British Airways Worker Suspended for Wearing a Cross

[SeVeR]

Europe's goal is to create an EU to become the anti-US, and their media is anti-US to cater to that opinion.

And your goal is to draw conclusions from very little evidence. How is it the goal of Europe to become the anti-US?

 

Europe, especially Britain, has become a production centre for critics of all countries in the world, even our own. It's because we don't have any patriotism. From your perspective, coming from a country where patriotism exists, this appears uncharacteristic of an ally. But what you don't understand is we criticise everyone just the same. Criticism needs to be heard but only from people who aren't selective in their criticism in a way that is hypocritical. Britain is turning into a !@#$%^&*-house of wannabe gangster teenagers with no education and no respect. America socially is in better shape, politically they're not. All countries have their faults. Its our job to voice all faults without letting patriotism get in the way of listening to the opposing criticism.

[Aileron]

Its cultural and historical. Europe has historically believed in a balance of power...when one nation rose in strength the others would form alliances to unite against them. When over time another nation rose to power, old alliances would collapse and the nations would reorganize themselves to balance the new strength. This mindset is basically what caused World War I to be World War I- all the powers of Europe allied themselves with each other to form two equally strong factions, and when hostilities started, neither side could defeat the other until the US got involved and tipped the balance.

 

It absurd to think that in the 20 years since the collapse of the Soviet Union that Europe has forgotten centuries of policy which all in all was mostly successfull. Its only logical for those in the European condition to unite, because it would be impossible for individual European nations to compete with the US one on one given population and landm!@#$%^&*. It takes a continental economy to compete with a continental economy.

 

This isn't to say that Europe is uniting to "make war" with the US. They are only doing this to avoid economic domination. That means that they want to help European economies. A good example of this would be the newest Airbus jumbo jet, which has parts constructed in about a dozen countries not one of them being the US.

 

Not that I criticise...it would be incredibly stupid for them not to have a policy of unification. As I said, the Balance of Power policy was typically successfull historically.

[SeVeR]

Ok i agree with all that.

 

I think i misunderstood your definition of "anti-US". You mean it in an economic sense, i mean it in a social sense. People in England aren't criticising the US for being an economic power yet i fully expect European governments to unite to compete with the US in that way. You are lumping two very different issues under one "anti-US" !@#$%^&*le. As far as economic strength is conerned, i'm happy to be living out of poverty and i don't care where i'm doing it. But starting a war in Iraq which has created a breeding ground for terrorists who Bush is now using to justify staying in Iraq even longer... (priceless ) ...is why i'm anti US.

[Aileron]

Nah, I just did a report on the Abbasid Empire. al Ma'mun started the conflict between Shi'ites and Sunnis in the 10th century. The fighting has been going on ever since. Its sort of a cultural anomoly between the west and the Middle East. In the west we had distinct organizations called "government" and anything outside of which was considered something else.

 

The Middle East is structured with a bunch of tribes, each consisting of a couple families. Each tribe has some sort of chief. Leaders were just people who had the support of a lot of these chiefs. They never really had direct control, just the loyalty of a bunch of small leaders who had. Historically during the Caliphate, tribes could fued over local control, but both would claim loyalty to the Caliph, so the greater government would stay out of the fued. This was a necessity, because the greater government was needed to maintain the irrigation system in the sawad region.

 

The current "civil war" in Iraq is just one of these fueds. They have been going on for thousands of years, but under the Sunni government of Saddam we in the west labled the attacks by Shi'ites on Sunnis as "rebels" and attacks by Sunnis on Shi'ites as "government reprisals". Truly the best thing to do is just let them kill each other, keeping ourselves, civilians who want nothing to do with it, and the new democratic government of Iraq from being caught in the crossfire. In a couple of years, the local leaders will know where their bounds are and will stop.

[11___________]

I hate it when people give enough care about religion to sue for anything.