The golden rule is being replaced by the platinum rule

Dann757 wrote:

jpete wrote:No one said "dissolve the military". Just return it to it's Constitutionally sized limit.

You're the expert, what is that limit? How does that fare with China building a massive navy as we speak?


I don't know the history about Switzerland, but if Hitler had have won, how long do you think it would have held in the face of the third Reich?

Maybe Ambassador Stevens tried his best to bring the golden rule to Libya.

The Navy is specifically authorized by the Constitution. Maybe you can tell us why that is?

What's wrong with each state having a National Guard(militia) that, in time of need, can be Federalized to defend against an attack? Isn't that what the Constitution says?

Why do you think the Founding Fathers specifically mentioned and funded a permanent Navy but required a vote on funding for the Army every 2 years?

Maybe because as Jefferson said, "Standing armies lead to taxes and taxes lead to tyranny"?

Dann757 wrote:

jpete wrote:Where in the Constitution does it say I can't defend myself? You have this bizarre notion that I am a pacifist or something. I am not. If attacked, I will defend myself fully.

That's a little different than the neo con philosophy of attacking everyone first.

You have a tendency to assume.

I just don't agree with sitting around waiting for an enemy tank to come up my driveway. There's a lot of turmoil in the world, like I say, China,Islam, Iran, Venezuela, would all destroy us if we implemented your brilliant strategic assesments.

What am I assuming?

Did you bother to watch the Wesley Clark video? He even talks about the "Project for a New American Century" in there. Now there's a group the American people should know about but don't.

You're right, there IS a lot of turmoil in the world. And you can probably find Federal Reserve Notes on both sides. "War is a racket" after all and the people at the top stand to lose a lot of "military industrial complex" money if there weren't a market for bullets and bombs.

Dann757 wrote:I just don't agree with sitting around waiting for an enemy tank to come up my driveway.

I wonder if all of the nations wherein we have the equivalent of tanks coming up their driveways (military bases, and drones, and the like) feel the same way you do, or if you might even permit them to feel as you do? I see jpetes point regarding relevance to the topic, in that "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" might be a good analogy here.

Not disagreeing with most of whats been said Jpete but could it just be that at the time the only way for an invasion Army to get here was by ship excapt for others in the Americas, therefore the need for a Navy but not a standing Army. The world has become much smaller & faster.

samhill wrote:Not disagreeing with most of whats been said Jpete but could it just be that at the time the only way for an invasion Army to get here was by ship excapt for others in the Americas, therefore the need for a Navy but not a standing Army. The world has become much smaller & faster.

We have the great fortune of having two very large bodies of water separating us from most of the rest of the world.

If they want to invade, they are coming by boat. They could use planes, but it would take an assload of them.

Either way, the Navy would be the first line of defense and a Federalized force of state National Guard units would be waiting when they got here.

What was it the Japanese said about invading America? "There will be a gun behind every blade of grass."

I'm not worried about America being destroyed by OUTSIDE forces. It's the INSIDE ones that you have to watch out for!

Our Navy and our Trident Class subs should be a fairly decent deterrent against invasion, and if they fail, there is our silo based missile defense system.

If we weren't so totally dependent upon foreign energy and nearly all other goods, perhaps we would return to developing and making our own? I.E., if the rest of the world abandoned us and cut off all trade with us due to our militarily abandoning them (very doubtful, but tossed in for the sake of argument), would our resulting forced isolationism be a totally bad thing?

If we weren't so totally dependent upon foreign energy and nearly all other goods, perhaps we would return to developing and making our own? I.E., if the rest of the world abandoned us and cut off all trade with us due to our militarily abandoning them (very doubtful, but tossed in for the sake of argument), would our resulting forced isolationism be a totally bad thing?

I think that is what I tried to express, but I chose to not sit and type endlessly about finer points. The world is smaller, and we need resources. It was part of the downfall of the Nazis. We cut off their raw materials and bombed their manufacturing. While we continued to produce prolifically. If everyone played fair and we procured our materials in a fair market, your plan would work jpete. But who said anyone else is going to play fair?

Kevin

Six pages of arguements on the topic of the golden rule Nice microcosm of the American man. Pretty much only Larry keeps coming back to it. If you're a true faithful Christian you're not worried about this world, and you will not do violence even if your physical life depends on it. Just a concept, I'm far from the truely faithful.
I wonder if we all form our political opinions ultimately based on what makes us feel righteous, powerful, or secure. In light of the huge number of Americans that are mostly uninformed about our history and world events, I suppose it's good to talk about our varying perspectives.