[joeclarke]

aw, I was just taken a little liberty with your tongue-in-cheek comment about the roots of terrorism. The opportunity to segue that into a US-as-the-aggressor analogy was just too tempting.

I'm not sure how you equate pissin' on other people with the quality of either my toilet habits or my car; as your remarks in other contexts have lead me to believe that you do not subscribe to a zero-sum view of macro-economics. I'm sure that (as a good capitalist) you would be the first to acknowledge that Americans are economically successful in accordance with their own industriousness as opposed to us having truck with the fiscal exploitation of our planet-mates.

Pissin' in my context refers to events like Iraqnam. Pissin' on peoples sovereignty or economic well-being in a bogus context of doing what's best for them or for poster children like freedom, democracy and world peace. Iraqnam is the epitomy of such pissin'. There are many, many other examples of such pissin' and such pissin' has greatly gained momentum since the 1960's.

Bear in mind that I'm a union bustin', money lovin' capitalist myself. I just don't happen to think that our way of relating to the world is sustainable since Sept 11th. Technology makes us all too vulnerable to be cocky about foisting our idealogy on or trying to lead the world around by the nose. If we try to turn world domination into a zero-sum game we will all go the way of the dodo well before our time.