I go to a very liberal university, which has by and large been good for me. I was raised by a military Republican, and thusly had in the past developed some very conservative viewpoints. Class discussion and study have helped moderate my views considerably. For that, I'm thankful.

However, I've noticed that students of government (much like politicians) are animals of the extreme. They're either extreme right or extreme left. At least the ones who speak up in class are. Perhaps this can be credited to the fact that being among the extremist viewpoints, they're a bit more passionate about their argument than a moderate such as myself. I tend to be more open to discussion about an issue, maybe bend my perspective a bit.

Not these clowns.

So...still being a conservative at heart, I turn red when I hear some right winger spout off overly patriotic, bigot-laiden bile from his/her narrow minded mouth. I'm embarrassed that they probably have similiar voting patterns to me. I don't think America should behave in such an imperialist manner. International institutions are important and valid. This isn't the Westphalian System any longer and sovereignty should be second to the good of mankind. Diplomacy is important, as is compromise. The War in Iraq was wrong.

That being said...

The only thing that's more obnoxious than an ignorant conservative is an ignorant liberal. Small c's and l's respectively. A liberal, who due to the yuppy movement of the 1980's has been brainwashed by Hollywood and a liberal media into believing that America is the Great Satan in everything it does.

We were roleplaying a hypothetical scenario in class today. The situation was that North Korea, in a scheme to make money, was selling nuclear weaponry to terrorist groups. Someone brought up the valid point that should the nuclear weaponry be used against the United States, should the US economy collapse, wouldn't it be counter-productive as the world economy would consequently be crippled as well? The money N. Korea made off the nukes would be de-valued to such an extent that it would be near worthlessness. The only thing they would garner would be blame for collapsing the economy and starting a depression.

So then a student holds up his hand and says:

"See? This is exactly the type of egocentric viewpoint that is typical of this country. The world existed before the United States, and the world will go on existing AFTER."

First off, he's essentially correct. Yes. There was a world before and of course there will be a world after. But the FACTS are there man! I'm not proclaiming American superiority or justified foreign policy, but the FACT IS we're the largest economy in the world. Just like we would suffer should other economies fall, the world would suffer should we fall, just exponentially. Again, I'm not saying that's reason for us to trample over people as we have, but it's the truth.

This guy has been so brainwashed by the media and Hollywood, that he ACTUALLY believes he's not permitted to say anything even REMOTELY positive about his country. He's the kind of guy who you could say: "Hey, last year we sent 3 billion dollars in aid to Africa and we're increasing it this year." and he would simply respond: "Yeah, but how much of our budget does THAT make up? We could send more." Of course we could asshole! So could you! You could have NOT bought that Banana Republic sweater for $65 bucks and fed some starving Ethiopian for weeks!!! But you didn't did you?! Nope...it's so much easier just to assail a big faceless government with your putrid, mindless diatribe about humanity and how much you want to help without getting YOUR hands dirty.

Here are the facts dumbass. America became powerful. America stuck it's nose in a whole bunch of business that it shouldn't have to beat the Soviets. Now, we have to figure out a way either to haul our ass out of these situations or we have to beat the attackers into submission. No, they're not intrinsically EVIL. They're skewed. They're born into a situation that sucks, they're told USA is the bad guy. What would you do?

We need to return to diplomacy and multilateralism. We need to stop trying to make the rules. The latest estimates predict that America will remain dominant for some time to come, but eventually all empires fall. It's our decision whether we want to lower ourselves gracefully or collapse in on ourselves. We need friends. But in order to expect them to deal with us in an upfront, truthful manner (fuck you Jacque Chirac), we need to reciprocate in kind.

We're not the great evil. We're just big. We have the power to do great good (and we do!) and the power to do great harm (and we do!). Nothing's black and white, and the sooner meatsacks like the kid at the front of my class start thinking critically and pragmatically, the better. That way, when WE'RE the ones in power, we won't be poll-watching imperialist assholes like the administration right now.

Rant over.

:oops: Sheesh here have a peanut.