tude dog wrote: ↑Mon Jan 18, 2021 12:18 pm
Distressed are you?
Undoubtedly. America didn't have to end up the latest scourge of humanity. There used to be idealism back in the nineteenth century, I've no idea why you chose to throw it away.
What the Trump administration brought to the world was a respite. For four years the Pentagon has been held on a tight leash. The new administration is promising "business as usual" which to people outside America means the imminent arrival of incompetent killers kept invulnerable by air cover, trashing their homes, wrecking their culture and destroying their means of subsistence. I would agree that President Trump made life hellish for most of his countrymen but, on balance, I think that's a fair trade. Robin Wright in today's New Yorker called the last four years a “self-absorbed, gridlocked” America (quoting Doug Lute, a retired lieutenant general who was the U.S. ambassador to NATO and served on the National Security Council in both the George W. Bush and Obama Administrations). A second term along the same lines would have been welcome. What we face instead is President-elect Biden bragging:
"We will reclaim our credibility to lead the free world,” Biden told reporters last month. “And we will, once again, lead not just by the example of our power, but by the power of our example."
If he just carried a bell and wore a sign saying "unclean" round his neck it would make his words a lot clearer.
If there's one consolation in all this it's that Mike Pence is out of the running for high office for the next four years, and the despicable bombast Pompeo can finally be ignored.