Originally Posted By FerretAfros Honestly, if I had asked you at this time yesterday, would you have said that we should alter our foreign policy with Cuba? Hindsight it 20/20. I know that it has been coming, but wasn't he ailing when Clinton was in office? I certainly didn't see him do anything to change the policies, but since he was a Democrat, he couln't have done anything wrong, now could he?
Originally Posted By ecdc >>You certainly can't be offended they were included in the Axis of Evil comment that Bush once made. I will never be offended if we put down known countries where despots and dictators are in charge.<< There's a difference between being offended and being stupid. Bush was stupid to apply the label to those countries. And they were the wrong countries, BTW. Where did most of the 9/11 hijackers come from? Where do we still have soldiers based that caused bin Laden to hate us? And who does the Bush family have close ties to through their oil deals? Saudi Arabia. It's funny the way people forget Ronald Reagan. Was Reagan a commie pinko for talking to Gorbachev? Nope, but now apparently we shouldn't talk to our enemies because...then the terrorists win! People get all up in arms and speak in absolutes like "I will NEVER be offended" yada, yada yada. Fat lot of good that attitude does us when we don't want the crazy people to come and attack us.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 <Honestly, if I had asked you at this time yesterday, would you have said that we should alter our foreign policy with Cuba? > I would have, yeah. I've long thought this rigidity (which, yes, has been prevalent through every admin. since Kennedy) has been counterproductive. We'd have been more successful in undermining Castro by exposing the Cubans to MORE American influence in the form of tourists and consumer goods, for example. We could hardly have been less successful - he remained a dictator till the day he was too sick to continue, and changed almost nothing of his policy. And, as I said, although Bush mostly just continued the usual bi-partisan policy, he did make one change for the worse by restricting travel for Cuban-Americans even more than previously.
Originally Posted By FerretAfros "Where do we still have soldiers based that caused bin Laden to hate us?" Where do we still have soldiers posted after more than 60 years of the people there being nice and peaceful? That's right, Germany. It takes time to get troops out, no matter what the circumstances. I will admit that the WWII situations around the world were definately extremes, but they also show a very successful (IMO) follow up to the fighting, not just in Germany and the rest of Europe, but also in Japan and other areas of Asia.
Originally Posted By Sport Goofy << Honestly, if I had asked you at this time yesterday, would you have said that we should alter our foreign policy with Cuba? Hindsight it 20/20. >> I've been saying this now for many years. It doesn't take a headline in the mainstream media for me to think about some of these issues.
Originally Posted By mele <<but since he was a Democrat, he couln't have done anything wrong, now could he?>> I think you're reading a lot into what people are saying. No one has said that Clinton was a saint here. Also, just because you and your friends didn't think about Cuba before today, it doesn't mean that other people, other Americans, haven't spent a lot of time wishing/hoping that things would change. As to just forgetting about Bush's mistakes, alrighty...what kind of American would just shrug and say "Oh well. Who cares if he bungles it. Everybody makes mistakes." when it comes to current events? Is that really all we've come to expect from our President? We're okay with that level of expectation? His mistakes DO matter when it comes to how he'll perform his job. People don't trust him to handle most situations well because of his past performances. Would you expect any employer to just shrug his shoulders when an employee provides a less than satisfactory performance? "Well, maybe he'll do better tomorrow." How long should anybody put up with that? No one is allowed to question his abilities based on past performance? It just doesn't work that way. For the record, I don't really trust Bush to do much of anything right at this point but when it comes to the Cuban situation, I'm not really sure what any leader could/should do so I'm not pointing fingers at anyone. It would just be nice to have someone in the White House whom I felt I could respect to make good decisions.
Originally Posted By Sport Goofy Anyone think Cuba could ever become our 51st state? I think that would be an interesting outcome someday.
Originally Posted By FerretAfros Sorry, post 27 was supposed to follow 25. : ) "How long should anybody put up with that?" Well, if it's the President, we're supposed to put up with it for 4 years, and then try to find a better replacement. For the last election, not many people liked him or what he had been doing, but he still managed to win, so there must have been a worse alternative. And, as has already been mentioned here, for the most part, he just passed stuff along that got approved in Congress. One of the many wonders of our federal government is the way it was designed with the checks and balances (without trying to be too elementary school teacher here), regulating the ammount of power that any one branch (or any one person) truly has over the country. Sure, he gets the final OK on everything, but a lot of the time, the decisions aren't his to make. What may (or may not) come as a surprise to a lot of people is that Bush didn't veto a single bill during his first term, and has used the veto vary sparingly since then. He was the only President since Jefferson to make it through a term without disagreeing on something that Congress came up with. Sure, he does come up with many of the ideas that lead to the bills and such, and is will ultimately be the one that gets the blame in the history books, but I think there are a lot more people at fault than just one.
Originally Posted By DAR <<Anyone think Cuba could ever become our 51st state? I think that would be an interesting outcome someday.>> 52nd unless we bypass Puerto Rico.
Originally Posted By FerretAfros "Anyone think Cuba could ever become our 51st state?" I don't think it would ever be 51, but it might get adopted somewhere along the way. Places like Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands and American Somoa have been waiting in line for statehood a lot longer than Cuba will (or would or however we want to say it), but it's not entirely out of the question. I'm not really sure if we'll ever add more states though, since we've now gone the longest in our country's history (by a long shot) without adding any more. And on top of that, 50 is just such a nice number to use for those sorts of things, too, but that's about the last reason they should use to decide wheter or not to add another state. : )
Originally Posted By Sport Goofy << 52nd unless we bypass Puerto Rico. >> Puerto Rico has had the opportunity for years. There's no rule that I know of that says you can't add any new states until Puerto Rico becomes one. Honestly, I see the lack of new states as a complete failure of our country's democracy. If we are really a beacon to the world, in terms of our representative government and freedom, why wouldn't other countries consider joining in our federation of states? Our Constitution doesn't necessarily restrict itself to a specific geographic or cultural affiliation. I find it odd that we haven't expanded our form of government beyond the current boundaries of the U.S. in 50 years. If our country is really all that great, why aren't other new "states" lining up to join?
Originally Posted By FerretAfros Because Imperialism is bad, and we should support the unique cultures of the world, rather than try to assimilate everything into how we know our world right now? It's a very fine line to walk, being the "city on the hill", letting others become part of the city, and forcing others into it, whether or not they want to.
Originally Posted By Sport Goofy ^^ I didn't suggest anyone is forced. Our Constitution should be independent of cultural differences. My suggestion is that our Constitution and confederation of states should lend itself towards others wanting to join. That hasn't been the case at all.
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan >>If our country is really all that great, why aren't other new "states" lining up to join?<< 50 is a nice, round number. We add new states, then we have to reconfigure the flag for the umpteenth time. It isn't worth the hassel. Besides, let's face it, we sort of stretched the whole concept of statehood with puny Rhode Island. My backyard is bigger than Rhode island. It's just there to pad the stats. We could always chop Alaska up into about 20 states if we decide we need more of 'em.
Originally Posted By FerretAfros "Our Constitution should be independent of cultural differences." And at one point, it was. (Keeping everything Disney-related here) That's what made Disney's America such a neat sounding park. It celebrated the diversity and variations of one of the greatest (if I do say so myself) countries in the world. There is so much history and background information that can be used that the possibilities are seemingly endless. However, if you look around the country today, a lot of those differences are getting less and less noticable. Sure, people in the south still say "y'all," girls in California still say "like" way too much, people in the norteast still say "pahk the cahr," and people in the Midwest still "Gee golly doncha know?". Some things will never change, but there are a surprising number of things that make our country less and less diverse everyday. We've all talked about WalMart and Starbucks and things like that, but it's more than just that. You can buy the same clothes across the country, eat the same food, and watch the same TV no matter where you are. It may be a sign of the world metaphorically "shrinking" in the global age, but at the same time, it shows that we are all assimilating to the same thing. Sure, there are still some differences out there (there's a lot more Chinese food on the west coast, and a lot more barbeque on the east coast), but they are getting fewer and fewer, and harder to distinguish. While I would definately like for others to be able to become a part of our country, I also want them to keep what is special to them. It seems that in this time of global exansion of everything, that becomes harder and harder to do, even when there are seperate countries. I just fear that eventually we will all become one giant country, and we all have to follow a single ruler. What happens when someone like Bush gets elected to that position? (And it's bound to happen eventually, if that structure is ever fully developed)
Originally Posted By Mr X **We could always chop Alaska up into about 20 states if we decide we need more of 'em.** Brilliant...20 states noone wants to live in instead of just one!
Originally Posted By Kennesaw Tom << we sort of stretched the whole concept of statehood with puny Rhode Island.>> In 1636 Rhode Island became the second place in the world to have Freedom of religion. Rhode Island was the first colony to ceceed England, April 12, 1776. Meanwhile all the other colonys didn't ceceed until July 4th 1776. Despite this RI has the oldest 4th of July parade in the country. RI was the last colony to join the USA. The only way that RI would join up was when the other colonys agreed to create the US Senate in which every state gets two Senators. So, RI has the same number or Senators as any other state including California. Also the population of RI is roughly one million. Which is a far larger population than many other states. The first Baptist Church in North America is in Providence, the oldest Jewish Synagog in North America is Newport, RI. The North American headquarters for the Budist religion is in Lincoln, RI.
