There appears to be two dominant religions in the US, Christianity and Americanism—belief in the latter requires a fairytale view of American history, and its holy texts are updated each year by Hollywood.
If any other nation had the same record of lies and military aggression as that of the USA, its periodic threat, accusations and political legitimacy in general would be shredded in an instant. Not so for the Land of the Free. American invasions, bombings, coups, and covert terrorism have effectively become normalized and tacitly accepted as legitimate by much of the political Left, Center, and Right. This is a testament to the hegemonic power of the imperialist American worldview and the global US media. >From this US perspective, American serial wars of aggressions do not even politically register as aggression, but are ultimately rationalized by the nationalist ideology of American Exceptionalism and a messianic creed that the USA is a crusader for democracy. America’s Manifest Destiny, it appears, is to rule the world for its own good. Hitler would be jealous of such imperial ambitions. For in terms of military power, spending, declared strategic doctrine, geopolitical intent, and most importantly actual behavior, the American Empire has demonstrated time and again that the preeminent menace is itself. This is the price the rest of the world has paid for American Exceptionalism SHARE OF WORLD’S PRIVATE CONSUMPTION • The wealthiest 10% of the world’s population account for 59% of total private consumption • The wealthiest 20% of the world’s population account for 76.6% of total private consumption • The poorest fifth of the world’s population account for just 1.5% of total private consumption • The poorest 10% of the world’s population account for just 0.5% of total private consumption • At least 80% of humanity lives on less than $10 a day • The poorest 40 percent of the world’s population accounts for 5 percent of global income. • The richest 20 percent accounts for three-quarters of world income • In 2005, the world’s billionaires, about 500 people (approx 0.000008% of the world’s population) were worth $3.5 trillion (over 7% of world GDP) • In 2004 the total wealth of the richest 8.3 million people increased by 8.2% to $30.8 trillion, giving them control of nearly one quarter of the world’s financial assets. In other words about 0.13% of the world’s population controlled 25% of the world’s assets • From 1960 to 1997 the average income of the wealthiest 20% of the population in the developed countries went from 30 times that of the median income to 74 times median income An analysis of long-term trends showing the distance between the richest and poorest countries • 3 to 1 in 1820 • 11 to 1 in 1913 • 35 to 1 in 1950 • 44 to 1 in 1973 • 72 to 1 in 1992 U. S. Imperialism: A Century of Slaughter http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/American_Empire/Century_Imperialism.html The invasion of Iraq and the crisis of American and world capitalism http://www.wsws.org/articles/2005/jan2005/nb-j17.shtml --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ Thanks for being part of "PoliticalForum" at Google Groups. For options & help see http://groups.google.com/group/PoliticalForum * Visit our other community at http://www.PoliticalForum.com/ * It's active and moderated. Register and vote in our polls. * Read the latest breaking news, and more. -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
