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| Understanding Anti-Americanism (Page 2) To top this off, the Bush Administration has renounced American support for the International Criminal Court. This becomes important because the ICC can only enforce laws in countries that sign and ratify the treaty for the court. The Bush Administration has called it a court with a �flawed foundation� and that could be �particularly troubling� while dealing with the War on Terrorism. The Bush Administration has even assigned Marisa Lino to negotiate pledges against extradition of Americans for ICC trials and the Congress has authorized military action against any attempts to bring Americans to trial for war crimes. Why would America fight so strongly against the ICC? Could it be that America is worried of trial for war crimes with good reason? America has long claimed to be the beacon of freedom and justice, among other democratic values. President Reagan made democracy the centerpiece of American foreign policy in the 80s and each President has continued those claims since. The very foundation of exporting democracy was the focus point for the likes of President Kennedy to justify invasion of Cuba. So when American leaders help in attempts to overthrow the leaders of other countries, influence their elections, and openly talk of overthrow of foreign leaders; those perceptions of democratic values ring hollow. The world had bought into American democratic ideals after the end of the Cold War, where the support of dictators and overthrowing of governments was hidden under the veil of national security. However, in the world today, concepts of self-determination and self-governing by the people of a country are goals that the United States has shown to be hollow. Freedom at its very foundation deals with ideas of determining one�s own leaders, and Justice leaves no one above the law. The decisions of the Bush Administration ignore those very basic American tenants. When one considers the 66 countries that have signed and ratified the ICC, the idea that even our strongest allies won�t support and have commented against our interference in Palestinian elections, that our Latin American allies don�t trust America not to try to overthrow their countries, and that even our best Middle Eastern allies won�t let us launch an attack on Iraq to overthrow Saddam, it becomes clear that just in the last six months, America has isolated itself from the world. Israel is about the only country that supports American actions, and it gets $3 billion in military aid a year, and President Bush has given in to supporting the actions of Ariel Sharon that he condemned less than six months ago in order to maintain that support. It is time to reflect on American foreign policy. It is time to actually take the time to understand it. Americans are woefully undereducated in foreign affairs for the most part. While some may think of this as an attack on the Bush Administration, it isn�t. This is just an attempt to give a slice in time to help Americans understand why the world so strongly dislikes America. This is nothing new or unique to the Bush Administration. Assassination of the President of Chile under Nixon, attempted overthrow of Cuba under Kennedy, overthrow of Grenada under Reagan, overthrow of Panama under Bush (41), overthrow of Serbia under Clinton, the War on Drugs use of military force against rebels, the use of the Carter Doctrine to hold up Saudi leadership from overthrow, and many, many other policies have reflected the very same contradiction between the spoken agenda and the actual actions of the American government. On this, the Fourth of July weekend, the most patriotic thing Americans can do is take the time to learn about their government, to question their government, and to fulfill their responsibilities as citizens to be informed and question. Any country based on democratic ideals and voters only maintains itself by the informed populous and the questioning of authority and policy. It is the very foundation of our country, from the questioning of the tea tax, to the questioning of our history. There is nothing more patriotic than to question our government and officials and make sure that we do fully understand what they are doing in our names. As of now, they know that most of America doesn�t know much or care much about foreign policy and act with immunity. It is that very lack of attention that causes the anti-Americanism. America has two choices in foreign policy: to continue down the hypocritical path that creates anti-Americanism or live and spread the ideas of �liberty and justice for all.� References |
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