It Is Not We Who are Arrogant

Arrogance to me means not being able to acknowledge one's own flaws. This whole Europe vs. America fight just seems worthless to me. I'm an American, part brit part french and yes there are cultural differences and both sides tend to have untrue sterotypes. In truth there is no way to tell who is a true "American" and who is a true "European" (it's a whole contintent!).

Henry James was one of the first to remark on the difference between us culturally but when it comes to foreign policy, arrogance is just a word to discribe something one doesn't like. Was the Iraq War arrogant? No, just poorly thought out and doomed to failure as all Wilsonian ideas are. I hope for the best though.

Failure is defined as not being successful in achieving one's goals and surrendering. Of course failure is also a relative term these days and so any life lost in a cause that is not universally supported is viewed as a failure.
My military friends over in Iraq have continued to wonder why the immense change and improvements have been singularly ignored by the media, the schools, the collective free election that globally was supposed to never have happened (over 1 million 'purple' thumbs confounded the media so of course they refused to cover it).
Nobody is being shredded life in giant shredders in public squares anymore and innocent versions are not being shipped into the palace and raped and killed anymore. Girls are being given education and people are learning the RUDIMENTS of free society.

It's not perfect by any means, but the lives lost in this many years is so very low by comparison to other fights for freedom that I call it disingenuous when teh body count is printed and no comparison to other lives lost printed as well. Every lost life is a wrenching, soul searching tragedy, but it's evident by many that this has not been an abysmal failure. It has given them more than a start. AFter this it is up to the valiant courage of the people, as it must always be.
The starfish story comes to mind: An old man walks up to a little boy on the beach and asks him what he is doing. He replies that he is throwing starfish back into the sea. The old man shakes his head and reminds him that with hundreds of miles of coastline the little boy can hardly make a difference. He threw back another starfish and replied that he certainly had made a difference to that one.
Every life lost is gut wrenching. Every life saved is wonderful.
Thank you for commenting, Christopher, some great points and I wholly agree that the term "american" is ambiguous except in the one context that used to be universal, the american dream was the reason so many came and assimilated, they knew what they wanted. =)

Will you?

Are you armed?

Are you ready?