USA face problem

Avatar · Jan 23, 2007

Refering to this BBC article: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/6288933.stm

Well, it seems the USA is heading towards another phase of isolationist politics, only this time it appears that the rest of the world is isolating itself from the USA, as far as it is possible the USA being a superpower and all.
A superpower that nobody appears to like because it is acting as if the rest of the world isn't there.

Question: are americans ok with that? Tall, proud of something, alone, oppressing others.

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S.A.M. · Jan 23, 2007

He has long-argued that Americans need to better understand how their policies appear to others.

"To communicate effectively," he has written, "Americans must first learn to listen."
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This is the crux of the issue.

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TW Scott · Jan 23, 2007

The problem is that this is just a approve-disapprove poll. Without further and more indepth questions we cannot be sure for the reasons of the approve-disapprove. It could be that they don't think we do enough in Iraq, didn't crush NK when we should have, didn't talk hard enough with Iran, or any number of things. All this shows is that quite a few people are unhappy.

Not everything popular is right and not everything right is popular.

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Avatar · Jan 23, 2007

"Right" itself is something very subjective.
What might be right for you, may not be right for others.

And I doubt that the respondents really ment that the USA should have gone all the way and nuked Iraq.
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Prince_James · Jan 23, 2007

When much of the world attempts to shit on America repeateldy, whyever should we listen to them?

The way Islamic countries "communicate with the United States" is to commit terrorist actions.

The way North Korea "communicates with the United States" is by exploding a fission weapon.

The way Africa "communicates with the United States" is stealing our aid money.

spuriousmonkey · Jan 23, 2007

When much of the world attempts to shit on America repeateldy, whyever should we listen to them?
America shits on the world. You failed to listen.

The way Islamic countries "communicate with the United States" is to commit terrorist actions.
Because you failed to listen.

The way North Korea "communicates with the United States" is by exploding a fission weapon.
Because you failed to listen.

The way Africa "communicates with the United States" is stealing our aid money.
The US is making a nice profit of Africa. I wouldn't be to worried about them stealing some petty cash. Why did the US fuck up in somalia? Failed to listen.

Prince_James · Jan 23, 2007

America shits on the world. You failed to listen.
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And that is why we spend billions in aid and have committed no atrocities to any people in our 225 year history.

Because you failed to listen.
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Yes, we failed to listen to stop being "the great Satan" and to institute shariah. Right.

Because you failed to listen.
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Don't you think they fail to listen to their starving people? Or how about the women Kim Jung'il abducts and rapes?

The US is making a nice profit of Africa. I wouldn't be to worried about them stealing some petty cash. Why did the US fuck up in somalia? Failed to listen.
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What money, outside the diamond industry?

redarmy11 · Jan 23, 2007

Prince_James said: ↑

What money, outside the diamond industry?
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spuriousmonkey · Jan 23, 2007

Prince_James said: ↑

And that is why we spend billions in aid and have committed no atrocities to any people in our 225 year history.
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The list of atrocities is so long it is embarassing. I'm not going to name them all. Once again a clear example that americans do not listen.

Two nuclear weapons used on civilian targets.
vietnam war.
Invasion of Iraq.
The removal of many democratic regimes.
The teaching of torture to dictatorial regimes.
Support of terrorist organizations such as mujahideen or contras in Nicaragua.

Prince_James said: ↑

Yes, we failed to listen to stop being "the great Satan" and to institute shariah. Right.
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A typical response of someone who has not listened to the ME.

Prince_James said: ↑

Don't you think they fail to listen to their starving people? Or how about the women Kim Jung'il abducts and rapes?
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Once again you are just showing reluctance to engage in a dialogue with North Korean.

Prince_James said: ↑

What money, outside the diamond industry?
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Educate yourself. Nigeria for example is sitting on a huge oil reserve.

S.A.M. · Jan 23, 2007

Prince_James said: ↑

And that is why we spend billions in aid and have committed no atrocities to any people in our 225 year history.
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Atrocities
http://www.google.com/search?q=US a...s=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a

Aid
Some perspectives:

Most aid serves as an instrument of foreign policy, not really as a charitable gift. For example, in 1965-66, during a famine, the United States threatened to cut off food aid to India when its government attempted to take control of U.S.-owned fertilizer companies. India capitulated because it needed the money, thereby giving more freedom to U.S. investment companies. In effect, while millions of Indians starved, food shipments were stalled to force the government to capitulate to the demands of U.S. corporations. In 1964, U.S. aid to Brazil dropped from $81.8 million to $15.1 million because America disapproved of the government at the time. These are just two instances in which the U.S. government withheld food for political purposes. Food is used to reward and manipulate poor countries rather than to feed hungry people. ~

Surprisingly, most U.S. aid actually winds up subsidizing American corporations. During the Johnson administration, 90 ,' percent of all foreign aid benefited U.S. corporate development programs, such as the building of dams, nuclear power plants, roads, and bridges in the Third World, and the profits accrued to the relevant U.S. companies. So U.S. foreign aid serves not only as a coercive instrument of foreign policy but also to support private U.S. contractors, universities, banks, consulting firms, lobbyists, and so forth. In fact, foreign aid is now recognized to be a lucrative business, and companies are scrambling to capitalize on it. Even in 1970, multinationals invested $270 million in Africa and repatriated $995 million, $200 million in Asia and received $2,400 million, and $900 million in Latin America for $2,900 million. Corporations also tend to borrow most of their investment funds for Third World projects from Third World banks.
In 1986, U.S. foreign aid expenditure totaled $15.9 billion, while Americans spent $10.3 billion on movies and theaters, $34.2 billion on tobacco, and $59 billion on alcohol. An expenditure of five cents per person would save the sight of 100,000 children who are blinded annually because of a vitamin A deficiency, and a mere three dollars each would immunize them against poliomyelitis, tetanus, whooping cough, diphtheria, and measles. One year's expenditure by the U.S. cosmetics industry would provide 1.6 billion people with sanitation.
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Third World debt is exacerbating global environmental degradation. Until 1973, the poor developing countries had made great strides in public health and preventive medicine, in education, and in crop production. But in the years 1973-74 world dynamics changed. The oil-producing, OPEC countries suddenly increased the price of oil fivefold, and oil became scarce. There were large and often angry lines outside gas stations in the United States and elsewhere. The oil-rich countries made huge profits and deposited their money, called petrodollars, in the world's major banks, particularly in the United States.
The banks, ever eager to profit from this windfall, decided to offer low-interest loans to Third World countries, which could obviously benefit from extra cash. The banks called this lending policy "recycling," but it turned out to be, in effect, an international lending spree, in which they unloaded petrodollars on unsuspecting developing countries.

The World Bank, which represents many of the major banks in the United States and other wealthy countries, decided at a conference in the Philippines in 1976 to lend this impoverished country $4.5 billion. It openly stated that it would rather lend to "stable" countries (that is, ones ruled by dictators) than to democracies governed by the people. Hence President Marcos of the Philippines was an excellent client. Countries with similar dictatorships received huge petrodollar loans-Chile, Brazil Argentina, and Uruguay. Other borrowers included Mexico Tanzania, and many struggling African nations. The amount of money available was vast. Lending to Latin America increased from $35 billion in 1973 to $350 billion in 1983.

Most of the loans were based on variable interest rates. During 1981-82, U.S. interest rates doubled, to 20 percent, because of tight monetary policies caused by the growing U.S. deficit, engendered by the Reagan administration's lavish spending on weapons. But each 1 percent increase in the interest rate meant $4 billion more that Latin America had to give American banks in interest payments. Furthermore, a global recession at that time decreased the demand for exports from developing countries, thus decreasing their income. Debt servicing rose from 15 percent of their export earnings in 1980 to 31 percent in 1986 in sub-Saharan Africa. Between 1973 and 1980, Third World debt increased by a factor of four, to $650 billion, and it now stands at $1.3 trillion. This is an unbelievable burden for countries whose populations are hardly surviving.
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In Latin America, for instance, a large percentage of the petrodollars was used to buy expensive weapons. Military spending in these countries increased 10 percent each year during the 1970s and 1980s. In Africa, spending on weapons increased 18 percent annually. The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute estimates that 20 percent of the Third World debt is a result of military spending. It goes without saying that these poor countries do not manufacture military equipment themselves. It is made in the United States, the Soviet Union, Israel Germany, France, Britain, and other industrial nations. Each country's military-industrial complex lobbies to sell weapons to poor countries. Arms bazaars are held in many cities of the United States and other countries each year.
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The World Bank has encouraged countries to destroy tropical rain forests to pay back their debt. In Brazil, it proposed that 5 million hectares of the Amazon be "brought under control and management"; in Ecuador, 1 million hectares; and in India, 30 million hectares. It is the same story in the Congo and in Papua New Guinea. The World Bank also approved a loan of $156 million for a dam on the Serang River, in central Java, Indonesia, which would entail the resettlement of twenty thousand people and the flooding of huge areas of forest. Similar projects have been prepared in Zaire and in Gujarat, India.

Since 1982, the IMF has decided to impose severe austerity measures that forced desperately poor Third World countries to use more and more of their land to grow cash or luxury crops for export, such as bananas, coffee, cocoa, pineapples, and flowers, in order to help pay off the debt. Forests and virgin land are being destroyed and cultivated, producing ecological damage and leaving very little land on which the indigenous population can grow food. The people then become dependent upon cheap imported food from the United States (grown with subsidies from the American government). In the 1970s, food imports to Africa increased 600 percent, and by 1985 two-fifths of Africa's food was imported. The net effect of these policies has been to produce nations that are hostage to the American and European agricultural system and that lose their independence. Instead, foreign aid should be used primarily to establish agricultural and economic autonomy for Third World countries.
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Most of the profits from commodity sales in the Third World go to retailers, middlemen, and shareholders in the First World. Only 15 percent of the $200 billion in the annual sales of these commodities in rich countries winds up in the countries that grow them. For instance, just 11 percent from the sale of bananas is paid to the producing country. In Brazil, only 4 percent in royalties is paid for the millions of tons of bauxite (used to produce aluminum) exported to the United States. The workers in the Third World in general receive only 1 to 2 percent of the value they create. Nicaraguan coffee pickers receive 0.5 percent of the wholesale value of the coffee, while governments and rich plantation owners make $750 million per year. And tea pickers in India starve because they get only eight cents per day and food prices are high, whereas company profits in 1976-77 were $21 million. In the Caribbean, the people actually starve beside fields growing flowers and tomatoes for export to the United States.

Wealthy countries impose tariffs or trade barriers on processed goods, but none on raw materials, thus ensuring that poor countries remain in poverty. For instance, in 1985, British tariffs on raw cotton were zero, on cotton yam 8 percent, and on cotton T-shirts 17 percent. So the Third World can never break the poverty cycle, because First World tariffs work against the importation of manufactured goods from the Third World. A Third World country is defined as one that exports raw materials and imports finished goods. But processed goods are worth much more money than raw materials are.

And so the spiral continues: increased debt leads to more cash crops and environmental degradation, which leads to flooded markets in the First World and lower prices, with decreased return to the Third World. Therefore, the debt increases, and this leads to malnutrition, starvation, and helplessness.
To make matters worse, the IMF also decreed that governments of debtor nations severely curtail spending on social programs. In Mexico, whose economy has stagnated for seven years, there has been a severe overall decline in health services, education, and housing. Twelve million people are out of work; the Mexican people consume one-third fewer calories than they did in 1982, because food is more expensive. Two million acres of arable land were taken out of public agriculture because of an 80 percent cut in public funding. About 40 percent of the money that Mexico earns from exports goes to service the debt, and real wages for its people have fallen 30 to 40 percent. Mexican interest payments are $1 billion per month, the debt has actually increased by 50 percent, and the country now owes more than it did before the crisis began. And the U.S. banks call Mexico a success story-for themselves!

Huge U.S.-based corporations called agribusinesses also grow food in Third World countries for foreign markets, mainly the American, and the debt crisis ensures them a plentiful supply of cheap, if not slave, labor and cheap land. They pay virtually no taxes to the host country. Ninety percent of the protein fed to British animals comes from underdeveloped countries. The meat consumption of people in the First World accounts for a volume of grain that would feed 1.2 billion people.
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And this is information before the 90s.

For whats happening now,
http://www.globalissues.org/TradeRelated/Debt/Causes.asp

TW Scott · Jan 23, 2007

Avatar said: ↑

"Right" itself is something very subjective.
What might be right for you, may not be right for others.

And I doubt that the respondents really ment that the USA should have gone all the way and nuked Iraq.
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How do you know? They could have. You just have to look at the poll and realize it means nothing excpet people disagree. They could want genocide or peace, they could want fire bombings or some diplomacy, they could think we should have had a better plan or that we react better when our plan stalls. Without knowing why they disapprove this poll might as well ask if they like cheese.

Avatar · Jan 23, 2007

I can vouch for the general feel in Europe.

p.s. http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/thr...=5351&edition=2&ttl=20070123105717&#paginator

spuriousmonkey · Jan 23, 2007

TW Scott said: ↑

How do you know?
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We are not americans.
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S.A.M. · Jan 23, 2007

TW Scott said: ↑

How do you know? They could have. You just have to look at the poll and realize it means nothing excpet people disagree. They could want genocide or peace, they could want fire bombings or some diplomacy, they could think we should have had a better plan or that we react better when our plan stalls. Without knowing why they disapprove this poll might as well ask if they like cheese.
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This is the information age. Seek and ye shall find.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/flash/0,,1327656,00.html

http://www.globalissues.org/Geopolitics/WarOnTerror/OpinionGap.asp

http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0317/p04s01-usfp.html

Japan, France and Germany are all more highly regarded than the United States among the countries of Europe; even the British and Canadians have a more favorable view of these three nations than they do of America. Strikingly, China now has a better image than the U.S. in most of the European nations surveyed.
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http://pewglobal.org/reports/display.php?ReportID=247

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/2994924.stm

http://www.nola.com/frontpage/t-p/index.ssf?/base/news-5/114784645160150.xml

http://www.antiwar.com/lobe/?articleid=10375

http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=2814371

Prince_James · Jan 23, 2007

spuriousmonkey:

Two nuclear weapons used on civilian targets.
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Against a power that had killed over hundreds of thousands of Americans in war, had started the war against America, in hopes of ending the war earlier than an invasion, and for less Allied and Japanese deaths.

vietnam war.
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Attempting to save a people from Communism is an atrocity?

Invasion of Iraq.
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Saving someone from an evil despot is an atrocity?

Oh yes, you do not believe he is evil, yes?

The removal of many democratic regimes.
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Communists. And you know the history of them.

The teaching of torture to dictatorial regimes.
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Source?

Support of terrorist organizations such as mujahideen or contras in Nicaragua.
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Freedom fighters against Soviet Russia and rebels against the illegitimate government of Nicaragua.

A typical response of someone who has not listened to the ME.
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Moslems respond through violence only. When has any Moslem asked for anything but death for America?

Once again you are just showing reluctance to engage in a dialogue with North Korean.
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WE did. And they lied to us and betrayed the agreement.

Why should we trust them again?

Educate yourself. Nigeria for example is sitting on a huge oil reserve.
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How likely are we going to be able to exploit this when they can't even keep themselves in line over there?

SamCDKey:

http://www.google.com/search?q=US at...ient=firefox-a
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Any that don't fit into the above I dealt with?

On aid:

Why should we not look out for our interests when helping other governments? Your government wanted to steal US businesses. You cannot commit a crime against us and expect us to be okay with.

Third world debt is debt rightfully owed to us. Why should we give to them -loans- if they are not to pay back?

Beg us for charity, beg us for aids, but do not say you will pay us back when you do not.

spuriousmonkey · Jan 23, 2007

HELLOOOOOO!!!!

You said the US commited NO atrocities. We are not really interested in why they commited atrocities.

torture: school of america
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_of_america

S.A.M. · Jan 23, 2007

Prince_James said: ↑

On aid:

Why should we not look out for our interests when helping other governments? Your government wanted to steal US businesses. You cannot commit a crime against us and expect us to be okay with.

Third world debt is debt rightfully owed to us. Why should we give to them -loans- if they are not to pay back?

Beg us for charity, beg us for aids, but do not say you will pay us back when you do not.
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Outsourcing

US public debt

Petrodollar

Prince_James · Jan 23, 2007

HELLLLLLLLLLLLOOOOOOOO

If it wasn't abundantly clear, I was saying those atrocities were not atrocities at all.

That is to say, the US has never committed a single atrocity against any country that can be objectively labelled as such, or which stemmed from policy rather than deranged soldiers (I freely admit that some American troops did horrible things in Vietnam).

Prince_James · Jan 23, 2007

SamCdKey:

I am afraid I don't grasp the point you are trying to make there?

What does outsourcing have to do with this?

Prince_James · Jan 23, 2007

Spuriousmonkey:

Where does it teach "torture"? The techniques referenced in the "Torture Books" at the School of America, are interrogation.

What do you expect us to do? Let them sit in a nice, air conditioned room, as we patiently wait for them to tell us everything?

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