[free-sklyarov] FW: Tribute to the US

[Jeme A Brelin]

Jingoist nonsense.

On Wed, 12 Sep 2001, Charles Eakins wrote:
> >> W: TRIBUTE TO THE UNITED STATES
> >> > > > This, from a Canadian newspaper, is worth sharing.
> America: The Good Neighbor.
> "This Canadian thinks it is time to speak up for the Americans as the
> most generous and possibly the least appreciated people on all the
> earth.

Let's get this kicked off with outrageous hyperbole!

(OK, I'm not going to sink into a line-by-line mocking of this tripe, but
I'll point out some of the more absurd sections.)

> Germany, Japan and, to a lesser extent, Britain and Italy were lifted
> out of the debris of war by the Americans who poured in billions of
> dollars and forgave other billions indebts.

The "debts" of Germany and Japan and Italy were IMPOSED BY THE US as
restitution for the entire war effort.  I hardly think that forgiving a
fine you imposed yourself is generosity.

However, the US DID utterly destroy the infrastructure of Germany and
Japan and it was the VERY LEAST we could do to help them rebuild.

> When earthquakes hit distant cities, it is the United States that
> hurries in to help.

We've got to get those markets up and running again.  Every day of
downtime is a missed opportunity for American corporations (who prefer to
be called trans-national corporations even though they use the US
government to enforce their will).

> This spring, 59 American communities were flattened by tornadoes.
> Nobody helped.

Shocking.  Small towns get hit by tornadoes... dozens wounded, maybe a
small handful killed (MAYBE).  We don't get massive foreign aide
packages?  Those ingrates!

> The Marshall Plan and the Truman Policy pumped billions of dollars
> into discouraged countries.

Those plans were particularly designed to make the third world subservient
to US will.

> Now newspapers in those countries are writing about the decadent, war
> mongering Americans.

I don't blame any indentured servant for denigrating his master.

> Does any other country in the world have a plane to equal the Boeing
> Jumbo Jet, the Lockheed Tri-Star, or the Douglas DC10? If so, why
> don't they fly them? Why do all the International lines except Russia
> fly American Planes?

Several reasons (including, but not limited to):

They didn't have a war machine propelling aerospace research.

Their infrastructure is geared entirely toward production of goods for the
American market as part of the IMF "restructuring" to improve the rate at
which the entire nation can pay back the debt incurred by US corporations
fronted by "local" business.  (It works like this:  Business gets a loan
from the World Bank.  WB gives the loan and the business dissolves.  The
World Bank calls the loan a default and goes to the nation in which the
loan was granted for restitution.  The nation cannot pay because it is a
third world country.  The IMF is sent in to "restructure" the economy so
that money can be raised that the WB can spend [i.e. US currency].  So the
production in said nation is aimed at US goods that have no value in their
country of origin.  The IMF prevents the government from spending any
precious resources on local improvements.  The US gets cheap consumer
goods at slave labor prices.]

> Why does no other land on earth even consider putting a man or woman
> on the moon?

Um, because it's utterly fatuous?

I mean, I believe in the positive side-benefits of space exploration and
pure research, but honestly it's third or fourth tier when it comes to the
needs of a nation.

Hell, why haven't WE done it in thirty years?  Could it be because it was
a PR stunt?

> You talk about Japanese technocracy, and you get radios.
> You talk about German technocracy, and you get automobiles.
> 
> You talk about American technocracy, and you find men on the moon-not once,
> but several times-and safely home again.  You talk about scandals, and the
> Americans put theirs right in the store window for everybody to look at.

No, our real scandals are hardly touched in the media.  Campaign finance
impropriety, the war in Colombia, the highest incarceration rate in the
industrialized world, the wholesale giveaway of public resources for
private interests... the list goes on and on.

> Even their draft-dodgers are not pursued and hounded. They are here on
> our streets, and most of them, unless they are breaking Canadian laws,
> are getting American dollars from ma and pa at home to spend here.

How old is this essay, really?  I mean, all of the references are thirty
years old.

Why did we have to have draft-dodgers in the first place?  Oh, it was
because we were fighting an unjust war that a preponderance of the
population simply would not fight.

> When the railways of France, Germany and India were breaking down
> through age, it was the Americans who rebuilt them.

We had to improve the infrastructure for US consumer goods, of course.

> When the Pennsylvania Railroad and the New York Central went broke,
> nobody loaned them an old caboose. Both are still broke.

They went broke because of the shift in government support from railways
to the automobile industry.  Trucks replaced trains at many times the cost
to consumers, life, and the environment.

> They will come out of this thing with their flag high. And when
> they do, they are entitled to thumb their nose at the lands that are
> gloating over their present troubles. I hope Canada is not one of those."

This is just plain ass-kissing.

J.
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     Jeme A Brelin
    jeme at brelin.net
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