Which Country is the ...

[ET]

[Sandy]

You're welcome to think whatever you want. This is, after all, a free country, and you can use the term "socialist" to apply to anything you want. That doesn't mean that it is, but you're welcome to do it. In fact, I hope that the tea partiers and their radio deejay mouthpieces keep using it as they have been, because it is a continued demonstration of their willful ignorance of what socialism really is, and their mischaracterization of this President and his administration in its application. It cost them the Presidency in 2012, several Senate seats, a couple dozen house seats, a couple of governorships and a state legislature. If they keep it up, it will cost them more. So keep it up, please.

So far, more than five years into his presidency, it's been nothing but a buzz word and an accusation. They can't point to a single policy of this president that fits the definition. It is kind of hard to turn that kind of accusation into reality when the chief measurement of the free market economy, the stock market, is soaring along setting records.

[ET]

I didn't use the world "socialist". The commentary to which you object was written in 2007, before Obama was elected. While he may not explicitly advocate for socialism because it would be political suicide, he is easily classified as either a statist, leftist, progressive or collectivist. Take your pick. It's hard to nail down an adjective because they keep changing what they want to call themselves...progressives one decade, liberals the next, then back to progressives. In the end it's a matter of "a rose, by any other name..." --- they are advocates for Big Government, less freedom, more central control, more central planning as the default solution to any given problem. The core base of the Democrat party is an advocate for Big Government as the default solution to any problem.

I find Timothy's classification of the Dem party as "center right" to be laughable, bordering on the ridiculous. Maybe that would be the case if we lived in the land of the Euros, but that's not the case here.

P.S. As someone has pointed out, Obama was a Marxist in college when he buddied around with William "bomber" Ayers. Have you ever heard him disavow those beliefs? He has stated he desired to "fundamentally transform" America. We both know he will not seek to increase liberty in this country, nor has he proposed anything that will increase liberty. Therefore, the logical conclusion is that he seeks to increase government and decrease liberty.

[ET]

[KeithE]

[ET]

[Haruo]

[KeithE]

It can be brought up to date with from Haruo’s own state.

As Peter, Paul, and Mary sang - “When will we ever learn”.

[Haruo]

[KeithE]

[Haruo]

The English Wikipedia says "34,000 to 200,000" estimated Filipino casualties. Unfortunately there is no article on the subject in the Esperanto Wikipedia, and the Tagalog article is just a stub with no casualty figure cited. Plus I don't read Tagalog to speak of and my browser claims to be able to translate it to English but the result

sure looks like Tagalog to me. Keith, what are your sources for figures higher than 200,000 (besides the Evergreen list that says 600,000)? I am seriously interested in this.

And I retract the "Pol Pottish" characterization, which would only be true if the regime inflicting the casualties had been Filipino itself. But even if the figure is only 200,000 I am surprised it hasn't been more widely publicized. It's not as if I have immersed myself in American self-congratulatory literature all my life. Colonial expansion was of course the motive, but Christianization is a laughable excuse except to those who truly don't realize the Catholic church is a Christian church. In 1898 the bulk of the Filipino population had been Catholic for generations, and no more in need of forcible Christianization (as if anybody ever needed such a thing!) than the populations of Maryland or Louisiana.

[Sandy]

It seems a little bit inconsistent to me (noting that is an understatement) to throw money in an offering plate every Sunday, or even every now and then with somewhat of an expectation that some of it will be spend on international missions (or at least giving that some lip service) and then cop an attitude with regard to what the rest of the world thinks of us. The bigotry and arrogance that goes along with the idea that we are big enough and powerful enough to do as we please and to heck with what the rest of the world, especially that part of it that does not share our economic, social, political and religious ideals, thinks is, frankly, a demonstration of evil.

The code word these days is "protecting US interests," which, in most cases translates into economic prosperity. We would not tolerate Russian owned companies coming into the US, harvesting a significant amount of our agricultural produce, bribing the government officials who allowed it with a tip off the top that they see as riches beyond belief, and then selling the product abroad, pocketing the revenue and most of the tax money and putting it in Russian banks. But in countries where the US has an "economic interest," namely, energy production and oil, that is exactly what we do. And we don't care what the world thinks. The way we act, and treat other nations is, as far as I am concerned, a clear testimony of how ineffective the influence of Christian philosophy and belief has been on our culture.

History can't be changed, but we can learn from it. We are not God's chosen people, our economic stature and military might are the result of the direction that our government and our people aimed it, it is not the result of some special blessing or dispensation from the Almighty. We are part of the world's humanity, and we are not superior to it in God's eyes. We could, at some point, be used to bring world peace and be a blessing to its people, but it would require an attitude of submission to God, not one in which we take his place and play the role.

[KeithE]

[Haruo]

Yes, I should have read on to the "Atrocities" section. I based my post on the first section of the article, which says "The war and occupation by the U.S. would change the cultural landscape of the islands, as the people dealt with an estimated 34,000 to 220,000 Filipino casualties..." (not sure where the extra 20,000 came from.