Demon of Undoing wrote:Ibrahim wrote:Demon of Undoing wrote:They don't look weak, any more than you look weak compared to pretty much anybody on either side of an NFL game. You're just a non- player.
Unless Russia invades again or F1 becomes their game again, Finns don't matter in this conversation.
Well this is just an odd way or re-stating my point, which is that nobody looks "weak" by not playing, and the 'roided-up criminals of an NFL team are a good analogy for the US military, which unfortunately finds itself in a soccer league. Its the obsession with both always being an actor and "looking strong" that has destroyed US foreign policy and credibility, with no tangible benefits to the national interest.
I agree in principle, and I'm a pretty solid isolationist in this.
However...
Playing devil's advocate here, Finland has little concern over as broad a spectrum as we do. In fact, nobody does. Leaving aside all the truthiness to the God- given greatness of our American way of life, fact is that " trade with all, quarrel with none" may be an optimistic way of maintaining an empire ( there, I said it). But that inflated sense of entitlement ain't going to feed itself, so there we are in Couscousjihad, Yemen.
Yes, yes, I know you're going to retort with something reasonable, like, " You don't have to hold the world at gunpoint to get oil blah blah blah". Whatever, Oprah. This is GTA V territory, biiiiotch.
Thank You VERY MUCH for your post, Bezerk Savant Demon of Undoing.
" trade with all, quarrel with none" may be an optimistic way of maintaining an empire ( there, I said it).
Quite correct.........
Definitely an optimistic
way of maintaining a small or even a large republic when the Big and the Bad Boyz want to 'play'
Remembering the war with the vile Barbary Pirates and the lead up to the War of 1812 & World War 1........
We wanted to just trade but the Barbary Pirates, the British, the French and Germans did NOT agree..........
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_181 ... ith_France
But that inflated sense of entitlement
FWIW we aren't the first or only ones with that problem.......
Jihadi/Traditional Muslims have it bad: "Best of Peoples" crap written in the Koran ........
http://www.quranbrowser.com/cgi/bin/get ... ng=003:110
Or as expressed by the Pirates.......
In March 1785, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams went to London to negotiate with Tripoli's envoy, Ambassador Sidi Haji Abdrahaman (or Sidi Haji Abdul Rahman Adja). When they enquired "concerning the ground of the pretensions to make war upon nations who had done them no injury", the ambassador replied:
It was written in their Koran, that all nations which had not acknowledged the Prophet were sinners, whom it was the right and duty of the faithful to plunder and enslave;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Barbary_War
Brits could be bad about enslaving too: kidnapping American sailors off merchantman ships and more....
Though nowhere near as bad as the vile Barbary Pirates
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_1812#Impressment
For the love of G_d, consider you & I may be mistaken.
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