Why do you hate the United States?

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Originally Posted by FunkyDexter

Oh, come on.

The Japanese strategy in WW2 was never to invade the US. They wanted to protect their Asian interests and to do that they attempted to set up a wide naval perimiter and make it difficult for the US to attack them. Even while they were doing this they knew that the US would eventually overpower them but they hoped they would be able to hold the US back long enough for them to negotiate a beneficial peace which would allow them to keep their mainland holdings. Pearl Harbour was intended to delay the US's ability to respond as part of that strategy or (and this was their most optimistic projection) that the US would lack the stomach for a fight and acknowledge their claims on the spot. It was never meant as a precursor to invasion.

This is well documented, by the way.

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Hawaii is part of the US and while you are right that there was no real plan to invade the continental US some feel there was a plan to invade and conquer Hawaii. This however was put out of consideration due to US victories (most notably Midway). Had the Japanese been successful in their campaigns in the Pacific some historians believe that there was a possibility of an attack an invasion of Hawaii (although you are correct that most feel that Midway was the farthest Japan was willing to go).

My point is had the Pacific war had gone bad for the US their soverienty could have been threatened by Japan through an attack on Hawaii.

X

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Originally Posted by visualAd

I do believe he is not joking; you appear to misunderstander the meaning of sovereignty.

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I guess crashing planes into major buildings being or daily intrusions via the Internet in order to collapse the US government doesn't qualify.

Mark are you really 20? You seem to have a lot of 'anger' (wrong word maybe) for a 20 year old.

Pino

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Originally Posted by FunkyDexter

Really!!?? You must be extremely old. I'm not aware that the USA's sovereignty has been threatened in well over a century. . .

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Hey do you remember Pearl Harbor I am quite sure that it was in all of the papers. Some of you Brits seem to suffer from a persecution complex.


Hmmm, Lets do a little math: 2008 - 1941 = 67 years.

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Originally Posted by Pino

Mark are you really 20? You seem to have a lot of 'anger' (wrong word maybe) for a 20 year old.

Pino

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No, my friend I am quite a bit older that 20, my "birthday" is the date I started my current job! As for my "anger", I get angry when ignorant people talk about issues they have not idea what they are talking about ;-), OK Pino.

Why did you assume Dexter is a brit?

Also why do you assume people are ignorant because they don't agree with you. You can be wrong too just like all of us, or are you special? You obviously love your country and thats fine but dont ask for opinions that make you angry. I dont want people falling out and I dont want to see this thread turn into a bitchy debate.

Pino

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Originally Posted by grilkip

I'd like to hear where you fought, because whether your fight was productive or not could be in question. :D . . .

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I would love to tell you where but unfortunately I can't, sorry.

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Originally Posted by Mark Gambo

So if it bothers you so much that I am a big "flag waver" then do yourself a favor don't read my posts better yet there is a function on VBF where you can ignore a particular user, I suggest that you utilize this feature because I am not going away and I will continue to espouse the virtues of the US whenever it comes under attack.by bombs or by the pen (or the keyboard).

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Originally Posted by grilkip

. . . Can't take the heat? You know the saying...

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What line in my statement, conveys to you that I can't "Take the Heat"? Your statement makes no sense.

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Originally Posted by FunkyDexter

Oh, come on.

The Japanese strategy in WW2 was never to invade the US . . .

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I think destroying war ships and killing thousands of poeple qualifies as an invasion.

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Hawaii is part of the US and while ...

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Agreed and I believe that Hawaii actually was included within the perimiter the Japanese would have like to create in an ideal world. So was the chain of Island that extend Westward from Alaska (can't remember what they're called). I really don't think that represents a threat to the US's sovereignty, though. Had they managed to occupy them (which they were a million miles from achieving) they would almost certainly have been bargained back to the US as part of a peace deal. To reiterate, the Japanese had no intention of reducing the US to some sort of subservient state (which is what I think most people would call a loss of sovereignty), they were trying to achieve the most favourable peace possible.

The worst case for the US would have been if the Allies lost with Hitler dominating Europe and West Asia, Italy dominating Africa and Japan dominating East Asia and the Pacific. But the US would still have retained it's sovereign status, albeit as something of a political pariah. It's possible that a subsequent conflict would have seen an invasion of the continental US but it was simply not on the cards in WW2.

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I guess crashing planes into major buildings being or daily intrusions via the Internet in order to collapse the US government doesn't qualify

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No. They don't. 9/11 represented a threat to your security, certainly, but it really doesn't come close to representing a threat to your sovereignty. As for internet attacks, I'm not sure what your referring to. I have no doubt the US Government (and every other government) is subject to lots of attacks but I'm not conviced any of them would represent a threat to your sovereignty. If you have a specific example in mind then post the details, I'd love to read about it (I'm not being sarcastic here, I really would find it fascinating).

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Originally Posted by Pino

Also why do you assume people are ignorant because they don't agree with you. . .

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No Pino, I don't think people who are ignorant just because we disagree, I think people who make generalizations about things that they have never witnessed and only rely on the half truths of other to formulate their opinions of an entire country.

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Originally Posted by Pino

You can be wrong too just like all of us, or are you special?

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Oh course I am wrong sometimes, but do you have strong beliefs that you are passionate about?

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Originally Posted by Pino

. . . You obviously love your country and thats fine but dont ask for opinions that make you angry. . .

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As I have probably said at least three time in this thread, my initial intent for this post was to be funny, but that notion crashed and burned quickly :-(

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Originally Posted by Pino

. . . I dont want people falling out and I dont want to see this thread turn into a bitchy debate.

Pino

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Sorry to inform you of this but I think it already has "turned into a bitchy debate. But I for one enjoy a spirited debate.

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Originally Posted by Mark Gambo

I guess crashing planes into major buildings being or daily intrusions via the Internet in order to collapse the US government doesn't qualify.

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You guess correctly, it doesn't qualify as a threat to sovereignty.... but even if it did, and you were fighting to defend against that, what where you doing, manning anti-aircraft guns on September 11th 2001?.

I will have to agree with X though, Pearl Harbour was a plausable threat to Hawaii, so the last time was 67 years ago.

Either way it doesn't really matter. I strongly believe that if you have served in the military or not, does not effect the value of your opinion. So it is a moot point. To imply that people who don't have a military record are some how unpatriotic or not willing to defend their country is just silly. Many people work to make their country a better place without ever joining up. What about the US businessman who goes to the trouble of learning Japanese etiquet in order to strengthen ties with Japan, the US health care worker who volunteers in Africa, hell, even the student backpacking around Europe who leaves some Europeans with a better opinion of the US after seeing that he's not like the stereotype they always see on TV.
All of these people are making the US more secure in their own way.

But, like I say it's a moot point. I believe that Gambo just mispoke (to use a Hillary Clinton approach) when he said Sovereignty, and he just meant that he served in the armed forces. I think we are getting too tied up in symantics.

I've just got back from Pakistan and quite a few things struck me about the people out there:

1) They are incredibly friendly and hospitable; I visited a family (8 people) in Balakot whose house collapsed in the earthquake and they've since spent a year living in a tent and another in a tin shack. They don't have much, but what they do have they insisted upon sharing with me.

2) In general they are quite pi$$ed off about the image their country has abroad; that all we ever hear about is bombs and Taliban and mullahs. I've felt more threatened in New York than I did in Islamabad, and more likely to get shot in Indiana than in the North-West Frontier. Of course there are places where you can go to find trouble, but that's the same of every country.

3) They're pretty modern as a nation. They like mobile phones, Ray-Bans and jeans. About 30% of the women have no head covering at all and about the same proportion of the men are clean-shaven. There are a few women who wear the full head and face covering, but I've seen just as many in Sparkhill in Birmingham. I was never approached by a screaming mullah.

4) In general, they feel that Muslims are under attack. Firstly, part of their faith is something called the Ummah; namely that all Muslims are "brothers" and an assault on one is an assault on them all. But beyond this, they hear the rhetoric of how the Taliban are a bunch of bomb-loving America-haters and how Pakistan is full of crazed lunatics and they know that it isn't the case. I've met some Taliban - it's a bit like saying "I've met someone from Virginia", it is more about race than religious fanaticism - they aren't all signed up to the extremist views that some of their fellows have. Consequently, they believe that if Western media is portraying a biased view of what's going on in Pakistan, then they're likely to be biased regarding Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan etc. From there, it's a short step to feeling that the West has got an agenda.
Many Pakistanis are buying land and property in Islamabad, because they're actually worried that it might cease to be safe for them in the West.

5) They're hearing reports that Obama is talking about going in to Pakistan next if he wins the election. Coincidentally, they've recently made significant oil discoveries.

6) There's a lot of conspiracy theory. It's fairly typical of people to want to blame somebody else for their problems, but combined with the "evidence" that they think they've seen, a lot of Pakistanis believe that the US set out to destabilise Iraq, seize the oil and kill some Muslims, and that the same is planned for Afghanistan, Iran and Pakistan. I've explained that actually, America is neither powerful enough nor sufficiently well organised to take on all this at once and that the situation in Iraq nowadays is very likely to be through incompetence, over-confidence and a lack of direction than some hidden agenda. For the most part, they can see that this is also likely to be true.



Basically my point is that we shouldn't make the mistake of thinking that people over there are stupid, nor backward, ill-informed, fundamentalist or in any way different from us. There's a small minority that seem to think it's OK to want to go out and kill other people and spread fear and hatred, but it is far from the majority. They also think that there is a similar minority group in the West; the difference is that in the West, that group is in charge.

FunkyDexter,

What about Japanese (Here also) and German invasions of the US mainland during WW 2?

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Originally Posted by SurfDemon

. . . But, like I say it's a moot point. I believe that Gambo just mispoke (to use a Hillary Clinton approach) when he said Sovereignty, and he just meant that he served in the armed forces. I think we are getting too tied up in symantics.

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One of the few thing that I will agree with you in this thread :-)

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Originally Posted by Mark Gambo

One of the few thing that I will agree with you in this thread :-)

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Sorry, it was a momentary lapse ;)

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Originally Posted by SurfDemon

Sorry, it was a momentary lapse ;)

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I understand, you probably haven't been feeling well lately, ok I will go easy on you until you are feeling better ;-)

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Originally Posted by FunkyDexter

Agreed and I believe that Hawaii actually was included within the perimiter the Japanese would have like to create in an ideal world. So was the chain of Island that extend Westward from Alaska (can't remember what they're called). I really don't think that represents a threat to the US's sovereignty, though. Had they managed to occupy them (which they were a million miles from achieving) they would almost certainly have been bargained back to the US as part of a peace deal. To reiterate, the Japanese had no intention of reducing the US to some sort of subservient state (which is what I think most people would call a loss of sovereignty), they were trying to achieve the most favourable peace possible.

The worst case for the US would have been if the Allies lost with Hitler dominating Europe and West Asia, Italy dominating Africa and Japan dominating East Asia and the Pacific. But the US would still have retained it's sovereign status, albeit as something of a political pariah. It's possible that a subsequent conflict would have seen an invasion of the continental US but it was simply not on the cards in WW2.

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No you are right Japan had no intention on “taking over” the entire US through mainland invasion. However you must concede that the possibility of an attack and occupation of Hawaii would constitute a threat to the sovereignty of the US. Included in this (which I totally forgot about, thanks for the reminder) was Japan’s military takeover of a couple of the Aleutian Islands in Alaska.

So while you are correct Japan could not possibly cause a loss of sovereignty to the US, it did however pose a threat, which is what you had originally posted.

X

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I've just got back from Pakistan...

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That's really interesting. I've got quite a few Lebanese freinds myself and, when Israel went into Lebanon last year, I remember reading all the opinions (not here but generally) about how the Lebanese were all a bunch of terrorists (I'm paraphrasing, obviously) and thinking it was really weird. After all, the people I know like partying, shopping, playing computer games and drinking (some muslims are less devout than others, I guess :rolleyes:). They're educated, moderate and laid back. Basically, they're me! Oh, and their girls are drop dead gorgeous. It's also worth mentioning that a significant proportion (maybe a third of my freinds) aren't actually muslims.

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Aleutian Islands

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Yep, that's 'em :).

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So while you are correct Japan could not possibly cause a loss of sovereignty to the US, it did however pose a threat, which is what you had originally posted.

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That reads like a contradiction to me. A threat isn't real unless there's a possibility of it coming to pass. The US's sovereignty can't have been threatened unless they were in danger of losing it... and they weren't, at any point. As has been mentioned already, though, we're in serious danger of descending into pedantry here though.

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I think destroying war ships and killing thousands of poeple qualifies as an invasion.

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I don't think it does qualify. It doesn't even meet the definition you've linked to, unless you're talking about definition 3 which really isn't covering a military invasion but rathaer talks about invasive diseases etc. Unless troops go in on the ground I don't think I'd call it an invasion. However, if, in your terms, air attacks, baloons and damage shipping etc. constitute an invasion, then, yes, the US was not only under threat of invasion during WW2 but the threat came to fruition, I just disagree with your terms. It was not, however, under threat of losing it's sovereignty, which is what you declared you had fought to protect.

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Originally Posted by Xanith

Included in this (which I totally forgot about, thanks for the reminder) was Japan’s military takeover of a couple of the Aleutian Islands in Alaska.

So while you are correct Japan could not possibly cause a loss of sovereignty to the US, it did however pose a threat, which is what you had originally posted.

X

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That's pretty ironic. Technically, it was an invasion of the US mainland, but the Japanese then left. Turns out, the Japanese didn't like those islands any better than we do. Is it a threat to soveriegnty when somebody takes something you really don't much like yourself?

I suppose it does. The only reason the US holds onto those miserable chunks of rock is because of territorial waters and fishing rights. We don't give a rats arse about them otherwise.

Betamax.

Americans, generally speaking, are arrogant isolationists. Luckily there are exceptions and many USA members in CC forum are worldly enough to realise there is a small chance there are better countries to live in apart from the USA. They may ultimately decide not - but will at least consider the notion.

What I do LIKE about America is the lack of "tall poppy syndrome" that plaugues Australia's society.

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Originally Posted by Mark Gambo

I guess crashing planes into major buildings being or daily intrusions via the Internet in order to collapse the US government doesn't qualify.

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No, they don't.

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Originally Posted by zaza

I've just got back from Pakistan and quite a few things struck me about the people out there:

1) They are incredibly friendly and hospitable; I visited a family (8 people) in Balakot whose house collapsed in the earthquake and they've since spent a year living in a tent and another in a tin shack. They don't have much, but what they do have they insisted upon sharing with me.

2) In general they are quite pi$$ed off about the image their country has abroad; that all we ever hear about is bombs and Taliban and mullahs. I've felt more threatened in New York than I did in Islamabad, and more likely to get shot in Indiana than in the North-West Frontier. Of course there are places where you can go to find trouble, but that's the same of every country.

3) They're pretty modern as a nation. They like mobile phones, Ray-Bans and jeans. About 30% of the women have no head covering at all and about the same proportion of the men are clean-shaven. There are a few women who wear the full head and face covering, but I've seen just as many in Sparkhill in Birmingham. I was never approached by a screaming mullah.

4) In general, they feel that Muslims are under attack. Firstly, part of their faith is something called the Ummah; namely that all Muslims are "brothers" and an assault on one is an assault on them all. But beyond this, they hear the rhetoric of how the Taliban are a bunch of bomb-loving America-haters and how Pakistan is full of crazed lunatics and they know that it isn't the case. I've met some Taliban - it's a bit like saying "I've met someone from Virginia", it is more about race than religious fanaticism - they aren't all signed up to the extremist views that some of their fellows have. Consequently, they believe that if Western media is portraying a biased view of what's going on in Pakistan, then they're likely to be biased regarding Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan etc. From there, it's a short step to feeling that the West has got an agenda.
Many Pakistanis are buying land and property in Islamabad, because they're actually worried that it might cease to be safe for them in the West.

5) They're hearing reports that Obama is talking about going in to Pakistan next if he wins the election. Coincidentally, they've recently made significant oil discoveries.

6) There's a lot of conspiracy theory. It's fairly typical of people to want to blame somebody else for their problems, but combined with the "evidence" that they think they've seen, a lot of Pakistanis believe that the US set out to destabilise Iraq, seize the oil and kill some Muslims, and that the same is planned for Afghanistan, Iran and Pakistan. I've explained that actually, America is neither powerful enough nor sufficiently well organised to take on all this at once and that the situation in Iraq nowadays is very likely to be through incompetence, over-confidence and a lack of direction than some hidden agenda. For the most part, they can see that this is also likely to be true.



Basically my point is that we shouldn't make the mistake of thinking that people over there are stupid, nor backward, ill-informed, fundamentalist or in any way different from us. There's a small minority that seem to think it's OK to want to go out and kill other people and spread fear and hatred, but it is far from the majority. They also think that there is a similar minority group in the West; the difference is that in the West, that group is in charge.

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Even Mendhak and I assumed you would be coming back in parts. :blush: //throws away the box for your head. I know this thread is about the stereo type of the Americans and the misconceptions of those who hold that stereotype.

But other nations, races and people are also stereotyped in a bad way. Many of them are formed by the behaviours of minorities rather than majorites.

Tall Poppy Syndrome?

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Originally Posted by FunkyDexter

Tall Poppy Syndrome?

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I was wondering the same...

Stick out of the poppy field (be more visible than others) and get your head chopped off.

I'm assuming that's what he means, there is a similar local saying.

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Originally Posted by visualAd

No, they don't.

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Your opinion and you know what they say about opinions, right?

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Originally Posted by Mark Gambo

Your opinion and you know what they say about opinions, right?

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Yeah: don't worry about trying to have your own, just go to Mark Gambo. He's got plenty to spare. ;)

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Originally Posted by penagate

Yeah: don't worry about trying to have your own, just go to Mark Gambo. He's got plenty to spare. ;)

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Hey Pen, I guess since I don't agree with you, then my opinion doesn't matter, huh? That is very elitist attitude, wouldn't you say? Oh yeah, I forgot you don't consider yourself as an elitist, but you seem to think that your opinions are the only thing that matter. So since I don't think and talk (in this case write) like you consider me a Proletarian and just like in the old Soviet Union if I don't shut up and speak the party line, the secret police will come and take me away to the gulag never to be seen and heard of again.

You seem very defensive. My comment was meant merely in jest.

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Originally Posted by penagate

You seem very defensive. My comment was meant merely in jest.

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So was mine ;-)

I guess Shaggy was right: Some people can't make some jokes. That seems to include both of us at the moment. :D

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Originally Posted by penagate

I guess Shaggy was right: Some people can't make some jokes. That seems to include both of us at the moment. :D

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We are allowed to have a "Spirited" debate and still remain friendly, right?

Of course. Although I am not really sure what this debate is now about, whether it is a debate any longer, or even whether it was ever a debate at all. Perhaps there is one in disguise, but no-one has uncovered it yet.

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Originally Posted by grilkip

Stick out of the poppy field (be more visible than others) and get your head chopped off.

I'm assuming that's what he means, there is a similar local saying.

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The tallest poppy is the first to be cut. Essentially, although we encourage everyone to have a go, if someone actually does do well they are then criticised for it. I think we may have inherited this culture from the British; I'm not sure. Certainly we have 'perfected' it.

The only exception to this seems to be sportspeople, although even they are not really immune these days.

To be honest, I don't see this as a problem. It keeps Australia, as a society, rather down-to-earth. You can have your dreams, but don't let them corrupt you.

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The tallest poppy is the first to be cut. Essentially, although we encourage everyone to have a go, if someone actually does do well they are then criticised for it. I think we may have inherited this culture from the British; I'm not sure.

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Oh, I see. Yeah, you definitely got that from us and I suspect we'd perfected it long before we gave it to you. Actually, one of the best things about the US is that they celebrate success instead of condemning it.

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Originally Posted by FunkyDexter

. . . Actually, one of the best things about the US is that they celebrate success instead of condemning it.

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FunkyD,
You feeling ok today? ;) :D

Different views of sovereignties

There exist vastly differing views on the moral bases of sovereignty. These views translate into various bases for legal systems:

* Partisans of the divine right of kings argue that the monarch is sovereign by divine right, and not by the agreement of the people. Taken to its conclusion, this may translate into a system of absolute monarchy.
* The second book of Jean-Jacques Rousseau's Du Contrat Social, ou Principes du droit politique (1762) deals with sovereignty and its rights. Sovereignty, or the general will, is inalienable, for the will cannot be transmitted; it is indivisible, since it is essentially general; it is infallible and always right, determined and limited in its power by the common interest; it acts through laws. Law is the decision of the general will in regard to some object of common interest, but though the general will is always right and desires only good, its judgment is not always enlightened, and consequently does not always see wherein the common good lies; hence the necessity of the legislator. But the legislator has, of himself, no authority; he is only a guide who drafts and proposes laws, but the people alone (that is, the sovereign or general will) has authority to make and impose them.
* Democracy is based on the concept of popular sovereignty. Representative democracies permit (against Rousseau's thought) a transfer of the exercise of sovereignty from the people to the parliament or the government. Parliamentary sovereignty refers to a representative democracy where the Parliament is, ultimately, the source of sovereignty, and not the executive power.
* Anarchists and some libertarians deny the sovereignty of states and governments. Anarchists often argue for a specific individual kind of sovereignty, such as the Anarch as a sovereign individual. Salvador Dalí, for instance, talked of "anarcho-monarchist" (as usual, tongue in cheek); Antonin Artaud of Heliogabalus: Or, The Crowned Anarchist; Max Stirner of The Ego and Its Own; Georges Bataille and Jacques Derrida of a kind of "antisovereignty". Therefore, anarchists join a classical conception of the individual as sovereign of himself, which forms the basis of political consciousness. The unified consciousness is sovereignty over one's own body, as Nietzsche demonstrated (see also Pierre Klossowski's book on Nietzsche and the Vicious Circle). See also self-ownership and Sovereignty of the individual.
* Republican form of government acknowledges that the sovereign power is founded in the people, individually, not in the collective or whole body of free citizens, as in a democratic form. Thus no majority can deprive a minority of their sovereign rights and powers.
* Imperialists hold a universal view of sovereignty where power exists with those of conservative or right-wing ideology, who defend individual states, territories and people from those who wish to subvert them or hand over sovereignty to left-wing forms of government, such as Marxism-Federalism. In alliance, and from any level, these people legislate for laws which grant the rights to capitalism, nationalism, hereditary power and royalism.

The key element of sovereignty in the legalistic sense is that of exclusivity of jurisdiction.

Specifically, when a decision is made by a sovereign entity, it cannot generally be overruled by a higher authority. Further, it is generally held that another legal element of sovereignty requires not only the legal right to exercise power, but the actual exercise of such power. ("No de jure sovereignty without de facto sovereignty.") In other words, neither claiming/being proclaimed Sovereign, nor merely exercising the power of a Sovereign is sufficient; sovereignty requires both elements.

Courtesy of wiki

I'm afraid that none of these views on sovereignty include a mandate against destroying buildings. If we expand it to include that, then i'm afraid that the US is threatened every time a tourist or illegal immigrant crashes their car or robs a liquor store. :ehh:

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Originally Posted by MaximilianMayrhofer

. . . I'm afraid that none of these views on sovereignty include a mandate against destroying buildings. If we expand it to include that, then i'm afraid that the US is threatened every time a tourist or illegal immigrant crashes their car or robs a liquor store. :ehh:

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or crashes a plane into a building :eek: :eek2:

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Originally Posted by Mark Gambo

or crashes a plane into a building :eek: :eek2:

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What's with you and 9/11?
Is that the only argument you find rock-solid?

Now, I would like you to take some time and give a serious look at this movie.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7E3oIbO0AWE
I'm not saying they have the answers, I'm not saying nothing happened but this is a perfect example of looking from another point of view.