What song best sums up the previous year?

"It's the best of all worlds!" - Liebnitz

Dreadhead,
Contextual thinking is not your forte, eh? We were the solution to Nazism, Japanese Imperialism, and Communisim (90 million dead! Get on board!!). Germmany and Japan were both victims of American "imperialism" and thank God, at least from their own points of view. This was Franklin Roosevelt's philosophy - change the damn regimes once and for all.

It's not working real well in Iraq for two reasons:
1) They've never had anything like a constitutionally limited Republic based on Jeffersonian principles and cannot yet comprehend the logic and benefits.
2) We did not inflict enough military punishment to convince the enemy of the futility of resistance. Remember that the Nazis mounted an insurgance after their formal surrender. We smashed it with such certitude that they gave up.

How long are we going to have a military presence in Iraq? Just remember that we've had troops on the ground in Germany and Japan for more than 60 years. By the way, things are going pretty well in both those countries, thanks to our imperialism. Even though our government and Germany's have many differences, there is absolutely no consideration of war or any military action considered btw the two. Germans are not coming to the USA to mass murder our citizens and no Americans are doing that to them. Why?

Imagine Iraq, Afganistan, and finally Iran becoming like Germany and Japan. "What a wonderful world" indeed!

Walter,
I also respect your point of view. By the way, I'm not a conservative. I believe people have the right to live for their own sakes and should not be coerced into servitude. However, this applies only to citizens of the USA because of the natural structure of reality. We simply cannot apply the same principles to others in the world, and this is why we have police work against our own citizens and war against other countries.

"It's All Over Now Baby Blue" Bob Dylan.
"the vagabond who's rapping at your door
is standing in the clothes that you once wore."

Tomryan

Thank you for expressing, so clearly, the facts of history to our more "emotional" members. Have you ever considered running for the Senate? How about - TOMRYAN for President! :-)
As you so clearly understand, rational, clear thinking debate, is a good thing. But, when the survival of our countrymen and culture is at stake, cloudy, emotional, ranting has no place in the debate.
Congratulations on being such an eloquent spokesman - I only wish I had your gift.

best wishes

paul

Paul,
Thanks for the support but you, too, have stated quite succinctly (Jeez, my spelling is bad!) where we are. I also think most of these responses are based on an emotional state caused by a thought package into which one is heavily invested.

I want to do everything possible to avoid being incinerated in a fireball (or beheaded or shot between the eyes) so I am willing to give the current administration some wiggle room when dealing with suspected Muslim terrorists in this country who are contacting other thugs who are in the Mideast. Remember what Osama said:

"We will not rest until we kill 4 million Americans on American soil, and half of those must be children." Only way to do that is with nuclear weapons. Anyone else thinking something immediately has be done about Iran?

And, Jeez Louise, is anyone still upset that some Army soldiers made terror suspect prisoners wear panties on their heads? You can watch any Madonna video and see worse than that! Or, pick any one of a dozen MTV shows like Jackass, Bad Boys, and that one where the adults kids assault their parents while we are supposed to be laughing. Raise a generation on this crap and how do you expect them to act in a degraded situation like an Iraqi prison? I remember in the days after 09-11-01 that people such as Thomas Friedman, Jeff Greenfield, and even Al Franken all advocated some form of torture of terror suspects. Even some Democrat congressmen (whose names I can't remember now) preached the same thing. We wisely realized in those brightly lit days that things had changed. We were now fighting for our very existance.

Breadman, I was wondering what happened to my pants.