Even though this is NotTracker: Yes, of course I am glad and of course that is why I question the powers that ruin that Empire. This is an English-speaking message board. We're all here because we're part of that same empire. It's so much part of who we are that we can talk about changing the empire, but it is close to non-sensical to even begin to think about leaving it.
Since you posited that having China being the driving force for economic prosperity would be no worse than the US, I hope your kids enjoy learning a 1,200 or so character alphabet and eating with chopsticks! Oh shit who am kidding, with your super smart/sophisticated genes they probably already learned this.
Actually they can use chopsticks. I don't think China as the worlds' dominant nation is particularly appealing, any more than any other major power, but I do question the idea that a balanced outsider could reasonably call the US anything other than an empire and a notably aggressive one at that.
at least under our influence most of them drive on the proper side of the road! Except Korea, they drive on both sides plus the sidewalk!
You're very gracious allowing us our quaint little customs. Seems only fair since we pretty much invented your entire culture
"Actually they can use chopsticks." - spot 261 why am I not surprised? Allow me to reward them with a nice bowl of tomato soup then.
Chopsticks are a lot easier than our multi-tool approach. It takes a lot longer to learn the latter than the former.
Y'know you can just raise the bowl to your mouth and drink the soup, right? Miso amazed you never saw this done.
Before the Pax Amricana, there was the Pax Brittanica. Before that it was Spain as the major "empire" builder. Before that . . . who cares? We live in a world built on the consequences of millennia of decisions, compromises, horrors, triumphs, tragedies, soaring accomplishments and miserable failures. To sit at one tiny moment in that timeline and decree "You're doing it wrong!" is somewhat misguided. America sits on top of the pecking order because the previous pecking order blasted itself into irrelevance in two world wars. Of note, there have been no global wars since WWII ended, largely because (1) nuclear weapons are a line no-one wants to cross and (2) we've managed, under the bi-polar world of the postwar period, to cobble together an international system that mostly works. You don't want America as point man? Fine. But someone is going to take that role, and the next occupant of the position is almost certainly going to be someone a lot more authoritarian, a lot less tolerant of criticism, and a lot more willing to send in the tanks when you question the rule. America is currently in decline, due mostly to the loss of clear leadership and shared experience since the "progressive" movements of the 60s took sway. Marso has some of it right, some of it wrong, but the bottom line is that there are two models for how the world works: one or two superpowers keeping everyone else more or less in line, or a multipolar "great game" world of unending chaos. We'll step out of the way. Most likely it will be China who comes in behind us and starts rearranging things to their liking. Hope y'all have fun with that. Some of you are so reality-impaired (Hi, Rick!) that you seem to imagine that humanity will spontaneously burst into a global culture of enlightened altruism as soon as those mean, nasty Americans are put in their place. Ain't gonna happen. Has never happened. In all likelihood, will never happen. We're herd animals with thumbs, five hairs away from being baboons, and all the "progressive" antics in the world won't change that.
Yes, China's thousands of years of existence were completely wiped away by the last hundred. Spot on. Communism originated in Europe, remember.
Who needs emperors when you can have chaos? Or perhaps the emergence of the New Soviet Man will fix everything.
I grew up in rural Texas and reciting the Pledge of Allegiance when I was in school was never some kind of daily ritual. It was done before some student assemblies, but that's it.
We did it daily in Catholic school around Philly, every morning. But I assume that was sure up the impression that our first loyalty was to the US, and not the Vatican.
Your Boy Donnie seems to think so. To paraphrase Groucho, if he got any closer to Putin, he'd be in back of him.
That's the irony of this new resurgence in commuphobia. It's led by a man who so clearly hero worships the Russian President.
Indeed. It’s all a matter of perspective. To the rich man, the freedom of others to reject his desire for wealth, without punishment, is tyranny.
