Are nations allowed to atone for past mistakes?

Are nations allowed to atone for past mistakes? [+ favourites]

kick me off...

"Wars are not won by dying for your country, they a"
[  Edited by tanker at   ]

I think it is the job of a nation's leader to publicly acknowledge past mistakes, which dear Bush has never done.

I think it is the job of the nation that erred to completely support the undoing of their mistakes, but not lead it.

My view is that a country that has made numerous mistakes in the past has no right/ability to make correct decisions in the future (logically) and as a result should provide their force and follow the motives of the world, hence the U.N.

I've written these exact words before somwhere on here, not sure where. Regardless, yes, nations are allowed, but not allowed to make decisions about what needs to be undone. They must in a sense "surrender" their might to the will of the nations of the world.

...or for god's sake, stay out of it and focus on unemployment, poverty, and medicare.

"Hating everyone protects me from elitism."

Tanker: I will say this once, so hear it really well. This is a discussion forum which indicates it is for ideas to be shared by everyone with ideas to share. Do not invalidate anyone's opinion due to their geographic location, race, sex or age. That is prejudice, and I won't allow it on these boards.

The world cannot "move in and take everything". This is again the self-victimization that plagues so called "patriots". If the US had any moral conscience to the incredible wrongs it had performed in the past, it would support whatever decisions the UN takes 100%. In this recent case it defied these decisions, which blatently means they are still fulfilling their own personal agenda regardless of world opinion.

I don't think the "child in school" metaphor you are using is at all relevent since a child goes to school specifically to learn, and a "childhood" is there for children to learn. A nation has no freebies. Especially not hundreds of years after it has been in existance. Nothing can be forgiven and nothing can be learned. All decisions must be made correctly, or the country must be held liable for all its bad decisions. A country as powerful and influencial as the US is definitely not allowed freebies, because every action it takes is very relevent to every other nation.

"There is no learning curve once you have nuclear weapons."

As for the unemployment stuff, you have not dissagreed with me so I have nothing to debate. The US should spend all their money in pleasing their citizens, not stealing natural resources from other countries.

"Hating everyone protects me from elitism."

I do not advocate that Canada is any better than the US, so comparing them really achieves nothing. Also, I do not speak for "Canada" as a representative.

A rate of 6 percent is worse than a rate of 3 percent, and unemployment is only one aspect where the citizens can be focussed upon. There is medicare, infrastructure, education and lots more.

"Hating everyone protects me from elitism."

" without a major war or terrorism on a massive domestic scale to contend with."
Bush did not have to contend with terrorism in such a wasteful way. Irak has no ties to Al Qaeda. It was a complete utter waste of men and ressources, unless Bush plans on taking all the oil. In that case it "may" be a good trade for human lives.

"AIDS is God's way of sending Catholics to heaven."

You say such illogical things tanker.

"And every citizen is an ambassador for his/her country, good or bad, whether they want to be or not."

No they aren't. I am not an ambassador for Canada. I have no patriotism towards Canada. Why would I speak on behalf of it? I don't even argue with you based on the fact that you are American. I don't believe you speak for "America". You are not an ambassador. You have opinions that are personal. Who knows where they come from, but they definitely are not patriotic.

As for the 3 percent, that was a witty way of saying that 6 percent is not as good as it can be. Sorry you didn't get that.

Yes the infrastructure can be upgraded and bettered. Yes the medicare can be bettered. Yes the schooling can be bettered. Clinton is irrelevent; Bush likes to spend insane amounts of money in war, he should have been passionate enough to put that towards his people. Then he would be a fantastic leader.

"Hating everyone protects me from elitism."

The Middle East and terroism is a problem for all countries of the world! Get a grip!

"The Middle East and terroism is a problem for all countries of the world! Get a grip!"
I don't think any nice quiet countries like canada, the netherlands or any scandinavian countries have ever had to deal with terrorism on a large scale in recent years.

"As for dumping money to the people of this country... yeah great idea, get more people thinking that giving my tax dollars, and the tax dollars of millions of hard working Americans, to people who didn' t work for it is a good idea."
It CAN be a viable economic policy as every dollar you give will be used to buy something, thus boosting consumption. I don't mean it is always viable, just sometimes, such as when a large percentage of your population is obscenely rich while others are very poor.

" Now, medicare needs to be fixed so that the people who saved the world from Hitler and WWII (your welcome, my grandparents and other AMERICAN grandparents) can have their prescriptions for less than their life savings...that's a good idea, but being passionate in your eyes is just doling out money..at least you haven't given me a reason to think otherwise....Care to explain some changes? Or do we want to play the blame game all friggin year?"
Saved the world from Hitler? If anything the Russians did the most in that war.
And being passionate is trying to allow people to live happier lives. This often means dolling out money for food, housing and medicine.

"AIDS is God's way of sending Catholics to heaven."

"Take our mone with us and fend for ourselves. Then we will watch to se who stands up for the under dogs of the world."
Because the US stands for the underdogs of the world? Oh, please, are you really so naive to think that the Bush Admin went to Irak out of sheer benevolence? If that were the case Irak should be on the road to being rebuilt by an international group and not rebuilt by the US to fulfil its great thirst for oil.
You are correct in saying it is good to bring down a tyrant, but there are other places in the world who need help more. What's more, Bush's case for the war on Irak was not based on moral obligation as much as protection from supposed WMD production. Bush should have sent the troops to NK where the people live under a communist despot and their leader made no strong attempt to hide his nuclear program.

"AIDS is God's way of sending Catholics to heaven."

"I admire nuetral countries, you never have to hear them profusely criticize other countries for sacrificing their men for the safety of the world."
Save the world? From Sadam he was being extremely cooperative in recent years that it wasn't worth the vast and wasteful military effort to boot him.

"They both continue or continued with programs that called for UN sanctions...UNTIED NATIONS economic sanctions that ended up starving large portions of their populations."
There is no proof Irak was continuing its programs recently. The UN attempted to offset the starvation by using the food-for-oil program.

"Also 12 years of UN resolutions...UNITED NATIONS resolutions to get Iraq to comply with WMD inspection and removal yielded nothing until the US went in. 12 YEARS."
What do you mean yielded nothing? The inspectors found nothing because its quite probable that there's nothing to find! Sadam was complying with every US demand barring leaving the country and even with US troops there not a single piece of convincing evidence concerning Irak's nuclear weapons has been found.

"AIDS is God's way of sending Catholics to heaven."