You know what they say about assumptions…

No, we haven’t taken up the “flying planes into buildings or setting off car bombs” game as yet. Instead, we have replaced it with dropping bombs from planes and firing missiles and artillery. Is there a meaningful difference there? Both methods kill scores of people – mostly civilians.

And people said a similar thing about the “American empire” 100 years ago. They were wrong then they are wrong now.

You are also wrong to think that Islamic extremists do not hate our way of life. All of the things we take for granted do not exist where Sharia law does. It is their goal to restore the Caliphate. And they view anybody who stands in their way as their enemy. Going and hiding in a little hole somewhere will not save you. To believe that it will is a mistake.

Harrison, you mention that Europe has let United States worry about their defense, and sank all of their money into social programs. I don’t understand why you’re making it sound like a negative thing? Isn’t that a society that we should be striving for, where we spend our resources not on weapons, but on the infrastructure and education to evolve as a country?

Read Paul Kennedy’s book ‘The Rise and Fall of Great Powers’ if you ever have a chance. Other world powers, at the height of their influence, did what we are doing now, sink majority of their budget into military force. And the closer they got to the end as the empire, the more they spent on war. At times I feel like United States is doing the same. And what do we have to really fear? A terrorist act that can kill 3000 people? Do we fear invasion and occupation? A nuclear war?

We have a government, and very helpful media outlets, that first plant fear of the outside, foreign world, that make us believe everyone is against us and wants to hurt us. Once we are afraid, once we feel vulnerable, we are told that the only way we can fix that is to attack some far away country and to wage war against an idea. If we want to fight terrorism, we have to start fighting it on the home front. There are more terrorists in Washington then in the caves of Pakistan and Afghanistan. If we want people to stop hating us, to stop wanting to hurt us, we have to do a better job ensuring they have a better quality of living.

I think over the last eight years, the Bush administration did a superb job making Americans believe that during 9/11 we were a target because the terrorists hated ‘the way we leave’, ‘how much freedom we have’, ‘how well we treat our women’, and ‘how much wealth and success capitalism brings us’. But those are not the reasons at all. Instead, we were attacked because of years of foreign policy decisions that, while militarily and strategically strengthened United States, in the process also hurts millions of civilians in the countries where United States operated. When you think about Afghanistan, that country was destroyed in the 80’s by the Soviets (when US funded the insurgents that are fighting us now) again now by United States, and in the middle was ruled by a harsh and oppressive government. The elected government, representing US interests, isn’t fairer, effective, or any more popular now. When you think about how poor and violent their life has been over the last three decades.. are you surprised they are resorting to suicide bombings to try to get change?

I have never believed in the 401ks and have absolutely no use for them, now, or before.

This is from Wikipedia:
“A shyster is a slang word for someone who acts in a disreputable, unethical, or unscrupulous way, especially in the practice of law and politics.” You can add “business” to that. “The word is derived from the German verb scheissen, ‘to defecate’ and the English suffix -ster, “one who does”. German speaking people consider the word to be the lowest form of insult. Shyster is an alteration of the German Scheißer (a person who is shitting). [2] Various false etymologies have proposed an anti-Semitic origin, and some people continue to regard the word as referring particularly to Jews or Jewish lawyers.”

Funny… when people’s 401Ks were doubling every year I never heard about the “Wall Street shysters.” Shyster, btw, is commonly an anti-semitic term.

Frankly, our young people are not faring much better nowadays as far as jobs. More and more are coming back after finishing their college education to live with their parents. And yes, as far as France is concerned, there was a story not too long ago about a group of unemployed young people taking over a mansion in Paris. Maybe our young people should take over the mansions of the Wall Street shysters?

And if I had prostate cancer, breast cancer, or any of the other most common forms of that disease I would not want to be treated for it in Europe… their survival rate is much less than it is in the US. Guess that’s why our healthcare system sucks?

From the time I lived there and the people I knew (French 20 year olds) they were miserable because they could not find jobs. It’s still that way. No thanks.

Yes, we have been covering their defense. Only a tiny fraction of Turkey is in Europe.

They actually have freedom of speech, but that varies from country-to-country Their health-care system – despite all the propaganda is superior to ours in most ways and in general, their quality of living is indisputably higher.

I have lived there also and I experienced it first-hand.

Yes… Europe is “far more advanced” in that they have higher unemployment, less diverse economies, poor healthcare, and in places like England “Big Brother” with cameras everywhere checking on their population. They also do not have true freedom of speech. Quite an “advanced” place indeed.

I lived over there for a couple of years and I can tell you I would take the US over that any day.

And Europe can only be “so advanced” because America essentially has covered their defense since 1945 allowing their governments to dump money into their social system. But even that time is drawing to a close as deficit spending threatens to rip the EU apart.

After all, the Holocaust was perpetrated by the Germans and the Berlin Wall was in fact built by someone else entirely.

I don’t want to disappoint you, but frankly, the president did not consult with me about going, or not going to the Berlin festivities.