Gun Control: Say What you Mean.

[DeistPaladin]

...considering that all of the anti-American hoopla and vitriol is coming from the left and from the europeans, they don't want to see it any other way....the left will take every opportunity to downplay and to demean the value of America's role in just about everything...

Has it ever occurred to you that there might be patriotic reasons to promote a bit more modesty when we're speaking to those who live in other nations? Or that acknowledging the good other nations do might serve us a little better in these times?

You see, we practice what Jesus said, "do unto others..." America would do well to consider that admonishment.

As Lewis Black once alluded, how would we feel if we worked in an office where every day some prick strutted around making it clear to everyone that they were the best employee and everyone in that business would be lost without them? Even if it WERE true, it would get very old after a while.

This reminds me of an obnoxious and personally toxic but technically talented employee I fired in the last few years. "You are difficult to replace. You are not impossible to replace" I told her and I replaced her. Eventually, being obnoxious will cost you no matter how vital you are.

We don't want that to happen to America.

We Americans are quite full of ourselves. Perhaps that's normal when one's nation is riding high as a world power. Perhaps our physical isolation of two oceans on either side has facilitated our sense of myopia. But the days when powers can beat their chests and rattle their sabers with abandon is long over. We live in an interdependent world and the problems we and other nations face, from international trade issues to climate problems to the proliferation of WMD can't be solved by one nation imposing its will on all others. We need to be a lot more constructive here.

Take the war on Al Qaida for example. If we want to win, we need the cooperation of other nations. Torturing, wars of aggression and saber rattling is counter productive in winning that international support. We can't abandon the moral high ground if we want to win.

We as liberals care about America. That's why a little more empathy and a little less chest pounding would serve us well. This bravado may feel good to you but it doesn't help your country.