Most Americans truly believe that even when we "screw up" (ex. Iraq) it is with the best of intentions and that somehow mitigates the results.

I'm not sure this is true--I have found, in conversation with people who speak AS IF they hold such a belief, that many times, when more context and factual information is presented, those people AGREE that there's lots of US policy which is "unfair" in a theoretical sense.

It seems to me more likely that our media (coupled with government information and an oddly one-sided education about "history") is just very effective at covering things with the most positive possible spin on any/all US actions.

Also, generally, the more highly-educated the citizen is, the more likely they are to become entangled in the indoctrination without being at all conscious of it. And no one CARES what poor/uneducated people think, even though they're the majority, because they have no power.

We will get nowhere with any of this until Americans are thoroughly disabused of the notion that we are somehow "different" from the rest of the world.

Most Americans truly believe that even when we "screw up" (ex. Iraq) it is with the best of intentions and that somehow mitigates the results. Most Americans continue to be lulled by the notion that our Constitution automatically protects us from the kind of abuses suffered by other countries.(The Constitution! Just draft, ratify and start consuming!)

This not only makes us lazy, it has made it virtually impossible for us to evaluate our own domestic and extra-national human rights abuses with anything approaching the clarity with which we see abuses in other countries.

The American activists who traveled to Beijing during the Olympics to unfurl bannners calling for the "liberation" of Tibet received much adulation from the American Culture Class, while both groups remained fairly ignorant (or only marginally concerned) about the systematic human rights and political abuses that were occurring on our own soil at the hands of a rogue administration, compliant Congress, and accomplice mainstream media.

And we wonder so many countries find our overseas "human rights" concerns so ludicrous even when they're not being used as a smokescreen for Wars of Empire.

Should we cease caring about non-American humans and their rights? Of course not. But when the plane loses cabin pressure, there's a reason we're instructed to put our own oxygen mask on first before attempting to help other passengers.

The last eight years may have been unprecedented in terms of the ideological abuses towards the Constitution of the United States. But you can't believe this is the root of the current world wide financial crisis. What I'm wondering, though, is this: would it be possible to put in a Constitutional amendment to prevent, should the radicals again come to power, a reversal of any gains which might be made in the present administration?

Did anyone see Eric Holder at his press conference Wednesday 3/4 discussing the dump of the 9 Bush OLC memos?

He kept referring to what what done as contrary to our "Constitutional traditions"; not as violations of law; or of the executive oath to uphold, protect and defend the Constitution; or even a lawyer's duty to act in good faith, not as an enabler of criminality.

It was really striking the way he avoided saying those things.

What is a "Constitutional tradition"? Something like an Easter egg roll on the Whitehouse lawn? Giving Thanksgiving pardons to turkeys?

Ah, yes, those quaint old traditions in the Bill of Rights !

"I attribute that to my mother, who constantly badgered me to become a doctor, preferably a neurosurgeon, "so at least I can hold my head up at lunch"

You have to be a neurosurgeon to hold your head up at lunch!!

I'd have thought just not being too drunk and having decent neck muscles would have cracked it.

and the power structure in their hands( hence the new laws) - but by the time the election came around - hell, there wasn't much of it left to keep. .

They looked at the sorry carcass and said "Nah, its not worth the bother"

@Pedinska March 4, 2009 04:48 PM PST:

AI - you're a classic overachiever. Compromise - put the seat down, but leave the lid up! I really think this is what's working against you with Myrna.

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I attribute that to my mother, who constantly badgered me to become a doctor, preferably a neurosurgeon, "so at least I can hold my head up at lunch with the goils."

Although I skipped med school altogether, I try to make it up to Mom in whatever small ways I can, like putting down the toilet lid and chewing my food three hundred times before I swallow.

As far as Myrna is concerned, I'm beginning to wonder if she isn't a little on the fickle side, even for a liberated woman.

I mean, I'm into polyamory as much as the next guy, but there is, after all, such a thing as penicillin resistance, and so maybe the toilet lid thing is also an unconscious defense mechanism.

So while I still believe in "nothing contracted, nothing enjoyably ventured", I'd just as soon the something contracted be penicillin sensitive, so I can live to chew another day.

all of this talk abot turdjidity and such is way far byyond me comprohention. Zoltun just scribes it as "sportin a woody" and doesnt go teknikel.

Zoltun has a way with wurds tho.

He also puts saren wrap on the turlet at partys which gave the gurls fits.

Zoltun is a real fun time even with his teeny weenie.

have noone seen calamari? he said he wuz hung like a horse and Zoltun said it must be a see horse.

but I feel compelled to answer since I started it.

Anonymust - good idea. If I can figure out how to avoid having to help change the sheets I might try it.

AI - you're a classic overachiever. Compromise - put the seat down, but leave the lid up! I really think this is what's working against you with Myrna.

Arne - I always knew you were considerate. This just proves it.

Bill Owen - don't think I haven't considered it! But it's hard to stomach shelling out the bucks when he was so concerned about getting it right before we got married!

Blunderdog - it never occurred to me that toilet design could be an issue. As for the other, there's a joke, the punchline is "This water sure is cold." "Yeah, and it's deep too!"

There are times when I wish I was on the west coast, instead of being held hostage to EST. This is one of them. ;-}