Your mutant zombie clones are no match for my Geneticly altered Vampire Sheep!

I wouldn't mind being 2nd best. in a world with 100+ countries, *granted only 15 of them are worth the space on the map* 2 is a pretty good spot.

I also think that it would be a cold day in hell when our states break off from the usa without foreign intervention aka invasion

Then why can't we win a simple war against a few 3rd world nations? I mean come on we've over in the middle east for 4.5 years! WW2 was against three major world powers and it was only about six years long. This stupid war in the middle east has dragged on far to long.

AHH! How did you know my one weakness? A-nything but the MUTTON! AHHHH! Good sheep! Nice sheep! Wait, no, back off, hey! ARGG! It's GOT MY ARM! AHH (etc.)

Fear my crack-baby pandas of doom!

All people, regardless of income, should be given free health care. Sorry, but it works in so many nations in the world. People aren't poor because they are lazy (of course some are, but very few). People are poor because of societal and economic conditions. I believe universal health care is a right. Your ability to pay shouldn't determine whether you can afford the care to become well after an accident/sickness. If you believe that we should weed out the sick, then all the rich sick people should die too. Bah.

I think it's important to remember that the people in America are much like people everywhere in the world. We humans are remarkably similar, despite some cultural differences. The vast majority of humans generally work towards the same goals, and some of us are simply lucky enough to be born in nations as wealthy as the United States, Canada, or nations of the EU (among a few others). Unfortunately, so many people seem to need to construct the 'other,' or, a group of people (generally from a different place) who are 'different.' I like to think that many people like to feel superior, but really, we're all simply incredibly blessed to live in a wealthy nation where we have the disposable time to play video games and debate future world powers from our personal computers online.

Being born in a wealthy nation like the United States is like winning the lottery. Many of the ethnocentric people would have such a different take on life if they were born in any peripheral nation. America has done many amazaing things to make our world a better place (along with other wealthy nations), but there are still so many things that need to be changed about our hyper-materialistic capitalist society. I believe the only significant difference between people now, and people beyond 150 years ago is our ability to record and keep information (specifically history). Hopefully we can all learn a little more about humans in general, and learn from past mistakes, and perhaps live in a slightly more harmonious world.

If all people arew given free health care then one of two things will happen taxes will rape the middle class or medical care will ber worhtless. Rich people can't stay rich if people don't work for them or buy thier goods. Use alternate fules instead of oil. Now back to the main topic. America as much as it pains me to say so can not forever last a superpower here are two reasons why we cater to the minorities that have not done anything to be worth cartering, and the federal gov't is to damn powerful. State's Rights!! Lastly all good thing must come to an end. IF anyone want a reason we can;t win agianst thrid world countries yet we beat JApan and Germany like we did it is because the Germans and Japanese at least had enought testicular fortitude to meet us on the battlefield. Terrorist hide in the crowd and thanks to our don't harm civilian policy make it harder to kill them.

This is 100% not true. Simply look to the excellent health care in nations like Canada, Cuba, Sweden, the UK, etc.. etc..

Additionally, this isn't about the US being conquered. Currently, I don't think a single nation could destroy the American military. It's about the US remaining economically and culturally dominant. The US war machine requires a HUGE amount of resources. If the US economic system collapses, the war machine collapses.

Additionally, people don't really have a choice. It's too hard to overthrow the wealthy elite simply because people need to eat. Specifically, the poorest people in the world MUST work for their worthless wages, simply because they have no choice. They must work to feed their families, but they are absolutely exploited by extremely poor working conditions, rock-bottom wages, and environmental destruction.

Course of events.

WW2: Vast tracts of land are bombed back into the stone age, entire cities razed to the ground, ~50 million people killed. The German army is utterly destroyed, the surviving populace left with most of their infrastructure leveled, unable to feed themselves and dependent on their victors for survival. Japan is even worse off, not only have they had their military shredded even more completely, they can't even just walk in and clean their rubble up, two cities are radioactive.

They're tired, hungry, everyone is missing relatives, and they know they got the shit kicked out of them in a spectacular fashion in the end.

The war in Iraq: The military gets the shit kicked out of it in no time flat, civilian casualties are nill, the infrastructure is primarily in tact. They haven't been hiding in bomb shelters at all, let alone for half a decade. Life goes on fairly uninterrupted, one day they're ruled by an egotistical fool, the next he's hiding in a fox hole.

They're not tired, not hungry, not missing relatives, and they haven't got the shit kicked out of them in any fashion, most of them were on our side when it came to removing the guy. There was no war against the population, they suffered no defeat. The nationals from other countries that make up a large portion of the enemy there aren't even in the picture then.

Of course, there's a flaw in the argument even if they are comparable situations. We're not 4.5 years into a war. We're 4.5 years into an occupation. We still have Semantics can be argued on whether it's an occupation as well, they run most of the show at this point, are even taking the lead in ground offensives. The textbook occupation of Japan lasted almost seven years, Germany four, and while they were occupied, they sure as hell didn't have their own military forces and governing body deciding their own laws. The occupation of Iraq ceased to be a classical occupation when we reinstated their military and gave them governing control. To call it one still is probably stupid, and at the least revisionist. If it is, we occupy most of Europe and much of Asia.

Now, if you want to unleash the US military on the middle east. I'd give the entire region a week before they were impotent even if we skipped the nuclear options. One fully stocked carrier battle group can probably wipe out the Iranian military all by itself with better than a thousand to one kill ratio.

Haha, what? The bombing of Pearl Harbor had nothing to do with the Black Fleet - it was motivated by the fact that embargoes put on Japan for invading East Asia were strangling its ability to hold those territories, and perhaps also a response to the perceived invincibility of the Japanese military after the defeat of both China and Russia, the latter being a major European power.

It does cost money to provide decent health care. And it is also true that countries that provide decent healthcare at 100% coverage to their populations have higher taxes than we do. But, only marginally so.

In America, we have spent the last 28 years dramatically relieving the wealthy and corporations of their tax burdens. Warren Buffet's marginal income tax rate on the last dollar he makes is much lower than his secretary's marginal tax rate. That's just not right. There was a loop-hole written into the tax code recently that allows Wall Street financiers to classify *all* of their income as a capital gain. All of it. Guys that make millions of dollars a year shifting beans around get taxed at 15%. That's far less than a highly skilled tool-and-die worker or software engineer. That's obscene.

Don't believe me? Read David Cay Johnston's books "Free Lunch: How the Wealthiest Americans Enrich Themselves at Government Expense and Stick You With The Bill" and "Perfectly Legal: The Covert Campaign to Rig Our Tax System to Benefit the Super Rich--and Cheat Everybody Else" and then get back to me with your apology.

If we simply taxed all income equally, regardless of whether it is a capital gain or ditch digging, America wouldn't be in the dire financial trouble that we are. Cutting taxes in wartime. Pheh. Obscene. Don't even get me started on Corporations. They used to be the source of over 2/3 of the federal government's income around WW2. Now, it is less than 1/10th.

My point is that there is a huge amount of tax revenue potentially available to the American government. It is a complete myth that we will go broke giving healthcare to the masses. That is just right-wing pablum.

Hi,

I think that US has to develop hyperdrive and you'll be alright.

Yeah... but then we'd have to give it to everybody... :-/