As long as we can pretend that event X has nothing to do with result Y
Thecurly1 ... let me say up front (for I reiterate it a few times) that I do not take issue with the topic post. However, I must disagree with a few things:
Whhaaaahhhh! Quit cyring. The world you live in is a much safer place at the expense of the American soldier and taxpayer. We haven't gone to war, acutally invading and destroying an whole nation, just for fun.
Is anyone aware that tyrannies cannot rise without the people? That is ... okay, so I, as a dictator, rise up and sieze power in a third-world backwater. Believe me, I have the endorsement of the people or else the people will take me down. It's not a democracy. But, as my father the capitalist points out, when the people are starving they will revolt. Unfortunately, in the United States, we never ask why people are starving.
Early in the Afghani Bush War (for time reference) I heard of an international commission working toward classifying prolonged hunger as violence against humans. I'm having trouble finding that particular story among the bazillion Google entries pertaining to
hunger, violence and other such terms. Whether the resolution has passed or ever will may be beside the point.
What I wish to point out is that such sentiment, the need to classify starvation as violence, arises largely because of the United States.
While on the one hand, it's true that we don't declare war without a reason (note for Vietnam, Gulf, and Afghanistan, at least), it's also true that we use our armed forces to achieve directly selfish policies. Any study of US foreign policy in Latin America will show this. And yet, when the communists rose up, and held enough approval from the people to not have a full-scale, burn-down-the-cities riot going on, we, the Americans, found this unacceptable. Truly, we didn't declare Vietnam a war, and what a lucky thing. This way we can still say we haven't lost a war yet.
And of the world being
much safer by the efforts of the American taxpayer and soldier, I find the notion to be horsepucky. Look, when the American soldier goes forth, it is in the
American interest. You erroneously correct
Justagirl regarding Germany and Japan while making a point that conveniently omits the fact that the Americans wanted nothing to do with that war, and did not officially enter it until A) the Japanese bombed us and the President achieved a Declaration of War from Congress, and B) Germany declared war against the United States. Um ... yeah ... we were going forth for our European neighbors? Why not go forth earlier? Or was lend-and-lease, cash-and-carry, and profiteering for weapons an equal contribution to the world's safety? On that point, sir, I find you out of line.
And right ... the Australians can kick the Americans off the continent. That's a good one,
Thecurly1
Given the fact that the Americans threw an influential, menacing fit all over the Aussies for their approach to drug abuse (
No no no no no no no no no you will not treat your heroin addicts with dignity and try to solve the problem!) nobody's particularly anxious to experience the American response if they kick out our military.
Now, since we've spent a moment on the military aspect, let's get back to hunger.
Can you put together a simple association of ideas:
• The United States supports dictators abroad
• The United States, when it finds such dictators no longer useful, deposes them and claims the glory
Likewise:
• American companies cannot necessarily produce at consumer-friendly costs given the standard of labor in the United States. Take Disney pajamas, for instance. If you paid American union wages for the manufacture of children's pajamas, how much of your market could afford or would desire them at that cost? For instance, how many minimum-wage single parents could afford them?
• Thus, these pajamas are made in other countries. The International Socialist Organization once, while comparing the high and low wages throughout the entire organization of various companies, noted that the women who sewed the Pocohontas pajamas in Latin America (Honduras, I think) were paid 29¢ an hour. Or a day.
• In order for these companies to operate and trade abroad, the Congress must negotiate rules for that international trade and operation.
• Thus the United States helps foster poverty and hunger among nations by working to ensure that its private entities abroad don't have to pay good wages.
Now, what's funny is that all of a sudden, this sounds like a discussion I had a while back with my brother. He offered a couple of interesting counterpoints (
and the responses that I gave him in italics.)
• If we paid better wages abroad, the governments abroad would just steal the money through taxation. (
What? As noted, that would be endorsed by the United States government, and have the effect of the US government working actively toward the maintaining of poverty and hunger, at least.)
• What are those "awful" wages actually worth? (
My brother, a lifelong ardent capitalist, actually agreed with an old PJ O'Rourke article which ridiculed Communists for seeking this and similar data. Why is the question suddenly important now, when it was ridiculous and trivial when you read the article not that long ago?)
• They eat every day. (
Note: I forget exactly how this came up, but the point was that apparently a subsistence diet is something people abroad should thank us for. e.g. a bowl of rice every day.)
• They can always move here. (
With what money? With what education and skills that will help them assimilate?)
• It would be cruel to pay them proper wages. (
Is this somehow like the argument that if you give the Native American tribes the monies owed them that they would just blow it on liquor and sex? You know, that argument that drove you nuts when you heard it last week out of that guy's mouth?)
•
Multi-layered exchange: They should be thankful we're raising their standard of living. (
What, you mean we're kind to do with the gun what we're cruel to do with compassion?) What the hell are you talking about? (
Didn't you just say five minutes ago that it was cruel to pay fair wages?) No, I didn't.
I bring this up because, while my brother graduated from the best university on the West Coast, he seems to have given up his critical-thinking skills in a way that is common among Americans. What shocks me most about that particular discussion is that it started with the question of whether to stop the campaign if we get bin Laden, which proposal is apparently treasonous or something. I can't tell you how many nasty things I am for wondering what to do when we achieve our stated goals.
All of this aside, what is the point of it? Oh, these people are miserable, and being oppressed, so we're going to go make a difference by making a ton of money off of their misery.
I would beg you to consider: So I want to build a product. Hmm ... it will cost me $30.00 an hour per person for the labor to build the product, plus benefits. Damn. We can do it, but the investors won't be happy. Hmm ... oh, they're sewing pajamas for twenty-nine cents an hour in Honduras. Let's check that out. We'll give 'em fifty cents an hour; they'll think we're gods.
Poverty and illiteracy are two vital components of terrorism and social unrest. Bin Laden may have achieved great wealth, but I highly doubt that Al-Qaeda is actually a Rich Arabs Club. Let me guess, the "detainees" at X-Ray have a mean estate value in the tens of millions?
The really difficult thing,
Thecurly1, is that I agree with you when you say we're losing the war on terrorism. Okay, that we
are not winning the war on terrorism. I would go so far as to say we're losing it, but that's just me. However, while I won't go so far as
Goofy as to call it an outright scam, it
is a symptom of a larger disease that, despite what you have advocated in our later posts, Americans are chief contributors to.
That's the only reason I'm in this one right now. Like your reminder to
Justagirl about Japan and Germany. Point, but in what debate? Given the actual history, I don't think it's valid, and that kind of simplistic Americanism is exactly what allows the people to go on believing themselves guiltless while perpetuating, inspiring, or inflaming the very difficulties we are attempting to solve.
Of poison gas and bioweapons in WWII ... you have a point. Americans, after all, are pioneers in biological warfare. We almost wiped out a continent once.
Could it be,
Thecurly1, that the reason we aren't winning the War on Terror is that we are, by our actions direct and indirect, perpetuating it? We fund and train terrorists, recognize them when they are in power, and exploit them for money until they're either too dangerous to ignore or simply no longer useful.
Like I said, I take no issue with your topic post. But your attitude in subsequent posts is a stark reminder of "why they hate us". Too bad Dubya's not here. We can't solve the problem with a snap of our fingers, but we can't even begin to address it until we decide to go about it with some sense of honety and integrity. And that includes not fooling ourselves about how we got here.
I mean, sure the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. But they'd been waiting for that opportunity ever since the Americans landed in Japan under a hail of ludicrous cannon-fire. Our entry into Japan was less-than-decent, and wholly undignified. By the time they got around to bombing us, they had a personal bitch-list about six miles long, including forced western occupation of Asian territories. Hmm ... something about how we use our armed forces?
The Americans, despite all we've done for the world, are still the Marie Antoinettes of the new world order. Seriously, let them eat cake. If they don't like it, they
must be evil.
Right?
thanx,
Tiassa
