It is natural for humans to look with suspicion and latent hatred at those more powerful than them. And so the current propensity to hate US Americans is understandable especially among those who might suffer in some way, real or imagined, because of US American interventionist policies over the long history especially since the beginning of the Philippine-American war of the 1900s.
Imagine if you were an ordinary Iraqi. The US invaded your country in 2003, and there has been no peace there since. As a consequence of that absence of peace, the West is now incessantly dropping bombs there making life generally impossible for non-combatants. And now, despite clear international treaties obligating civilized countries to grant safe haven to those escaping war, the US is now discussing plans to close down its borders to refugees.
Hearing especially the Republican politicians discuss the recent spate of terrorist attacks in Europe and Africa, one cannot help but be emotionally affected. At the very least, one understands why it is so easy to hate Americans.
The Republicans attack Obama for being a failure and showing lack of leadership. But the truth is that Obama is a decent man, certainly the most enlightened president they’ve had in many years.
And as for leadership, the question always is: What and to where do they want to be led?
The Republican George W. Bush led them to the ill-motivated and vengeful war to bring down Saddam Hussein purportedly because he stored and planned to use weapons of mass destruction. As it turned out, the WMDs were only imagined and may have been just a convenient excuse to invade a foreign country. They were warned that the invasion of Iraq could be another Vietnam.
Instead, they dreamed they would be greeted as heroes in the streets. In a few years, they would be out of the country and leave behind a healthy democratic system, and all would live happily ever after.
But how do you invade another country and expect things to be well after that? Where is the blueprint for that? Where is the historical precedent? As it turned out, Iraq turned out worse than
Vietnam. The Vietnamese never exported their war to the urban centers of the West the way ISIS is now doing. And yes, the Vietnamese won that one in the end. But only after the death of tens of thousands on both sides of the border.
And now, the Republicans think of going to war in Syria and putting boots on the ground there. They want to close down their borders keeping out Syrians and other Middle Easterners who are only escaping the bombs they are dropping. Not to argue against the rightness of dropping bombs on ISIS, but if you were a Syrian or an Iraqi refugee and you hear how the US is now planning not to take in refugees, notwithstanding established international practice and all sense of common decency, what would you feel?
Those watching all these from a relatively safe distance may be excused for asking: Why would Americans make it even easier to hate them from hereon?
It is almost as if the Republicans, and by natural extension many US Americans are begging the world to be more sympathetic with their foreign enemies, even to join in with them. It is almost as if they are putting a line on the planet to divide them from the rest of us, notwithstanding such a line would put us on the same side with the terrorists.
But such is the nature of fascism. And one must now have to accept that the next few years will be marked by a reemergence of rightist fascism all over the world. If the Republicans succeed in putting their president in the White House, there will be war. And all of us who do not like war, will have to stand aside and pray the war will not touch us and our families. At no other time in our history should we, Filipinos, be thankful and happy, we are Filipinos who have little to do with all these, thus far. But we can never tell what might happen in a situation of war.
But let it be said, that Obama is a good US president, perhaps the most decent human being ever to hold that post thus far, perhaps the last decent human being to hold that post for a good while from hereon. Just because he would not lead his country to a pointless war it cannot possibly win, does not make him any less a leader. Notwithstanding the inflammatory speeches and pleadings of some of his ignorant countrymen, he is leading his country up the most correct path.
Americans should listen to their leader. Seven years as US president and the Americans would rather listen to Trump or that other guy over this issue? We shake our heads. Unbelievable!
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