JakeStratham

We've got plenty of problems inside our borders. But that won't stop us mucking about around the world, notably the middle east. Egypt, Libya, Yemen, and now Syria.

Critics say we haven't been doing a great job. From CNN's Cafferty:

There's no money in the till here at home. A lot of lives are on the line. And we're in bed with so many dictators that saying, "Let us know when it's over" may not be an option.**

So, how would you handle the mess? What would you do?

I'm sure a few of you are thinking, "Nuke the bastards." lol C'mon now. Any takers?



* lol at voters
** And then there's China.



In before lukep posts "Century Of Self" again.

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BluAffiliate

U.S. dominance is on its way out. It would only take time before Europe recovered from WWII, China recovers from Colonialism, Russia recovers from Communism.. etc. We're not the big dog anymore and we're on the way out. Pull our forces from the rest of the world and let em settle it.

HardSale

Fuck the middle east and rest of the world for that matter. We've been taking care of so much shit for so long it's drained us.

Let the mid east implode and if the rags want to chop each other to pieces, have at it. Take 1/100th the war budget and build a drone airforce and hellfire the shit out of any obvious terrorist camps.

Let Europe and the rest of our allies for that matter pay for their own defense and lets see how long their socialist bullshit 8 weeks vacation lasts.

Tell the fucking Saudi royal family if they don't lower the price of oil that they can fend for themselves and mean it.

con.mic

1. Scale down armed forces spending. Less overseas deployment, more emphasis on tech development. Forget about the "we are the world police" mentality.
2.Follow Chinas lead and deal with countries without considering their own domestic policies. Bitching about whether they have human rights or not gets the USA nowhere, just deal with them and get resources. If you don't, China or Russia definitely will.
3. Stop blind support for Israel. It is actually crazy that a foreign country has so much influence in USA politics. Any time a US president decides to take Israel on he is forced to U-turn or step back once the Israelli lobbys pressure is applied.
4. Stop worrying about Iran. Who cares if they have WMDs or not? The same goes for North Korea. Just a waste of time and money.
5.Get the fuck out of Afghanistan. What is the point in fighting over a mountain wasteland when you will never win. How Obama stayed there I will never understand.
6. Get out of Iraq. The war is over, but you are still there.
7. Concentrate on Intelligence, better border defence and a better image in Muslim countries. That is a much better approach to fighting terrorism

megatabbers

Put a plan into place where we'd actually pay for the world's oil rather than take it by brute force. It would be much more cost effective, plus we'd be a lot safer as a nation.

But... let's not kid ourselves. War is much too profitable for the small group of people that pull the world's strings.

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Linklover

Build up our armed forces into a non negotiable force clear into the future and be prepared to fight China for the world's resources. Best be prepared for cyber, bio and information war cause it's comin'.

cyber - they will take down our grid. say goodbye to all 200 of our nuke reactors and our electricity dependent JIT delivery system addicted populace.
Bio - get ready to hunker in place for up to 3 months as they unleash a bio weapon, most likely extremely virulent influenza. get ready to seal our borders to keep it out. watch for it as their own population revolts against food inflation and they try to thin their herd as well as ours.
Info - no preparation for these types of warfare will ever be made cause all of the owners of the MSM want into China. You'll never hear any of this on the nightly news. orders from Beijing.

for your reference...
"When we decide to revitalize China based on the German model, we must not repeat the mistakes they made."

And he means Hitler's model, which he states, specifically.

"Our Party’s historical mission is to lead the Chinese people to go out."

Liebestraum. Ask your family members how that worked out last time..

The Epoch Times | War Is Not Far from Us and Is the Midwife of the Chinese Century

Oh no, those guys wouldn't use biological weapons. And it's complete chance that this guy Haotian happens to be a general, and the Minister of Defense. Complete coincidence. Rolling Eyes

Here's John Derbyshire's take on it in the National Review:

Sino-Fascism - By John Derbyshire - The Corner - National Review Online

They just gave this idiot their equivalent of the Nobel Peace Prize, the "World Harmony Award" <<cough>> and that was LAST year so that guy Haotian is still a hero to them, officially, as are his views. You can be sure of the type of "harmony" they envision for the world.

Rebecca Novick: A Loyalist and a Tiananmen General Win China's Peace and Harmony Awards

King.

oh noes panic USA not sending any monies

give me a break. USA looks after itself, which means fucking over other countries if it has to. no country simply 'takes care' of another country out of charity. any aid you've given is merely to keep things stable for all the fucking up you're too busy doing the rest of the time. the middle east is unstable because everyone's been wanting a peice of it since before WW2. the brits, the russians, and now the americans.

con.mic

Not sure if serious

Falian

Although your post is "what would you do?", I'd rather just lay down some thoughts.

First off, I'd prefer to stay out of conflicts in the Middle East. However, it isn't that easy.

We have a huge vested interest in keeping OPEC, and through that oil, attached to the dollar. If countries can buy oil without using the dollar, then that's going to put a huge strain on an already hurting dollar.

Sure, getting involved could and is costing us billions of dollars. But, I like my dollars depreciating at 3-4% a year instead of 20% a year.

The truth of the matter is that there's very little any President can do. Why do you think every president since Reagen ages 20 years during their presidency? It's a stressful job being the captain of a sinking ship.

On to China, I find it hilarious how everyone get's so paranoid about them (not saying you are Jake).

First off, China isn't as invincible as most people like to believe.

China's credit is expanding wayyyy faster than it's GDP, about 3-4x as much. That's a huge sign of overheating and a bubble waiting to pop. They also posted their first trade deficit in 7 years.

Even if none of the above was true, why are marketers and businessmen of all people scared that 1+ billion people are becoming more wealthy? That's a huge market to sell to.

Competition breeds success.

I look forward to stacking paper with some Chinese ballers.

DeluxJonathon

We are helping people who hate us, while spending billions of dollars doing it. Obama is driving this country into bankruptcy, and starting more military operations where we have no business being. Everyone who was "anti-war" was just anti-bush. American soldier fatalities have shot up during 09-10, however anti-war protects have pretty much disappeared.

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Linklover

Dead serious. Read the speech he gave. he is a hero in China and is broadcasting the PRC's intentions. "depopulate the US through the use of bio-weapons"

thelorax

Holy hell the tables didn't paste.




Source-
iCasualties: Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom Casualties

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richcam

^^This. Its amusing seeing how americans justify their Government action as helping the world and now it has to stop because it has put "too much burden on them". You as a country might not benefit but some of you did/do, big time, so it wont.

con.mic

I mean't, not sure if your serious. Because obviously you don't know shit about foreign policy or China in general if your basing your China foreign policy on the ideas of some nutjob general in the CCP.

Sure China has some idiots who think that they should base their whole foreign policy on a coming war with the United States for supreme domination of the world and known galaxy, including Uranus.(Buhahahaha...evil voice) However, there also exists an equally deluded group of people in the United States who believe the same kind of thing. Luckily, these people are extremists, as well as idiots.

Most people don't take them seriously..

jeffrey

Too much hurr durrr to respond to from our wonderful international members.

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HardSale

Yes, by helping the world America benefited too. It's because of America that the world has enjoyed as much peace as it did for so long. America spent billions upon billions keeping the peace through massive military strength and all the while the world became dependent on America's protection. It's really fucking easy to be a pie in the sky socialist utopia when America is footing the bill for your defense.

But as always happens when you spoil the children, they get lazy and unappreciative.

Unfortunately for the world America's back is breaking so hopefully American's will be waking up soon and bidding the rest of the world a hearty fuck you. Protect your own borders. You deal with all of the despots and wanna-be dictators and "revolutionaries". Too bad we have a dumb-fuck Liberal as President who actually managed to get us involved in a third war in another shit-hole part of the world. He'll be a 1-termer.

We'll go ahead and keep our money and technology at home for while and see how the kids handle reality for the next few decades.

Hurr-Durr

I seriously don't get how US is still in the middle east. Osama bin Laden & Saddam are dead, seriously just get the fuck out of there.

ly2 from WF

BRO WE HAVEN'T COMPLETED SPREADING DEMOCRACY YET

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d_diggler

Fuckin aye!

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richcam

No, America is not helping the world, thats just the reason use by your leaders. People fight, dies, married, fucks with or without America. Like King says there is always a motive and believe you me, it is always in the best interest of America rather than the country is supposed to help. Which is actually fine, except in some cases its not even benefiting America as a country but rather a small group of people in America.

They way the world think about you is very different than the way you think the world think about you, y'know

megatabbers

notsureifserious.jpg

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craigmc

Maybe it's just me but, the Founding Fathers were very against getting involved in ANY foreign wars. As recently as Eisenhower many Presidents spoke out against this.

music4mic

We never cared about them in the first place. Obviously Bush's wars were about control of oil and establishment of a base the size of the Vatican.

Obama is just on a power trip, he seems to think he declare wars without oversight of congress. The guy is actually a little bit worse than Bush in some ways. He never wanted peace, he just wanted to get elected and he'll say whatever he can to keep his power.

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HardSale

Really? Is that why we have $5 gas and most of the contracts have gone to China? Maybe it was about Bush getting back at Saddam for daddy. Maybe it was for military industry but it sure as fuck wasn't about oil.

If it was about oil, and if it were like most other countries that have shed blood to invade another country, we'd have that shit pumping and enjoying the spoils of the victors.

lukep

Century of the Self is not relevant to this question; That's a totally different war that needs to be fought here on our homefront.

My answer for a Fix for our Foreign Policy:

The USA must go into isolationist mode for a bit. Our own problems are too big for now and we are way too broke. -So we should make a deal with the rest of the world (our allies) that they help keep us out of shit for a while (say 10 years?) and they'll get our best trade agreements while we're under.

We've been isolationists many times before, and most of the founding fathers were quite serious about being isolationists forever.

While we're in Isolation mode we need to do whatever it takes to become fiscally viable again, and yes, that necessitates taming the corporations.

To the rest of the world, we'd still be visitable, but there would be no budget whatsoever for anything that happens off US soil. This would cause undue stress on our allies when something like Japan or Haiti happens again, but they'd know it's temporary and are getting our trade agreements in the meantime.

When we emerge with new money and new laws to ensure the money stays put, China will finally have an opponent, instead of a wounded lamb to hunt.

About Oil: We have huge reserves, I think they'll do great at getting us through the 10 years. Solar, Nukes, & Wind should be the goal for energy, however.

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Linklover

we cannot be isolationists when our power grid and economic engines are at the mercy of the world banisters and foreign governments who want to destroy us.

Do we really need to allow another hitler with WMD take charge and call the shots...
Hummm... seems all of our factories have been relocated to a big country far away who believes they have the right to rule the world under one big "harmonious" leadership and are building a military who believes can take it if they can't buy it.

The world will NOT be a better place without America as the prominent player.

Lucidity

From a philosophical point of view, I would prefer that the role of the U.S. military be limited to national defense from eminent threats (no strategic interventions) and securing international trade channels, especially with our Navy. I'd rather us be pew pewing pirates than smart bombing camels.

Of course, that's a much easier ideal to uphold when you're a small underdog nation and not the world's reigning superpower. I don't pretend it could ever be as simple as just pulling all our guys back home at this point.

jeffrey

Uh, we have been losing our dominance for some time now. In fact, if we continue down this road we will lose much more of our power, hence why we need to go into isolation and fix the many problems - education, infrastructure, healthcare, etc, etc.

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Linklover

If we withdraw the world will cave in on us.

megatabbers

Speak of the fucking devil:

imf-bombshell-age-america-end-marketwatch: Personal Finance News from Yahoo! Finance

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jeffrey

Not really, China is exceptionally strong, Russia is still growing, there's no reason for us to be the world police when we have major issues here.

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lukep

Wow, not a lot of press on that one! -Good find, megatabbers.

From the article:

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-joe-

Yes, you have cheap oil compared to the rest of the west. We pay easily double what you guys pay.

REIMktg

Not just oil - we have a lot of reserves




of course the above includes natural gas - which by the way is a renewable energy source (for you green nuts) .


The price you pay is irrelevant. You pay too much so we should also? Gas should be $1.45 gallon. Supplies of oil are abundant. Gas is up because the Gov't wants is up - no basis in supply/demand - I here this on Bloomberg radio every week.

The gov't wants gas prices up because they are trying to destroy the US economy. period.

By the way, whomever mentioned Europe and how they are now recovered from WWII etc - so now they will again dominate? They will dominate if we continue toward copying their socialism. They will never dominate if we correct our current course back away from the crush of socialism.

One last thing - someone mentioned we are taking the oil from the Middle East.
1. Bullshit or prices would be lower. (as was mentioned)
2. Who's oil is it anyway? Did we not partner with oil producers, gave them our technology, our mental capital, etc - then they nationalized it all and told us to screw off and screw the agreements they made with us?

lukep

Wow, hadn't seen it put like that before. I now have a bit more respect for the USA, because this chart makes it blatantly obvious that our plan all along has been to dwindle everyone else's supply of oil before we touch our own.

Perhaps we will be #1 again, if Green tech doesn't step up soon enough.

Whoa - That also would be very strong evidence that we are artificially keeping green tech under wraps so we'll be able to sell all that oil someday!

NOW who killed the electric car?! </pulls tinfoil hat tighter>

Um, how is natural gas renewable? It still comes out of the ground, right?


<Removes tinfoil hat in awe of bigger tinfoil hat>
Hmm. So you're saying the US Government wants to destroy the economy directly? The US Government? What purpose would that serve exactly?

Lucy, you got some Esplainin' to do...

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REIMktg

Are you doubting the image and therefore claiming we do not have the reserves?

When I mentioned the "govt" - I meant the leaders of the government. There is an obvious intent to the policies of our government to harm the economy. You cannot see that?
1. Spending way more than we should.
2. Re-distributing wealth to non productive sectors.
3. Artificially keeping energy prices high, to reduce disposable income, crush the lower classes, and kill small business.
4. Allow unlimited cheap labor to once again lower wages, opportunity, etc for the lower and middle classes.
5. It goes on and on and on -

You cannot see that as intent?

Natural gas is renewable.

Natural gas is methane and other gasses. They treat it to take out the other gasses and leave the methane. Methane is the natural gas we use. Methane can come from everything from decomposing organic wastes produced in everything from existing landfills to decomposing grown grasses. It also comes from cows - and is renewable.



on a more serious note these are landfill gas generators



http://www.energyfromwaste.com/exper...fill-gas.shtml

lukep

No. It was interesting and I meant every letter of that "wow."

I already knew we had more than enough to go into isolation mode for years... But to have more oil than every other country save russia put together... That should be damn scary to the rest of the world.

Nobody can prove that intent, and in fact there are better explanations for all this crap:

A. The Popular answer: Bloated Beauracracy/ineptitude/laziness/incompetance on the part of our lawmakers and the system in general.

B. The CORRECT answer: Corporate lobbying and campaign funding have completely turned our system into something that serves Corporations, not taxpayers. It works EXACTLY how the big international corporations want it to... Primary goal: Profitable. (At our expense.)

I've never before heard anyone imply that our lawmakers have gotten in the system with the intent of breaking down the country... What would be their overall goal to do this?

Ahh, methane. I thought you were talking about Propane, which is mined. (Because it's a major consumer fuel, and methane is not.) My bad. So the answer here is that SOME natural gases are renewable. -Of course burning methane puts pollution in the atmosphere so I don't think many greenies will go for that solution for the long run either...

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hellblazer

Stop all foreign aid, withdraw all U.S. troops, stop the War on U.S. Energy, and let them all go to hell.

They say we need to be there because we need their oil, while they shut down every U.S. oil drilling company/coal company/natural gas company here at home. Isn't the solution obvious?

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lukep

God Dammit I hate it when HB and I agree!

...Now I've got to go and Re-think my position. It MUST be flawed...

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richcam

The terminology definition for natural gas is NOT renewable as bender boy puts it is coming out with fossil fuel which in theory may get depleted which is by definition is not renewable. Its natural aka not man made.

Landfill gas is biogas taken from municipal waste, garbage even human shit etc basically anything that emits methane. Biogas is renewable