Despite Iraq, America's love affair with war runs deep

[Horse with no Name]

Pretty on spot.:thumbsup:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/apr/23/iraq.uselections2008
>>>snip
Though foreign policy is rarely salient in peacetime elections, Americans have been almost persuaded by their president, George Bush, that they are not at peace. To visit America at present is to be reminded of the continuing trauma of post-9/11, of a nation that craves a cohering substitute psychosis for the lifting of the Soviet menace. It is seen in ubiquitous threat alerts, hysterical airport security, the continued acceptance of Guantánamo Bay and even jibes about public figures not wearing the American flag in their buttonhole. A country in so many ways a kaleidoscope of the world is in many ways so different. Above all it is full of soldiers.

Americans still do not travel abroad, and rely on television news for their knowledge of foreign places, which they continue to regard with bizarre suspicion. Hence a world view is lumped in with defence and security in a collective paranoia. And a candidate's stance on foreign policy is a proxy for his or her character.

To this the candidates must pander. Hence Clinton emphasises her "role" in Kosovo and her "mis-remembered" landing in Bosnia under fire. Obama stresses his links to three world continents and a seminal visit as a young man to Karachi. McCain trumps them by having been tortured by the Vietnamese, a sanctification whose only drawback is that it recalls his age (71).

All must appear trigger happy. McCain may distance himself from the unilateralism of George Bush and remark that Americans must show "a decent respect for the opinions of mankind" (in Bush's America the remark was worth reporting). But his team is penetrated by such neocons as Robert Kagan and John Bolton, on the basis that "if we can't beat him, we can persuade him". The only thing to be said with confidence about McCain is that his position on everything is uncertain.

[Solly Mack]

1. K&R

That was good

[NNN0LHI]

2. Look back and see how well dovish anti-war candidates have done in other elections here

I will save you some time. Not too good.

Don

[msongs]

3. hey the bible says smite thine enemies - let it be written, let it be done nt

[Xenotime]

4. What can we say....our leaders like blood. It gives them power or something.