by Charles Peterson

Created on: June 06, 2009

Friday 5 June 2009

US American policies contain two major evils for individuals. These are: 1) isolationism and 2) protectionism. This is not to say that on the national level these policies are evil. When the copy cat-monkey see monkey do mentality gets hold of big ideas, though, they can be translated; devoid of their meaning, to the individual level.

Isolationism has been a policy of US America dating back to Colonial times. For example, when England was fighting France, we maintained a neutral policy. This allowed us to trade with either or both sides. We, as a capitalist ideal, are all about trade. The national government doesn't enter into alliances or agreements with foreign countries, except if it is necessary to promote trade.

Back in Colonial times, the concept of contraband was born. US America had the right to trade unmolested, as long as we didn't carry contraband. This concept started out as weapons which could help one side or the other. Today we have degenerated to thinking of contraband as illegal drugs. Today the government assumes the right, at points, to search everything about you. I'll go there anyway, just to make sure. How does that make you feel as an individual?

We have pretty much stuck with our isolationist attitude for 200 plus years. But it was weakened after we became a superpower. We had to intervene in two World Wars because we could see them impacting on us. We had to fight ideologies because we saw them impacting on us, such as communism in the 20th century. We have weakened our isolation with respect to immigration. We used to have barriers which accepted only people of good characters who had reputations of valuable work experience to offer. Since, say, 1960 we have come to accept uncontrolled influx.

We believed in laissez-faire for a long while. That was the point of our international stance, only to make alliances, so trade could prosper. We are degenerating into nationalization, since the World Trade Organization began in the early 1990s.

Now let's descend to the individual level. Most people are pervaded by network news from one of the three major channels. They set our attitudes. They tell us what we can say on a given day. The network news isolates US America from within. We are an open society, but the network news brings a protective umbrella down close over our heads. We have no concept of the world. Even when a closed society emits a news blurb, such as when Eastern European nations were hiring their nationals

• 1
• 2
• 3
• Next Page >>