i see some people are asking that question without the sarcasm thingy

He could strangle puppies on live TV and they'd be 100% behind him

not sure why people are asking.

You LOVE death, especially brown people dying

See how logic works, you do an ad hominem attack, and you look like an idiot

who attacked us for not supporting the war on iraq.

You did express hatred for the United States.

When they said we hated America because we didn't want war with Iraq, they were wrong. But in a few cases, inadvertently, they were right.

That's reassuring.

Rand Paul is a great example. He promotes "liberty" but if you read between the lines, he is a very authoritarian person

I know we don't agree on this issue, but you can't tell me it's not a cool word....

...turned the USA into that Cruel, stupid Bully that we hated in School.
We hurt people, just to hurt them.

My European friends see the USA as "Churchy Dull Ants) They don't work like slaves 50-52 week per year. They have lives.
Americans are like people from Minnesota. They don't know any place different.

..."empires fall" just like stupid shit, huh?

"The empire is spending our kids' future"

Huh? Isn't this a RW talking point?

Oh, I forgot...

Does that mean you're coming out of the closet as something else?

Because if you're a cryptofascist and you come out of the closet, the "crypto" part goes away.

Of course, it sounds so much cooler to say "crypto," especially when, as in Taverner's case, you have
no idea what it means.

Oh yeah, it's YOU

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023945165#post60

Wake up. The OP is nonsense.

But among us grown ups we use something called logic

Something you've never heard about

I mean, stringing a bunch of doomsday cliches together isn't "logic."

repeating it doesn't make you an "adult."

In fact, the OP isn't screaming "adult" either.

A jury didn't think he was being an adult.

when the OP can no longer add to it but it still stays kicked.

Ron (and Rand) Paul are cryptofascists
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023859295

Who knew a word could be so broad to include "Ron (and Rand) Paul" and "Feinstein DINOs, John Kerry Hypocrites and 'hawks'"?

Crypto Night School, and he went there because it sounded so cool.

... then it's every man for himself.

I'm in.

All the "Rah!" "Rah!" "Go USA!" types are not surprising either.

http://orwell.ru/library/essays/nationalism/english/e_nat

George Orwell

Notes on Nationalism

Somewhere or other Byron makes use of the French word longeur, and remarks in passing that though in England we happen not to have the word, we have the thing in considerable profusion. In the same way, there is a habit of mind which is now so widespread that it affects our thinking on nearly every subject, but which has not yet been given a name. As the nearest existing equivalent I have chosen the word ‘nationalism’, but it will be seen in a moment that I am not using it in quite the ordinary sense, if only because the emotion I am speaking about does not always attach itself to what is called a nation — that is, a single race or a geographical area. It can attach itself to a church or a class, or it may work in a merely negative sense, against something or other and without the need for any positive object of loyalty.
.
.
.
It is also worth emphasising once again that nationalist feeling can be purely negative. There are, for example, Trotskyists who have become simply enemies of the U.S.S.R. without developing a corresponding loyalty to any other unit. When one grasps the implications of this, the nature of what I mean by nationalism becomes a good deal clearer. A nationalist is one who thinks solely, or mainly, in terms of competitive prestige. He may be a positive or a negative nationalist — that is, he may use his mental energy either in boosting or in denigrating — but at any rate his thoughts always turn on victories, defeats, triumphs and humiliations. He sees history, especially contemporary history, as the endless rise and decline of great power units, and every event that happens seems to him a demonstration that his own side is on the upgrade and some hated rival is on the downgrade. But finally, it is important not to confuse nationalism with mere worship of success. The nationalist does not go on the principle of simply ganging up with the strongest side. On the contrary, having picked his side, he persuades himself that it is the strongest, and is able to stick to his belief even when the facts are overwhelmingly against him. Nationalism is power-hunger tempered by self-deception. Every nationalist is capable of the most flagrant dishonesty, but he is also — since he is conscious of serving something bigger than himself — unshakeably certain of being in the right.
.
.
.
Negative Nationalism
[examples]
(i) Anglophobia. Within the intelligentsia, a derisive and mildly hostile attitude towards Britain is more or less compulsory, but it is an unfaked emotion in many cases. During the war it was manifested in the defeatism of the intelligentsia, which persisted long after it had become clear that the Axis powers could not win. Many people were undisguisedly pleased when Singapore fell ore when the British were driven out of Greece, and there was a remarkable unwillingness to believe in good news, e.g. el Alamein, or the number of German planes shot down in the Battle of Britain. English left-wing intellectuals did not, of course, actually want the Germans or Japanese to win the war, but many of them could not help getting a certain kick out of seeing their own country humiliated, and wanted to feel that the final victory would be due to Russia, or perhaps America, and not to Britain. In foreign politics many intellectuals follow the principle that any faction backed by Britain must be in the wrong. As a result, ‘enlightened’ opinion is quite largely a mirror-image of Conservative policy. Anglophobia is always liable to reversal, hence that fairly common spectacle, the pacifist of one war who is a bellicist in the next.

.
.
.

Don't be a wingnut (right-wing or extreme-fringe).

Democratic Underground is an online community for politically liberal people who understand the importance of working within the system to elect more Democrats and fewer Republicans to all levels of political office. Teabaggers, Neo-cons, Dittoheads, Paulites, Freepers, Birthers, and right-wingers in general are not welcome here. Neither are certain extreme-fringe left-wingers, including advocates of violent political/social change, hard-line communists, terrorist-apologists, America-haters, kooks, crackpots, LaRouchies, and the like.

about the DU Facebook group?
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023946966

Wowser!
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1018507392

will happen to this angry crew?

Link: http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/George_Carlin

http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/mike-friends-blog/why-washington-cant-stop-coming-era-tiny-wars-and-micro-conflicts

How's that perpetual war workin' out for yah, America?

-90% Jimmy

The two "president" Bushes each lied America into war with Iraq. Poppy's daddy Sen. Prescott Bush had his eyes on Iraq's oil since the Shah was a pup and didn't much care for FDR, being named as one of the 1933 coup plotters. Their ancestors made big bucks off war. Smirko summed it up:

"Money trumps peace."

We "ARE" the terrorists!

No, I really do. But I find that going off on crypto-Chomsky rants kills a good buzz and chases everyone else out of the room.

goes on the list. (plonk)

And many of those "power brokers" are outright sociopaths.