Originally posted by Vrylakas
I was going to stay away from this thread because it looked ripe for flame wars and extreme opinions, but what the hay, I'll add some input:
>>I'm glad you replied, I think you've raised the level of debate. I'm going tocome back on the areas disagree, and blank the rest - agreement is sooo boring!
Bigfatron wrote:
Second, the thread exhibits the two primary myths of pro- and anti-US bias; first that the rest of the world is 'jealous' or 'hates' the US because it is a wealthy bastion of democracy and freedom. This is pure, self-serving cack. Don't delude yourselves.
Here I would disagree. I believe, to quote the British historian Eric Hobsbawm (and I think Simon Schauma also spoke of this, though in another context) that great powers evoke a certain level of jealousy. Having spent many evenings as a student in Hungary with British professors and lots of alcohol, I've been subjected to countless tirades from them on why Britain in her prime was greater than America is now. One severely upbraided me for the way Washington forced the British, French and Israelis the to pull back from the 1956 Suez war - as if I personally had advised Eisenhower to do so; never mind that I hadn't been born yet and my family wasn't in the U.S. yet). This is anecdotal but indicative of a larger sense, especially from Western Europeans that I've felt that there is some lingering jealousy about the fortunes of Europe and the U.S. over the 20th century. In 1910, a mid-level German diplomat (or a low-level French diplomat) could shake the world with an off-handed comment, while in the 1990s Yugoslav crisis the EU heads of state were screaming and no one listened.
>>Lots of comment here which lies in your personal experience so I can't refute it. All I can say from my own experience is that I have seen no evidence of jealousy, except perhaps amongst the political elite which resents its clout on the world stage.
The other myth is that there is a programme or guiding force behind the US treatment of the rest of the world, often referred to as 'US Imperialism'.
This much is true, and this one is so silly I usually disregard it when I hear it. Americans do not think in terms of control, they think profit. There is an old debate that is reviving again in the U.S. about after a hypothetical Iraq war, how long should the U.S. have to stay to help rebuild. When Americans think about military efforts abroad, they think about costs and effort. Ten minutes after an American soldier leaves the U.S. for duty abroad a chorus arises about "bringing the boys back home." There are constant loud critics in the U.S. against keeping U.S. troops stationed outside the U.S. in places like the DMZ in Korea, Europe, and lately Afghanistan. American nationalists would like to turn the clock back to 1913 and keep all American soldiers at home. The U.S. has no interest in an empire.
>>Well, I'd disagree slightly - as a colonial power the US annexed Hawaii, Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Phillipines and it has struggled to adjust to the independence of two of these possessions. But in general I'd agree.
The US is a corporatist state; government action, especially as regards foreign policy, is geared toward protecting and developing the interests of US corporations in foreign countries. This extends toward endorsing action designed to damage the corporate interests of other nations.
Here I would disagree. I think the U.S. is by far the least corporate state in the "First World". European governments have far closer relationships with private corporations, and the U.S. had to catch up in the 20th century to the European concept of a government representing private interests abroad. Schroeder or Chirac never make a trip abroad without business leaders in tow; the news cameras may not focus on them but trust me, they're there. Yes, the current American administration is a little too closely tied to "Big Business" than many Americans are comfortable with, but there are strict laws regulating contacts between the two spheres in the U.S. I am a fixed-income (bond) researcher and in my work it is clear that the sovereign and municipal (national and local government) securities fields in the U.S. are very distinct and separate from the corporate and asset-backed (private) securities fields but in Europe they all meld into one another, creating major headaches for investment-related databases that rely on distinct categories. European governments are very tied into their private sector, to the extent that it is often difficult to tell them apart. Japan, or as we analysts sometimes refer to it, "Japan, Inc.", is even more incestuous with its private sector.
>>I think you are completely wrong here - the links between Congress, the Senate, the Executive and big business in the US are far closer than in the UK which is my area of expertise.
>>However, my point is more complex than the issue of direct links - the uS governmental system is totally wedded to thecapitalist ideal, so that the advancement of corporate activity is seen as the PRIMARY goal of government. This single-minded approach is not seen in other western democracies.
Acts such as Helms-Burton, the imbalanced trade treaties with third world countries, aid policy, Kyoto abrogation, all demonstrate that the US government will put the interests of its corporate sector above all other things. This has included steps as far as being complicit in the downfall of democratic governments that were felt to be unsupportive of US business interests, in favour of dictatorships that were in favour.
All governments do this. France for decades has artificially supported its moribund farming sector through tariffs and subsidies. The EU Court has recently considered slapping France with a fine for continuing the ban on British beef, a ban that French farmers have benefitted from and have therefore pressured Paris to maintain despite evidence it is no longer necessary. The Japanese government was involved in initial negotiations in the 1980s to build private car factories for Nissan and Mitsubishi in the U.S. The EU and the U.S. just had a "banana trade war" last year over Central America because both sides were supporting their respective companies' interests. I'm afraid every country actively supports its own private business interests, not just the U.S. As for supporting dictatorships, the EU is guilty here as well. I agree it is a regretable practice and one that all governments should refrain from, but all do it when it is in their immediate interests. France, Russia and China have all signed oil exploitation agreements with Iraq that cannot take effect until the sanctions are lifted - hence, all three have become the loudest proponents of fully lifting the sanctions despite Hussein's failure to meet any of the UN conditions. Germany traded high technology to Libya and Iran for years, even after a German judge declared the Iranian government responsible for the Berlin disco bombing that killed several people, and linked it to many terrorist cells throughout Germany.
>>Yes, all governments seek to protect the interests of their firms, support trade missions, etc. But the US carries this to extremes which many would think unethical. For example, trade agreements with developing states made conditional on accepting and supporting US stance on intellectual property rights. Sounds reasonable? Well, only until you discover that US corporations are lobbying for this because they are busily patenting indigenous crops around the world, so that if they were ever to be farmed commercially then a US company would levy a patent fee. Who woudl they levy this on? Poor countries that actually originated the damn crops in the first place. US firms have even patented human DNA from tribes in remote areas in the hope that these individuals have a resistance to disease. This is a form of imperialism, just economic, not political.
This would provoke less reaction from other countries if this went hand-in-hand with an admission that the US acts only in its best interests. However, the US people live embedded in a myth of the US as the 'land of the free', a unique beacon of democracy in the world and the example to which all other nations aspire.
The U.S. is a country, not an international body with elected representatives from around the world. It is a country like any other, and they all act in their own interests. Why did Britain send troops last year to Sierra Leone but not Rwanda in 1994? What were Belgian commandos doing in Congo a year ago? Why was Spain willing to take military action a month ago over a few rocks sticking up in the water in the Mediterranean, a move the EU actively supported politically? Why have Ireland and France been the strongest opponents of the easterward expansion of the EU? (Hint: cheaper Eastern European farm produce, competition for EU financial aid). Why does Poland's right to security have to be sacraficed on the alter of Irish or French short-term economic interests?
>> I answer to your question, we went into Sierra Leone because the country was disgusted by reports of children having the limbs hacked off by the rebels who brought new levels of barbarity to warfare. It may sound bizarre but the UK is still remembered quite fondly in SL as a supportive colonial power, and our troops were invited in by the local government. We had minimal interests to protect.
>> and your polish point is illlogical - there is no 'right' for any country to join the EU. It's an invitation-only club. Personally I'll be glad to welcome Poland, but the point remains.
>> Again my point is the extremity to which the support of business is taken. Steel tariffs, unequal trade treaties, exceptionally low levels of aid (the lowest of all 22 industrialised nations on a %GNP basis) all point in the same direction.
The American Marshall Plan after WW II pumped hundreds of billions of U.S. dollars into Europe,
>> Sorry, this is not fully accurate. While the Marshall plan was an act of undoubted charity, it also reflected the fact that the US had no functioning trading partners at the war's end - the supply of goods for reconstruction ( and it was goods, not simply money) supported US factories through the conversion from a war economy back to peacetime operation.
>> However, the US' actions have not been that altruistic for decades. There is no evidence that the US is interested in everyone in the world having better living conditions - the evidence against comes from the US opposition to many fair trade initiatives, normally designated as 'anti-dumping' but essentially preventing developing countries from selling local crops into the US. For example, under US legislation poor african countries are able to export cloth products to the US but ONLY if they use US grown cotton in their manufacture!
>> And why does the world hope for more financial help from the US than anywhere else? The answer is very simple - because the US uses between 30% and 50% of the world's resources while sustaining only 4% of the population.
>> It's worth reflecting that to let everyone on earth enjoy the US standard of living would require 12 times more energy and raw materials than the world uses now. It is simply impossible to achieve and most of us acknowledge that fact. Eventually the US will have to as well, it's simply unavoidable.
This myth is sustained by an entertainment industry that has made rich on peddling the American dream whilst paying little attention to what goes on in the world outside.
Got some news for you: None of the major Hollywood studios are owned by Americans anymore. >> Who owns it is irelevant - it's the message which is delusional.
The myth is championed abroad in fiction and in foreign policy. It's rammed down the throats of the rest of the world, and sometimes that is an irritating experience.
I personally found Soviet occupation and propaganda far more "irritating".
>> Living under the Shah in Iran was no fun, nor was Pinochet's Chile or Batista's Cuba - these were US-sponsored regimes with appalling records.
So the friction lies between the rhetoric - land of the free, champion of democracy - and the reality - exercisers of power on behalf of corporate America.
I think the friction comes more from the mistaken belief by many non-Americans that the U.S. is supposed to be some sort of benevolent and neutral grandfatherly country, and they become upset when the see that it sometimes acts in its own interests. They often also fail to see that their own countries do much the same.
>> The US acts almost exclusively in its own interests but claims not to - this is the problem. It claims a mandate based on the defence of ideals which it does not live up to and in any case do not deliver an entitlement to the mandate claimed.
That this dichotomy is not apparent to ordinary Americans is no surprise - firstly I would be stunned if any US news organisation would ever bring it to their viewers' attention - it would be completely contrary to the US cultural imperative and thus virtually suicidal in business terms. Secondly the US people, content in what is undoubtedly a huge, abundant and beautiful country, take little interest in what is going on elsewhere except where it impinges directly on US interests as at WTC.
This much is indeed true, that Americans and Canadians are insular. But I think this is a hemispheric problem;
>> yes it is about size, bt with great size and power goes great responsibility.
The great strength of the USA is the determination and commitment of its people, harnessing the huge natural wealth and resources at their command in a country as big as half a continent. It's ironic that this concentration of power is one of the main causes of the country's problems with the rest of the world.
I think its greatest strength is its willingness to give anyone a chance, to incorporate peoples from everywhere and anywhere into its fabric.
