A quick thought
And possibly a bollocks one, but still…
I was thinking, after reading, about U.S. foreign policy and its attempts to force 'Democracy' down the throats of Arabs/Orientals/Central Americans/etc. It never works. It hasn't worked anywhere since they've tried it. Well, that's not quite true, they have been successful in installing military regimes in various places, but how do those police states equate with U.S. democratic ideals?
Well, after speculating for a while, I figure I know what the problem is. The problem is U.S. democracy itself, which isn't even a little bit democratic. In the States there are two parties, both more or less the same. Sure, there are details here and there which vary, but the Republicrats are very much on the same page.
In a country the size of the U.S., you would expect there to be fucking millions of candidates for the presidency and everything else from a million different parties with a million radically different views and policies. You don't have that though. Anti-communism took care of the leftists and the far right were asked politely to stop hanging black folks and given a say in military decisions.
So, essentially, you have sham elections every four years and a government which is a puppet of the military industrial complex.
This works in the U.S. because it happened gradually, and the two main parties initially had very different positions and so nobody really noticed when the elections stopped mattering so much and continued believing they were living 'free', despite very strong evidence that the U.S. media is little more than a tool for the Propaganda Machine. (The media keeps America believing it is right, it is wealthy, it is The Good Guys — and that the rest of the world is full of funny, peasant people with weird accents. This makes it easier to promote wars that are being lost and deadens the public to foreign slaughter. As Bill Hicks said, it's not easy admitting that you might be part of the Evil Empire. I love that people like McCain still try to claim CNN, Fox and the rest of the U.S. media has a 'liberal' bias. Hahahahaaaaaa!)
When you try to introduce this kind of structure in another part of the world it stirs up some anxiety, because it's quite plainly neither fair nor good for the country. When you try to do it suddenly, people get pissed off. If they'd been left to it, chances are the various countries buggered by U.S. influence (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand, El Salvador, Guatemala, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan — to name a few) would, given time, have eased into similar unfair types of government anyway.
There's a lot more I want to get down about this, but I really only wanted to jot things down so I didn't forget before I get the chance to investigate more.
Of course, I could be entirely wrong on all points, and if anyone knows different (or, even better, wants to prop up my speculations…) then lemme know.
I was thinking, after reading, about U.S. foreign policy and its attempts to force 'Democracy' down the throats of Arabs/Orientals/Central Americans/etc. It never works. It hasn't worked anywhere since they've tried it. Well, that's not quite true, they have been successful in installing military regimes in various places, but how do those police states equate with U.S. democratic ideals?
Well, after speculating for a while, I figure I know what the problem is. The problem is U.S. democracy itself, which isn't even a little bit democratic. In the States there are two parties, both more or less the same. Sure, there are details here and there which vary, but the Republicrats are very much on the same page.
In a country the size of the U.S., you would expect there to be fucking millions of candidates for the presidency and everything else from a million different parties with a million radically different views and policies. You don't have that though. Anti-communism took care of the leftists and the far right were asked politely to stop hanging black folks and given a say in military decisions.
So, essentially, you have sham elections every four years and a government which is a puppet of the military industrial complex.
This works in the U.S. because it happened gradually, and the two main parties initially had very different positions and so nobody really noticed when the elections stopped mattering so much and continued believing they were living 'free', despite very strong evidence that the U.S. media is little more than a tool for the Propaganda Machine. (The media keeps America believing it is right, it is wealthy, it is The Good Guys — and that the rest of the world is full of funny, peasant people with weird accents. This makes it easier to promote wars that are being lost and deadens the public to foreign slaughter. As Bill Hicks said, it's not easy admitting that you might be part of the Evil Empire. I love that people like McCain still try to claim CNN, Fox and the rest of the U.S. media has a 'liberal' bias. Hahahahaaaaaa!)
When you try to introduce this kind of structure in another part of the world it stirs up some anxiety, because it's quite plainly neither fair nor good for the country. When you try to do it suddenly, people get pissed off. If they'd been left to it, chances are the various countries buggered by U.S. influence (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand, El Salvador, Guatemala, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan — to name a few) would, given time, have eased into similar unfair types of government anyway.
There's a lot more I want to get down about this, but I really only wanted to jot things down so I didn't forget before I get the chance to investigate more.
Of course, I could be entirely wrong on all points, and if anyone knows different (or, even better, wants to prop up my speculations…) then lemme know.
posted by Stephen McMullin at 6:04 pm
2 comments
