My Thoughts On Isolationism And Stuff

I can still remember the 2000 election. Sort of that is. I can remember that there was an election, and that there was some kind of minor problem in Floirda. I also remember something about not having much of a choice - both people running were white and both had more money than most Americans will ever see even if they live 10 lives. One was a goon, the other was a goober. Some choice huh?

The guy who ended up winning by like 50 votes ran on a "put America first" platform. Isolationism. Screw the world, we do not need those jokers. We can do without the whole lot of them!

But there was a problem. We can not do without "them". In fact, we need "them" more than anyone else wants to think about.

First off, we must have their oil. Domestic production is just not enough. And if we increased production, domestic reserves would run dry faster than the only Shell station open in Miami after a hurricane. Then what would we do? Life without my Escalade? I would rather die!

We also need their stuff. Nothing is made here. Well I will take that back, I do have a neck tie made in the USA - from 100% imported silk. The tie was "assembled" here, but the raw material was actually made someplace else. The tag says the silk was imported from Italy - which is kind of amusing seeing as how Italy had to import the silkworms from China at some point. I am still trying to figure out how Italy gets silk to export to the USA.

So we need The Middle East, Italy, and China. And Japan. We need those guys too. They make good hybrid cars. And while we are talking about cars Mexico and Venezuela have fairly large oil reserves - so lets add those guys to the list. Greenland will be a good place to get ice, and Iceland has some cool golf courses, so they are on the list too. England has some fantastic beer. And so on.

Now lets look at where we are today. Electing a president who originally ran on the isolationist platform worked out great huh? Not only does the world love us, but things could not be better at home! Finding a good job is as easy as finding water in a swamp, and the whole world looks towards America for leadership.

No nation can isolate itself anymore. Those days are gone. No longer in the Atlantic Ocean, or even the mighty Pacific, enough to allow the USA to ignore the rest of the world. A commercial jetliner can cross the Atlantic in only a few hours. I can fly to Germany in less time than it would take me to drive to Atlanta Georgia. If I start driving at the same time the jet pushes back, and if I do not ignore the speed limit signs.

America can not produce all the stuff the economy needs within out own borders anymore. We need imports. And imports, by default, come from someplace else.

But it is not enough to just import stuff. Stability is also important. This is why the UN is in place. The idea is that a strong international body can prevent wars before they start by providing stability in hot regions. Instability leads to unpredictible interruptions in supplies of imports, and that is no good to a nation that must consume to survive.

But look at what the consertive movement had done to the UN. It has made the UN the enemy. Remember the 2004 election talk, that John Kerry would "ask the UN to rubber stamp any US action"? As opposed to what? Not asking? Ignoring them totally? Pissing on the views of every other nation, then expecting them to kiss our ass afterwords? The world does not work that way. We had 100% world support, even the support of Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez (who are really the same people by the way, except Fidel is older) after 9-11. And what about now? What happened to all that support? Where is it now?

Flushed away - all because the isolationist "we will go in alone" mentality. So we went in alone, and then act surprised because nations who opposed the action in the first place will not send in troops to help. Would we send US troops if Canada decided to invade Greenland after the USA voiced objections? Probably not.

Should the USA be "the world police"? No. I never said that. The world police BS was coined by the consertive movement in an effort to undermine the UN, and push the USA towards an isolationist agenda. We are so concerend about terror and phantom weapons in Iraq that we started a war (or a "police action" if you will - seeing as how our goals changed from finding the weapons we sold to Iraq in the 1980s to liberating the people from a criminal leader) and yet we totally IGNORE real acts of terror in other parts of the world that has less oil.

I am saying that the USA needs to be PART of the world police, but not the only part. Is it fair for any one nation to "go in alone" and take on the entire cost, both in money and the loss of life, by itself? No it is not. Nations should work together, towards a common goal of stability. A united planet is far more powerful than ANY individual nation. Isolationism tends to lead towards decisions that undermine unity.

So what places are we ignoring? Somalia for one. Pirates attacked a cruise ship - with US citizens on board - using machine guns and RPGs. These same pirates have also prevented UN ships bringing in humanitarian aid from docking. Notice how the media is being careful to NOT call the pirates "terrorists"? Has the mighty USA lifted a finger to stabilize Somalia? No, we cut and ran, under the same republican controled congress we have now, when the terrorists shot down some military choppers. Mind you - these are the SAME people saying that cut and run is the wrong thing to do now - but back then when an evil Bill Clinton was president cutting and running was a great policy. After all, the military had no business over there anyway. What could a bunch of camel jockeys possibly do to us anyway? There is no way terrorist could strike the USA and take down any tall buildings! No way! Impossible! Keep our military right here, let the UN sort out its own problems without us! Kick the UN out of New York. And so on.

And back then, they did not call the terrorists in Somalia terrorist either - they were all "warlords" or "tribal warlords" or whatever. But not terrorists! Nope - no terrorism at all over there! Not even a little bit. Just some pirates and stuff. Send em some rum and some Jolly Roger flags and they will be happy.

Another editors note. When the Blackhawks were shot down, public support was NOT behind a war, so it is highly unlikely that Clinton would have escalated things over there even with congressional support. And without a supportive public, congress members who wanted to get re-elected would NOT support a war. So it was not all the fault of the republicans that the USA allowed terrorists to shoot down military aircraft and get away with it. Democrats who wanted to keep their job were also calling for the USA to get and split. At the time popular support was calling for that line of action. Gas was cheap, the economy was good, jobs were around just waiting for people to apply, and people were just starting to get on this thing called "the internet". Nobody wanted a war. Nobody thought that terror would ever get to America. And even if we were told that there was this guy in a cave in Afganistan planning to attack The Pentagon and The World Trade Center, would you have believed it? Would you have thought that some guy in a cave without electricity could do anything to Fortress America? I would not have. The 9-11 attacks were so far outside of mainstream thinking that not even Hollywood, the guys who brought you a movie about oil drillers saving the planet from a huge space rock, could not have thought of it. If they had thought of it, you can bet that some cheezy action movie would have been made - with extra explosions and staring Van Dame as the good guy and The Rock as Osama.

It is just another example of why isolationism will always fail as a national policy. It ignores the fact that the planet is a pretty small place. Anyone who reads this can be anywhere in the world in a matter of a day or two at the most. The oceans are no longer an effective barrier. Problems in some far away place, even a dirt poor far away place that ends in STAN, can find its way to America. We need a strong UN now more than ever. but first the USA needs to decide to be a MEMBER STATE of this UN, and not some BULLY STATE that tries to just tell everyone to do what we say or kiss our ass.

After all, it was the United States that invented the United Nations! It is time to seriously think about re-joining it.