Is America it's own Enemy?

[ck4829]

A person on Politically Incorrect recently said that America has a problem with it's hard core Conservatives.

America is at war with people who have some low standards in regards to equality and Civil Rights. (Now, I hope I don't hear complaints. I am not really talking about Iraq, but rather the Taliban. And as a Muslim, I do know that there are those Muslims who want to contort Islam into a thing for Power)

But, is America really all that different from those who restrict freedom?

It has been the Liberals who have had to drag America, kicking and screaming, in order to face Modernity.

Slavery
Racism
Inequality

One is a problem that was so rooted in America that it took a war to end.

The other two still exist.

Is a large segment of America really all that different from those who think progress is a bad idea?

[Wildewolfe]

1. Progress is ...

.. anathema to fundamentalism of any type. Progress generally means a lack or loosening of controls as they are found to either be silly, or just no longer needed. Progress calls on the carpet cherished ideas/ideals exposes them to light and most, if not all, of them whither in the harsh light of reality. Progress destroys the underpinnings of fundamentalism.

[StellaBlue]

2. "Is America its own Enemy?"

YES!

[JuniperLea]

3. answers...

Is America it's own Enemy?"

yes


But, is America really all that different from those who restrict freedom

no


I don't think I get question number three but I will say this: I'm not so sure we know what our fellow Americans think.

[melissinha]

4. that's my philosophy...

but most definitely:

The NeoFascist Zombie Brigade is the biggest threat to the physical, economic, and emotional safety of this country.

I do live in a culture of fear, but its not of some unidentified middle-eastern boogeyman.... I fear all the things the Administration and most of the Republican COngress is raping our country.

[Holly_Hobby]

5. Yes!

Half of the people in this country have no critical thinking skills and no grasp of history. They're easy marks.

[afdip]

6. it's more than half . . . .

[melody]

7. The US is at least two distinctly different cultures locked together

While we have liberal policies and politicians, we can survive together. The minute the hardliners start to exert control over this complex a system, it's bound to kill it. It'll break up by legal means (we can hope) or revolution, but it'll happen.

[hfojvt]

8. 'we have met the enemy and it is us'

The capitalist ideal is the 'war of each against all' but that conflicts with religious ideals that say 'we are members one of another' so people are often at war with themselves or what they call 'their inner demons'.

Nobody thinks progress is a bad idea. That is true by definition, but we all have different ideas of what constitutes 'progress'. I dislike the argument of change for the sake of change, or calling one direction 'modernity'. But then again, I also think cell phones are a bad idea, and I used to feel that way about the internet (before I got involved with it, I scoffed at is as the latest fad). If you want to argue about the merits of some proposal or social change, then do so, but it is pre-emptive to label it 'modern' just because it came later. Consider transportation, simply, which is modern - trains and buses like Europe or automobiles like America? Should I put my bicycle away and join the 'modern' world by buying an SUV? Isn't the SUV the latest and greatest thang?