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Title: �Anti-Americanism� Revisited
Topic: Canada-U.S. relations
Written By: robertjb
Date: Monday, February 21 at 10:01
 
Denialism is the enemy within
 
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[Individualist]

Seeing that you obviously aimed this at me, let's get a few easy points out of the way.

I don't consider knee-jerk anti-Americanism "blasphemy", but in some cases it definitely earns the term "bigotry".

And to get the question of "knee-jerk pro-Americanism" out of the way (ignoring that it's little more than a variation on that favourite of schoolyard debate tactics, "I know you are but what am I"), let me admit to being pro-American. I like the US, and it's culture. I like it's people, and I like their dominant values of self-reliance and suspicion of the nanny state. There are some things I don't like about the US, including (but not limited to):

- the Iraq War, which I was opposed to from the very beginning
- the US health insurance system, which is the result of a too dogmatic devotion to free market principles
- the lack of regulation of financial markets that led to the recession that we're still struggling to get out of

I think there's a Goldilocks solution somewhere between the US disdain for government intervention and control and Canada's too willing embrace of them. I reject your "progressivism", not because I am anti-Canadian, but because I believe in a different vision of Canada from that which you hold. I believe in a more meritocratic and individualistic society than that the Central Canadian political elites have engineered for us.

So I have provided my criticisms of the US, most have which have appeared in other of my posts on Vive. On that basis, I deny your implied charge of knee-jerk pro-Americanism, and challenge you to respond in kind. Provide me at least one instance of something you feel the US has gotten right, either in its domestic or foreign policy.

And please don't say putting Conrad Black in jail. That would have been like my arguing that I'm not reflexively pro-American because I don't like Michael Moore.

[JBG]

The United States is hardly perfect, yet I always love my country. As far as Canada goes, we couldn't have a better neighbor. Nor could you.

[robertjb]

Individualist- I usually do not comment on my own posts but will in this instance so as to clarify that this article was not "aimed" at you, but your comment on Dave Ruston's post did trigger this article. I have written on anti-Americanism before and felt it was timely to revisit the issue, espeically so-as I point out in my article- we are more American than ever as the numerous posts on this site verify and we have a government that is more than willing to sell out the country completely.

When Engelhardt says "and its taking us down" that "us" includes us Canadians-acolytes to the failing empire

My feelings towards America are both anger and sympathy as in so many ways it is a great country but I think its foreign policy is ruinous both to itself and us-its ally. If it had a more humane and moderate foreign policy it could be a great force for good and stability in the world, but as the Engelhardt quote suggests it has not got a brain. Eg: How do you condone exhausting the country chasing a rapidly resource like oil that will be scarce in the next few decades and extinct by the end of the century-thus my theme of denialism.

I also write on militarism which in itself is ruinous to the US-spending half of its national budget on military spending, a third of the Pentagon's budget is black money that goes unaccounted for. For Canada the acquisition of the F35 is no more than corporate welfarism pandering to Military Industrial Complex. People should be outraged at this spending but hyper-militarism is so ingrained in our societies it is taken for granted.

I read widely on various US websites, Tomdispatch, Counterpunch, Truthout, et al and what I write is often parroting what Americans are themselves saying about their country. In the area of very informative reading there is Chalmers Johnson, Michael C. Ruppert Noam Chomsky, Chris Hedges, Andrew Bacevich, Richard Falk, and the late Tony Judt and many, more.

One of the things I admire most about America is that freedom of speech persists and the country must start listening to its dissidents like those listed above and others.

I am just a cranky parrot sitting on my perch.

[Dave Ruston]

Well, given that Canadian fiat currency is now on par with American fiat currency, let me put my two Canadian cents in. One thing I do like about the original American mindset spelled out in their constitution is the right to bear arms. why? Well, its not to shoot your neighbour if he insults you. The original intent of this was so that the people could defend themselves against an oppressive tyrannical government. Benjamin Franklin was asked by a fellow citizen, "Well, what do we have doctor." His response was," You have a republic-if you can keep it." So the founding fathers of America saw what the people faced in the future. Thomas Jefferson was also quoted as saying," The banks are more dangerous to our liberties, than standing armies. If ever we allow the private banks to issue our currency, they, and the corporations that grow up around them, will ensure, that one day, our great, great, great, grandchildren wake up homeless on the continent that their great, great, great grandfathers conquered." Now, from what I can see, people around the world just want freedom and dignity in life. Doesn't matter if you're Canadian, American, Russian, or whatever. Unfortunately, government is a necessary evil in this. It is a delicate balancing act, given that any political system is only as good as the people runnung it. Yes, I would like government to butt out of my life. I don't like seeing surveilance cameras up on every street corner like you do now. I don't like paying ridiculous taxes for poor services. I could go on and on. But a responsible government with a conscience, if it ever could exist (and I think it kind of existed more so years ago) should be there to act as a counterweight to the powerful forces out there like banks and corporations, who see that profits should come no matter what the cost! That's why slavery exists- so that the already ridiculously wealthy can get richer, and little men with big issues can try to act as Gods. The police force, the fire fighters, garbage collection, etc.- these could all technically be called (here it comes) socialist! But these services are necessary. So is water and wastewater. So is quality public health care, which now in Canada is under attack by the profiteers. Even key energy sectors such as electricity and natural gas should have a degree of responsible government control so that people can afford to live! And then there's the question of who creates and controls money. That funny worthless paper with all those funny pictures on the bills. If government created money, instead of borrowing it from the evil sociopaths running the banks, then this whole world would be a much better place! No more wars for profit, no control and hoarding of food, water, and resources, to control the masses, and people would have enough of this exchangeable papaer to live their lives in freedom and self-actualization. The banks are the heart of it all. But sad to say too, I think it is do-able, to put responsible, conscientious people in government, for the purposes of making this world a better place. But what is happening now, the manufactured wars, the engineered starvation, the denial of essential services, the manipulated periods of boom and bust, this is evil, and I don't know how the people who run the world can live with themselves!

[RickW]

$1:

Provide me at least one instance of something you feel the US has gotten right

Thomas Paine. Then it went downhill from when the Federalists hijacked the government.

[Individualist]

RickW RickW:

$1:

Provide me at least one instance of something you feel the US has gotten right

Thomas Paine. Then it went downhill from when the Federalists hijacked the government.

So are saying that the US hasn't gotten anything right since Thomas Paine? If so, that's quite a sweeping condemnation. Your buddy Dobbin at the Tyee would be proud.

Speaking of which, have most of the BC regulars abandoned Vive for the comments section of the Tyee? My, how the mighty have fallen.

[RickW]

[quote="IndividualistSo are saying that the US hasn't gotten anything right since Thomas Paine?[/quote]
That about sums it up. The US would have been a populist democracy. But the Federalists hijacked it to create the beginnings of an exploitive empire. It was the seed stock for Manifest Destiny.

[Individualist]

Okay, thanks for giving a clear answer. I assume you wouldn't (or shouldn't, at least) object to being called anti-American.

I, of course, have very different beliefs about the US. As I have mentioned, I am unapologetically pro-American. I acknowledge that they have gotten many things spectacularly wrong, but that the country has also accomplished much good in the world.

I wonder if your judgement of other powerful countries, say China or the old Soviet Union (or even post-Soviet Russia) is as harsh. Did you feel that the USSR was "less wrong" than the US? Did Cuba's trying to spread its revolution in Latin America and Africa bother you? I guess what I'm curious about is if you fell that the US possesses a unique and singular "badness", or if you concern is more about powerful countries in general seeking to control smaller or less powerful ones. Would you have been more comfortable with pretty much any other country as the "lone superpower"?

[andyt]

To mix myself into this discussion, I don't see how anyone who thinks about it can be anti-american in the sense that they are the great satan or a force for evil in the world. OTOH, I don't see how anyone who is not American can be reflexively pro-American. They've certainly made their share of boneheaded and even evil actions.

To me it comes down what would any other country, given it had the same dominant (ex-dominant?) position do any better? I can't think of one, including Canada. That doesn't mean they would do any worse either, tho, that America is somehow better than other countries in this regard.

If China becomes the world's no. one power, I think they would do worse than the US has done. Worse for us and our belief systems. But since China would dominate the ideosphere (is that a word?) as well as the economic and military one, I'm sure the majority of the world would see it much in the same light as it sees America now.

[RickW]

Individualist Individualist:

Would you have been more comfortable with pretty much any other country as the "lone superpower"?

Now that is about the stupidest question you could have asked. Get your head out of your nether regions. The US had a unique apportunity in the 1790's to create something that did not exist up to that time. But they succombed to the same forces of all those other countries you so blithely named, as well as virtually all of the countries in existence at that time. The "movers and shakers" who hijacked "the great experiment" were no different than those you think are evil incarnate.

You mention the US has done a lot of good. Name something.

[Individualist]

RickW RickW:

Individualist Individualist:

Would you have been more comfortable with pretty much any other country as the "lone superpower"?

Now that is about the stupidest question you could have asked. Get your head out of your nether regions. The US had a unique apportunity in the 1790's to create something that did not exist up to that time. But they succombed to the same forces of all those other countries you so blithely named, as well as virtually all of the countries in existence at that time. The "movers and shakers" who hijacked "the great experiment" were no different than those you think are evil incarnate.

You mention the US has done a lot of good. Name something.

Off the top of my head, they opposed and held back the advance of totalitarian communism. They also played a major role in defeating the Nazis. Even if that were the country's only positive achievements, that would be enough for me not to be anti-American.

And to your other point, if the greatest fault that you can point to in the formation of the US was that they failed to do better in terms of democratic governance than the other powers of the time, then I find your blanket condemnation of the country excessive. What country do you approve of?

[RickW]

$1:

Off the top of my head, they opposed and held back the advance of totalitarian communism

The US had some 150 years before communism came along. During that time, it condoned and encouraged what we have come to call "robber barons", who basically got their obsene wealth on the backs of their fellow citizens, indigenous peoples (called genocide, and far eclipsing the "paltry" efforts of the Nazis).

$1:

What country do you approve of?

None.

[JBG]

RickW RickW:

The US had some 150 years before communism came along. During that time, it condoned and encouraged what we have come to call "robber barons", who basically got their obsene wealth on the backs of their fellow citizens, indigenous peoples (called genocide, and far eclipsing the "paltry" efforts of the Nazis).

Could it be that it took "robber barons" to actually get steel mills, railroads, and oil refineries built? Daisy picking doesn't do it.

[andyt]

JBG JBG:

]Could it be that it took "robber barons" to actually get steel mills, railroads, and oil refineries built?

Why?