← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · Hilaire Belloc
Thread ID: 8029 | Posts: 6 | Started: 2003-07-10
2003-07-10 14:39 | User Profile
[url=http://english.pravda.ru/mailbox/22/98/387/10456_Bush.html]http://english.pravda.ru/mailbox/22/98/387...10456_Bush.html[/url]
The Un-Americanism of the Bush Administration 07/10/2003 14:44 The Bush administration does not show the values that the American people admire
The American people are, in general, fun-loving, friendly and easy-going, like everyone else. Perhaps due to the short history of their nation, they are on a permanent quest to draw the line between where right meets wrong, to search for the truth, to be honest and to live within a framework of values shared by the main religions.
Although George W. Bush likes to speak about how good he and his administration are, no matter how many times he bashes the Bible and proclaims his superiority to the world as he launches his crusades against evil axes and empires, a peek beneath the veneer reveals that this man and his administration are no more American in their values than Hitler and his gang of Fascists were German.
Hitler, an Austrian, usurped the spirit of the German nation and insulted the values of its people. Bush, like the Lone Ranger, is out on a limb. Gullible and easily manipulated, his weakness of spirit has led him to cross over the line which his fellow Americans seek to respect.
While his personal life is not a matter for the public to discuss, his victory against alcoholism is commendable. However, to swap the bottle for the Bible and to follow a warped version of Christianity as justifiable as the Taliban-s extremist version of Islamic law and Pashtun lore, proves that not only the mind but also the mind-set of the man and his government is pathologically unbalanced.
Here is a man who sent people to their deaths in Texas, claiming that it was better to take a life to save others. Here is a man who has seen his armed forces commit acts of murder in Afghanistan while 3,000 civilians were butchered. Here is a man who has sent his armed forces to Iraq, where up to 7,000 civilians have been murdered. We are speaking about something in the region of 10,000 people. Ten thousand people.
Ten thousand people. Is mass murder part of the shared values of the American people? Is lying part of these values? And the bullying of weaker nations in the UN Security Council? And the blackmail used to get these countries to vote for the resolutions proposed by Washington? And the forging of documents, trying to insinuate that Niger sold uranium to Baghdad when Washington knew all along that there was no active nuclear program?
Are these the common values, shared by the people of America? They are not. Honesty, decency, a peaceful, happy life lived together in the community where discussion, diplomacy and debate are not only expounded but practiced, as the fundamental principles of democracy. These are the values of the American people.
George W. Bush and his administration have destroyed and insulted these values. George W. Bush, Rumsfeld, Cheney, Rice, Wolfowitz, Perle, Powell, Fleischer. Like Hitler and Himmler, these names will go down in history as the people who stepped over the line, who went too far, who destroyed the fabric of diplomacy, betrayed the principles of their people and created a feeling of abject hatred for their cause in the hearts and minds of the vast majority of mankind.
Timothy Bancroft-Hinchey
2003-07-10 21:49 | User Profile
**a) Austrians are Germans.
b ) Hitler was the ultimate German in spirit and heart. He united our nation and created for the first time "Greater Germany". Untill the last days of the war, he had the support of the people. There was never a more popular leader than him in our history!
c) It seems the "pravda" is still the same old marxist rag.
d) How insulting for Hitler to compare him to dubya!ÃÂ **
Yes thats the one part of the article I found to be ridiculas. However the main point about Bush's administration being un-american in its policies I agree with.
2003-07-28 02:23 | User Profile
*Originally posted by Leland Gaunt@Jul 10 2003, 10:16 * ** a) Austrians are Germans.
**
:taz: Argggh!!!!
Pray, man, are you Austrian? If yes, you are severely misguided. If no, how dare you do away with our 1000-year-old nation as a matter of course?
See, this is one of the serious problems I have with WNs. Many of them seem to agree with everything Hitler believed, no matter how absurd.
Austria is part of the larger German culture, yes. So is the German part of Switzerland. But tell a Swiss patriot his country should really be annexed by Germany, and he will probably lose his usual Swiss politeness. What makes some people believe the same is not true for Austrians?
2003-07-29 03:05 | User Profile
*Originally posted by Leland Gaunt@Jul 28 2003, 02:09 * ** Maria Theresia, Erzherzog Johann, Franz Josef - they all considered themselves German. **
Glad you mention Maria Theresia -who came very close to wipe Frederickôs behind! :D
But seriously: Nearly all of what you say is BS.
Austria has been a separate state since the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire in 1804.
That the Crazy Guy :hit: wasted lots of Austrians at Stalingrad does NOT put a duty on us to support any schemes for a da capo. :lol:
Even in the 30s, Conservatives were dead against "Anschluß", and Social Democrats were split on the issue.
And donôt even try the line about the 1938 plebiscite. It was not exactly free, or was it? Guess what the result would have been had the vote been held by Chancellor Schuschnigg? :lol:
The Swiss are a shining example for not letting themselves be killed by the lies of either side.
And I donôt care a fig about your definition of "separatism". If I wanted to be part of a Greater Reich, I would support the New World Order!
Long Live Separatism! :punk:
If the Germans wanted to be part of Austria, they shouldnôt have revolted against the Holy Roman Empire (and its Austrian administration! :D ) all the time!
2003-08-07 01:22 | User Profile
Most of your post is irrelevant to the question if Austria is a "nation" or not. Btw, your quotes are highly dubious. Renner in 1938, for example, included a commentary on the "means" of the Anschluß, which you omitted. ;)
Be that as it may, "nation" is defined not by language alone (What about Switzerland again?-there you have a nation with four languages!), but by ancestry, political history etc
Now as to ancestry, fact is that Belgians, for example, are (on average) genetically closer related to Germans than Austrians -does that now mean that Belgium is not a nation?
And as to political history: Even while the Holy Roman Empire existed, Austria has been a semi-independent entity throughout the centuries, not least due to the fact that a large part of the Habsburg monarchy was not German.
And even if that had not been so: Given the fact where the power was, late medieval/early modern Germany was much rather a part of the Austrian/Austro-Spanish Empire than the other way round.
And, as you are so fond of quoting: what about the Austrian poet -Grillparzer, of course? Do you maintain Grillparzerôs patriotism was German rather than Austrian? Or that he was a Commie? Good luck with either or both of these theses! :th:
And if Dollfuß was so hot about "Anschluß", why did the Nazis shoot him dead? Some communication error? :lol:
2003-08-14 00:33 | User Profile
*Originally posted by Leland Gaunt@Aug 12 2003, 23:13 * ** What you Idiot dont seem to understand is that STATE and NATION are two different things. **
They are related. And Grillparzer definitely preferred -just as I!- to live in an Austrian state. He even opposed the German unification:
"Ihr glaubt, ihr habt ein Reich gegründet, doch habt ihr nur ein Volk zerstört."
A people, not his people, because Austria was not included in Bismarckôs empire, anyway.
Why, do you think, was it Metternichôs -and every other 18 th and 19th century Austrian leaderôs!- policy to keep Prussia small? Because they thought themselves Germans in the first place? The might occasionally use "German" rhetoric, but that proves nothing. Their factual policies were the precise opposite of that. For what, do you think, we fought in the seven years war, and at Königgrätz?
Austria is non-negotiable. Germany means about the same to me as Italy or England or other European countries I am fond of -I like to visit them, and I certainly feel related to all of them, but they are not my country.
I stand to what I said: If you are Austrian, I consider you unpatriotic, and if you are not, impudent. :angry: