See part of me just doesn't get why we put them in there in the first place. I mean wouldn't they take into consideration it MIGHT bite us in the ass in the future?

 

Of course it's from special interests within the countries, but getting rid of one ruthless dictator and putting another one just seems like a shuffling of the deck to me.

 

Most global superpowers aren't forward thinking. The nations on top believe they can create their own reality. Look at monetary policy of our nation, it's clear to bite us in the ass but that's "far away" when bureaucrats only think in short term.

 

They believe the sun will never set on the empire, at least not in their lifetime and that fuels these bad decisions. Plus it's hard for the leading nations not to play God, power hungry bastards will always screw up the future for power now.

 

i believe America doesn't want any kind off peace in middle east

if there is peace in middle east that means ppl investing in America will dwindle

 

Doubt that's the case. We are seeing a recycle of petrol-dollars being funneled through the UK into treasuries for sure, but that will drop off as more realize how bad of a buy they are. In fact the market is extremely low on volume as of now, it's basically the Fed buying 100's of billions in bonds and the primary dealers using high frequency trading to push the market up.

 

as Jews and Arabs the major investers in america and if their countries are stable why would they invest in america

 

More comes from Asia. Money invested in the US from the middle east is low in the grand scale of money flows in our market. However oil is the major influence and strategic positions of our military.

 

I kind of believe that the US might try to put some influence in there, but I think for the most part we'll just let it be.

My view is it comes down to basic human nature. The people in power will always try to force their beliefs/views on other. Our government tells us who can marry, what we can/can't put in our body...why would that not translate into foreign policy for the powerful nations capable trying to force those beliefs on others?

 

Empires are usually bad, they bankrupt and create enemies that almost always lead to the destruction of that empire. It's only useful to a few in power and their friends. Being the world power is detrimental to most Americas, but when did that stop our government?

^you make very convincing arguments nick. I agree in that a lot of these people in Washington only really seem to care about the short term consequences of our actions. I mean looking back in some sense the whole fear over communism was stupid in the sense that our country could be communist, but of course more of a reality in terms of nuclear weapons. But now countries that we aided to fight against the Russians are now our enemies (aka. Afghanistan). This especially goes with energy. If we were to find alternative energy and get rid of our dependence on foreign oil, there wouldn't be much of a reason to be in countries that we are in. Also we know that the supply of oil will run out, so why not invest in energy like solar or wind or water that is unlimited? Once again it's our shortsightedness towards the future.

 

Our country should be more forward thinking in our actions, and what possible consequences might occur from them.

 

 

From what you are saying I do agree that we try to force our beliefs on others. I think it's wrong because many times these people that we try to change don't want to adapt our way of life, so why should we force it on them? Of course it has to do with other interests.

 

At the same time I feel that this country is great in what we can do and the amount of freedoms we get compared to many other countries. However that said, we should have more freedoms in the sense that I think that certain drugs (like pot) be made legal (it would limit the amount of money put into incarcerating people and the drug war, plus could be a beneficial tax to help the deficit), also allowing same sex couples to marry (i don't understand what the big deal is, it shouldn't matter who you love based on gender).

 

Unfortunately as history has shown all great empires fall. It seems our country is no longer the biggest in the world and has been taken over by China in so many fields (education, innovation, economy). I think that our attitude needs to change and we should stop being the police of the world. It is not our place many times to do what we do, and I could see why much of the world hates us.

^What you said, America needs to back the fuck out of foreign policy and nurse its economic wounds right now. Our economy's for shit, we're obviously not going to be at the zenith of our power ever again, and it seems to me like we need to back off and do as much with what we have left as we can. America was a staunchly non-interventionist country until a little before WWI, maybe being non-interventionist in itself isn't feasible in the global culture we have now and we need to improve foreign relations, but backing out of other countries' businesses is one of the best things we can do for foreign relations anyway. Win-win situation. We've been acting like the moral police for decades now, which hasn't always been bad for everyone obviously, but is not working out too hot for us right now.

 

I'm not a policymaker or even of voting age, but that's my two cents.

But now countries that we aided to fight against the Russians are now our enemies (aka. Afghanistan). This especially goes with energy. If we were to find alternative energy and get rid of our dependence on foreign oil, there wouldn't be much of a reason to be in countries that we are in. Also we know that the supply of oil will run out, so why not invest in energy like solar or wind or water that is unlimited? Once again it's our shortsightedness towards the future.

 

Completely agree with this.

I would love for all these people over there to have freedom, the only worry being the result of more wars and conflicts between countries.

Well the Middle East is quite diverse and the countries in the region shouldn't be bunched up together as one monolithic structure (which is a mistake of both Western and some Islamic thinking), but that's just a sidenote that I wanted to bring up.

 

The overwhelming majority of protesters were calling for a civilian state, and it was interesting to see the Muslim Brotherhood adapt some of its policies during the demonstrations. They're not really a radical group as is being shown by the media abroad; Mubarak was quite successful in scaring people into thinking they were the only alternative to his regime (this can also be seen from Gaddafi in his speech today warning of Al-Qaeda taking over). The Brotherhood are more a conservative religious group; they do have policies that, should they ever be in charge, would not be in favour of the current situation with Israel, but they're not the Taliban or the Iranian regime and would not be at war with Israel. Although what Israel wants should be irrelevant.

 

The army does appear to be moving towards creating real reform, though I do have reservations that they're moving too fast with unilateral decisions. The constitution should be completely rewritten and the figures from the NDP need to go.

 

There is definitely a sense of excitement in the region and the feeling of pride and empowerment are some of the two biggest gains from all that's going. People for the first time really, feel they can change things and their voices will be heard.

These authortain goverments, despite how evil it may seem, could be the lesser of two evils.

Yes its horrible, but I have spoken to many people from these parts of the world and asked their views, and they say sadly their peoples are not ready for a democracy as under the surface they are very divided, and if they could do their own thing they would fight each other tomorrow.

These authortain goverments, despite how evil it may seem, could be the lesser of two evils.

Yes its horrible, but I have spoken to many people from these parts of the world and asked their views, and they say sadly their peoples are not ready for a democracy as under the surface they are very divided, and if they could do their own thing they would fight each other tomorrow.

 

To be honest I find this a little condescending. They didn't "seem" to be evil, they were and are evil. Here's something said by Issandr Al-Amrani in the Guardian yesterday which sums up how I feel about this type of thinking:

 

"For several decades, there has been a soft bigotry of lowered expectations in the west and among Arab elites about the Arab world. The prevalent thinking about this region of over 300 million souls is that it offered no fertile ground for democracy, either because democracy risked bringing political forces hostile to western interests or because democracy is not a value that has much currency in the region. Many regimes understood this, and played a double game of decrying their societies' "immaturity" while encouraging anti-democratic tendencies such as populism and, at times, a reactionary social conservatism. After the revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt, no one will buy this any more – and nor should they about two more north African countries: Libya and Morocco."

 

No one thinks things will magically get better now that the despots are gone. Remember, its that type of thinking that brought in people like them (with support of the West, of course) in the first place. Saying the Middle East may as well just stick with tyrannical leaders and hope for the best is both defeatist and unfair.

^^

 

very well written my friend. you make some very critical and sensible points.

I think most of the media organizations in the United States (Fox News, CNN, MSNBC especially) want people to think that the Middle East is full of crazy people who want to kill Israel and start massive wars. Obama defended the dictator Mubarak by saying he's a 'US Ally' and he's 'pro-Israel'. These would be good things to consider, but as it turns out, the people of these countries feel the same way. Obviously there are some lunatics who want nuclear war, but the vast majority of the citizens of these countries want peace, and don't want any conflict with Israel. Their main issues are internal. I think they really care a lot more about how fucked their countries are domestically than they do about any foreign policies. In fact, it's the same sentiment many Americans feel. A lot of us feel that our plethora of economic problems should be at the forefront, rather than these costly, atrocious wars we're involved in.

 

Post of the year, I couldn't agree more with this.