Thread: Biggest failure in US history?

And in my humble opinion, they were wrong. Slavery could never survive - it was already dead in all but the most repressive regimes in the world. And the South would never have given up the right to own slaves peacefully. There was only one way for it to end. The north didn't directly fight the war to end slavery, but the south fought the war to maintain it. There was ultimately only going to be one country and it was not going to allow slavery.

Originally Posted by Fiddytree

Our participation helped two causes we found preferable, defeated a number of God awful regimes, ensured that we had dominance in nuclear weapons, ensured our success in the international community, with its major organizational structures largely benefiting us and our key allies, but other than that, horrible damn mistake.

I see a lot of where it helped OTHER PEOPLE. I do not see where it assisted a properly ISOLATIONIST society, which is what we had prior to WWI and should have continued to have.

The Founders not better codifying their objections to all things nanny-state ........

.... and the resulting nanny state we've created.

Letting our civil rights erode over the years. Giving up our privacy to fight a drug war, standardizing and marginalizing political dissent, allowing religion to inform lawmaking, trading liberty for security, "if you have nothing to hide, then you have nothing to fear". All of it. Every time we chip away at the Bill of Rights, then the entire ideal behind America fails a little more. But on the flip side, every time we strengthen it, we succeed. This country's history has been an attempt to keep those ideals, to create a truly free society. Some times we're doing better than other times. But our major failures are when we take a step backwards away from those ideals.

Jim Crow Laws.

The war on drugs or the war on poverty. Can't decide.

Originally Posted by Wiggen

And in my humble opinion, they were wrong. Slavery could never survive - it was already dead in all but the most repressive regimes in the world. And the South would never have given up the right to own slaves peacefully. There was only one way for it to end. The north didn't directly fight the war to end slavery, but the south fought the war to maintain it. There was ultimately only going to be one country and it was not going to allow slavery.

I was speaking in historical context. From the people living during those generations, it was not a foregone conclusion, and at times, was far from discussion.

Originally Posted by Tigger

I see a lot of where it helped OTHER PEOPLE. I do not see where it assisted a properly ISOLATIONIST society, which is what we had prior to WWI and should have continued to have.

Politics does not operate on a completely altruistic accord. Much of the reason why we are fine with the UN, NATO, IMF, World Bank, and so forth, is because it is another tool in our foreign policy chest, and extends our economic interests throughout the world.

Furthermore, Americans have a distorted view of the isolationist foreign policy. It was there to an extent, but in many other ways, it was not.

Failures:

1. Inhumane treatment of Native Americans.
2. Not annexing Canada in the War of 1812.
3. Overtaxing the South from the 1830s-1860s.
4. Not annexing Mexico in the Mexican-American War.
5. Pressuring the South to eliminate its socioeconomic institutions, rather than refine some, while phasing out others.
6. Not holding onto Cuba and the Philippines in the Spanish-American War.
7. Allowing the Jim Crow era.
8. The Supreme Court of the 1930s-1940s.
9. Feminism.
10. Affirmative Action.
11. The Supreme Court of the 1960s-1970s.
12. Reluctance to resolve more international disputes with nuclear weapons.
13. Lack of consistence in providing humanitarian military aid.
14. Rejection of imperialism and foreign compensation for wars principally benefiting others.
15. Erosion of constitutional protections, particularly the Second, Fourth, and Tenth Amendments.

Originally Posted by Zen

Failures:

1. Inhumane treatment of Native Americans.
2. Not annexing Canada in the War of 1812.
3. Overtaxing the South from the 1830s-1860s.
4. Not annexing Mexico in the Mexican-American War.
5. Pressuring the South to eliminate its socioeconomic institutions, rather than refine some, while phasing out others.
6. Not holding onto Cuba and the Philippines in the Spanish-American War.
7. Allowing the Jim Crow era.
8. The Supreme Court of the 1930s-1940s.
9. Feminism.
10. Affirmative Action.
11. The Supreme Court of the 1960s-1970s.
12. Reluctance to resolve more international disputes with nuclear weapons.
13. Lack of consistence in providing humanitarian military aid.
14. Rejection of imperialism and foreign compensation for wars principally benefiting others.
15. Erosion of constitutional protections, particularly the Second, Fourth, and Tenth Amendments.

Good god - your kind just comes slithering out the woodwork in groups, don't you?

How you can cite the inhumane treatment of Native Americans, allowing the jim crow era - and then cite Feminism and Affirmative Action as an equal 'evil' is beyond stupidity.

You sound like 10 other sock puppets that just signed up.