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Comment by mtgx | Hacker News Reader

Sometimes I wish Americans felt what real blowback was. Americans kill so many people abroad, and then they're shocked that there's a "terrorist attack" every 10 years or so, against them. That's nothing. Imagine having these wars with a country that can really fight back. Imagine having that war close to home. I think, then, Americans would be a lot more cautious about sending over attacks to other countries without caring what happens.

That's the problem. Americans are very sheltered from the wars they start for the most part, so they let their government do whatever. Americans aren't still thinking 9/11 happened because they hated them for their freedoms, do they?

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You won't get very far figuring in general terms about "Americans." I'm an American, and I wasn't in favor of a retaliatory invasion, even in 2003.

That said, where the public stands has relatively little to do with the US's actions. the Iraq and Afghanistan invasions were knee-jerk actions made supported by people who were acting under information that later turned out to be totally false. The current drone strikes weren't ever a serious ballet issue. In fact, I daresay most conflicts in which the US has been engaged in the last 40 years were initiated with very little regard as to public consent beyond "will they riot if we do this?"

I always hear this from amercians. If you are going to boast about being 'free' and 'democratic' then you 'support' whoever is running the administration (that's how democracy works, the majority "Wins" the support of the people).

Have some personal accountability.

Or else, you are not free, nor a democracy.

I know this gets brought up often, but you understand America is not a true democracy. We elect our leaders, but we don't vote on their decisions. Inherent in our system of government is a very long and arduous feedback loop between leadership decisions and citizen support and approval. For instance, the Obama administration is on its second term right now. There can be no reelection for our current president. He has four years to act without concerning himself with voter approval. To protect against our executive branch going rouge there are other checks we have in place such as judges and legislatures. What is happening right now in America is a struggle between our three branches of government.

I think he touches on the propaganda machine america has. You can't claim to be the best in the world if you don't lead the world in any categories; you can't claim to be the superior developing country, if you're infant mortality rate competes with the 3rd world countries; you can't claim that what makes america special is freedom, because 180 countries in the world have that, and freedom isn't even up to a very high standard here as of late.(especially relative to some socially liberal regions such as scandinavia).

Drone strikes, and assassinations were occurring before his reelection... So I'm not sure how anyone can argue "We didn't get a chance to vote him out"... as you actually did.

While I agree with you, it is more complex than I simplified it. It is that general apathy of americans that lets administrations get so out of control.

Was the alternative likely to be any better on this front though?

I always find this a bit weird, you only get to choose between two parties. The difference with China doesn't seem that big, they only get to vote on one party less.

But you have more than two parties don't you? Not that it matters, more parties don't have significant advantages. It's just that there is a bigger pool of crooks.

I think it does matter. In the Netherlands you are able to vote right wing without the religion, or even vote on a religious left wing party. There are party differences between how we should handle a lot of different issues. It is easier to find a party you agree with.

Party sizes vary greatly after elections which means politicians feel the consequences of their actions. It is not perfect of course, but it is better.

The weird thing is that it is possible to have multiple parties in the US, but they never get enough votes. This makes it seem like their has to be a lot of corruption.

It matters, similarly to haow it matters that you have more choice in Internet providers than a binary choice of either 1) cable or 2) telco-provided DSL.

Countries where multiple parties feasibly compete have the possibility, at least, of a disruptive new party taking share.

The American system, like the American ISP market in most of the country, is so rigged for the two corrupt incumbents that you basically always have a choice of light dark gray or dark light gray.

I live in Japan where we have a wide range of competing ISPs and political parties. Both Internet service and political representation are vastly better than in my native USA.

(Admittedly, the former more so than the latter...)

There are institutional and legal barriers to third party candidates. It is disguised pretty well but is obvious when you know what you're looking for.

Not at all.

    he did indicate he would continue President Obama’s controversial drone strike program against alleged terrorist suspects.

http://www.examiner.com/article/romney-ratifies-obama-s-dron...

I'd love to see some country in the world where voters are wise and altruistic and empathetic about people on the other side of the world, rather than self-interested and easily manipulated.

What, so if we voted them into office that means we automatically support & approve everything they might do?

It's completely legitimate to say Americans for acts done by your government, because you have a democracy. You don't get to have it both ways. If too many people are apathetic and don't care enough what the US military does to thousands of people all over the world rather than stop it, then be ready to accept the responsibility.

The United States is a Democratic Republic, not a Democracy.

You're confirming his/her point exactly - Americans don't care. But I (and probably the whole rest of the world) bet that they/you would if the wars were closer to home.

You're right, America is still #1!

In human rights abuses, illegal wars, prison population, and all of those other great things that you're all so damn proud of.

"Imagine having these wars with a country that can really fight back. Imagine having that war close to home."

My friend, have you considered the horrors of an America faced with a credible threat and given the opportunity to justify real, total war against an opponent capable of the same?

I do not wish to live in that world.

Unfortunately, it's becoming more and more apparent we _do_ live in that world - it's just not happened yet.

I don't buy that for a second. Having firsthand knowledge of how terrible our border security is, how much theater goes into our domestic security, and how half-assed all these show layers are, there's only one reasonable conclusion:

The number of humans on Earth that want to kill large numbers of other humans is exceedingly, vanishingly small.

Most people just don't want to blow people up, no matter how angry they are.

If this were false, we'd see bombings, shootings, and poisonings constantly all over the country. We don't.

I grew up in Detroit. Trust me when I say that this country has no shortage of machine guns.

If these sorts of things were being stopped by the NSA's dragnet, they wouldn't have claimed to have stopped "dozens" of attacks with their surveillance. They'd have claimed "hundreds" or "thousands". They didn't.

There just aren't that many people who wish civillian populations harm, even if their government did blow up their loved ones.

> Sometimes I wish Americans felt what real blowback was.

The typical reaction of a nation is not "Oh well, we better stop doing that then".

Exactly, so why does the USG think it will work in the opposite direction?

Europe is very pacifistic by the US standards precisely because of the wars and totalitarian states experienced in the past. Remember, the "historical memory" doesn't vanish with a generation that experienced Nazism or Communism. It is passed on to the next generations. My guess is that what USG is claiming is that given the US had the same sad and tragic historical experiences as the Europeans did, they would have thought twice before engaging in all the wars.

Just to give you some perspective: I live in Poland. 20% of the population - 6 million (not 10,000) civilians - was killed in WW2 by Germans and Russians. Our neighbors. We lived through it. We have quite good relations with both countries. Now - forgive me the language - but how many Poles look at your 9/11 - it's a non-event. And you go like crazy on a 1000-year war with billion Muslims because some idiots blew up a couple of buildings. I'm sorry but that's how I and I'm sure many in Europe perceive it. Completely and totally overreacted. Just bring the responsible before the Court give them the due process and hand them or something.

You are totally inexperienced as a nation with just 200 years of history with the phenomenon called "shit happens" and totally, totally overreact to the point it just looks comical. You are like this big fat guy with a machine guy at a bar doing shooting-frenzy trying to kill a fly.

As a scandinavian I totally agree. The US should learn from Norway and the Breivik mass shooting to see how one deals with madmen. Capture them, put them before a judge just like every other criminal and then unceremoniously lock them up.

The obvious problem with Breivik is lack of the capital punishment in Norway. Not Norway following the law and due process.

To use an analogy, it looks like in the US they would have tortured Breivik for years before letting him to go to face a Trial but without a defense attorney. It's another extreme. Taking into account that the US is the world superpower, much more concerning one.

EDIT: Now thinking about it, Breivik spent a lot of time in France. It's a stretch, but if the Norway had the US attitude, it would just invade France now, lol. My point is that they are really, really over the top with that "terrorism" thing.

I think that this line of thinking is part of the problem in the US. The lack of capital punishment in Norway is a feature not a bug, and if you look at the results it's a good feature. Norway has very low crimerates compared to the US, far fewer homicides and almost no problems with guns and violence.

The Unites States has a mentality of punishing the perpetrators, often very hard, in order to gain revenge and maybe act as a deterrent to others. This is why the US is one of the onlycountries in the world that use capital punishment, and the country in the world where most people are in prison.

Unfortunately research shows that this doesn't work, as evidenced by crimerates and homicides in the US. Norway takes a different approach, and instead of looking for revenge they ask "how do we prevent this from happening again". This is why there is no capital punishment, why you see drug offenders in nice rehabilitation homes, and why Breivik was convicted like any other murderer within the Norweigan system.

The Norweigan system works, and the American doesn't. Just look at the numbers.

To act as the devils advocate I do have to note that Norway has less social problems than the US in general which also affects the level of crime, e.g. you have no minorities recently out of slavery and not much immigration (Sweden and Denmark have way more immigration though but still have quite little crime).

I am a firm believer in the Norwegian style of punishment and rehabilitation. The goal of a justice system is not to punish or get revenge but to create a safe society with little crime, and if rehabilitation does that (which is what I believe) then we should have more rehabilitation.

> Just bring the responsible before the Court give them the due process

That might not work with suicide bombers. Just a thought.

What are you then suggesting? Killing the suicide bombers family? Well, the US is already doing that and this behaviour is just barbaric.

I just tried to be funny and point out that bringing suicide bombers before the court after the fact does not work.

> I think, then, Americans would be a lot more cautious about sending over attacks to other countries without caring what happens.

The problem here that the "Fight for what's mine" mentality is a core of American society. If there was a credible threat to America, the 310 million of them would band together stronger than ever before to unleash a horrible, all consuming war.

Well said. I think that eventually a real blow will happen and of no terrorist origin, but a nation. A lot of people are aggravated by the militant attitude of the US. Even the most patient of us have their threshold.

As a side note on the Middle East. I think that the US deliberately destabilize the situation in the region, preparing the ground for the Iran takeover.

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