Another Slice of the Obama Pie: by Heath Suddleson
As I indicated yesterday, I’m working on my non Obama list and thinking about more pleasant things. Heath Suddleson has however jumped in with comments on Obama’s trip that expand the thoughts I expressed. I’m using his comments as a guest post today while I think about East Coast Pizza. It has been found that good pizza helps satisfy the need for calming mental disruptions.
Obama today from Heath. Pizza tomorrow from Buck
Heath’s thoughts are worth your time. They follow—
Regards, Buck
A few things strike me from Buck’s most recent posting that I wanted to share. It is a bit longer than a simple paragraph.
As Obama travels the world on the taxpayer’s dollar, apologizing on behalf of us taxpayers, I have to ask myself what we have to apologize for. This is not to say that we are perfect, and the Bush Administration did many things that I did not agree with, but that is no cause for us to apologize to nations and people that we have not harmed. As Obama apologizes in Turkey, I am reminded that Turkey did not stand with us after September 11, 2001. As a country they did not admonish the acts of the terrorists who murdered more than 3,000 people in a single day. Well here we are 7½ years later and we are making apologies to a country that we did not harm, and they did not come to our aid when we were viciously attacked. To what end? Are we thinking that they will somehow say, “Thanks for the apology. Now I can tell those terrorists to stop hating you.”?
Obama even goes so far as to say that we are not at war with Islam and that this is not a cultural issue. Well excuse me, Mr. President, but it is a cultural issue. It is our culture that the terrorists hate and that is why they have declared war on us. Are all Muslims terrorists? Of course not. Do all Muslims hate our culture? Of course not. Truth be told, out of the 1.66 billion Muslims on the planet, there are only about 16 million who are terrorists. That’s only about one percent. Unfortunately the one percent has used religion as the basis for their hatred and attacks. It doesn’t help that the other 99% of Muslims are not speaking out against the actions of their brethren.
On the whole, why would someone hate our culture? Think for a minute what you know of other cultures that you have not visited. How did you get your information? Perhaps you learned about it in school, saw movies, or perhaps you follow coverage on new stations when events of interest take place in these far off lands. I had the opportunity to spend our last election day in Santiago, Chile. I was there for 2 weeks on business. I spoke to people from all over the world and here is what I found out.
1. They don’t feel any Anti-American sentiments, nor do they know anyone who does. Yes, they hear about it on the news just like we do, but they have never heard it expressed elsewhere.
2. They get to see a lot of our country on television shows and movies. These shows and movies are truly the closest they will ever come to visiting our country. Think for a minute about the movies coming out of Hollywood for the past 15 years or more. Does any of it show us in a positive light? This, by the way, is the same reason so many Indians did not like Slumdog Millionair.
3. They get their news and information from CNN and BBC. They have never heard Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, or any other conservative host. They do know who Rush Limbaugh is and they don’t like him because of how he is portrayed on the news.
4. Similarly, they have never heard Bush give a speech or listened to his words, but they know they do not like him because that is what they heard on the news.
So where does all of this leave us? Hopefully it leaves us with an understanding that we have not harmed anyone in today’s world. Apologies are for those you have harmed. Some apologies I personally agreed with were to the descendants of slaves and the Native Americans whom we displaced from their homes and treated with cruelty. We imprisoned thousands of Japanese during WWII because we didn’t know who to trust. Our history is not perfect and our records are not unblemished, but for the past century we have also been the protectors of the globe sending out citizens into harms way to stick up for those who could not stick up for themselves. We have provided money, food, and the blood of our soldiers to help everywhere we have been asked to help. It never mattered what the religious traditions of the location were. We came to help in anyway we could. We owe no apologies to the rest of the world. It is the rest of the world who should be thanking us for what we have done and continue to do.
If you have not done so, I encourage you to seek out three conversations. The first is a conversation on Anti-American Sentiment. Speak to your friends who are immigrants to our land and ask what they think about our country. Secondly, speak to a veteran of the war in Iraq and ask them how they feel about our mission there. Ask them to tell you what really happens there that is not reported in the news. Lastly, seek out conversations with your friends who are of a different race than you. Speak openly about prejudice, racism, and stereotypes. Through these conversations, both sides will gain a greater understanding. With understanding comes acceptance. With acceptance comes peace.
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