Afraid of Americans

Greetings...

Just a quick note from me this evening. I found a cool video on the Web. It's called "Afraid of Americans." I thought it offered an interesting perspective on American cultural iconography.

Now, before anyone calls me anti-American or un-patriotic for posting such a video, just hold your horses. I love America, but my scholarly interests lie all over the map. I can be quite conservative, too, along the lines of Bill Buckley and George Will.

If you continue to follow my work, you'll see what I mean.

Actually, I think Ralph and I share the view that true conservatism is not the primary political philosophy that informs the current Bush administration. Bush is more radical in his solutions, like trying to create Democrary in the Middle East in less than six months. Any way you slice it, that's radical surgery. It's not a "conservative" approach unless you're an oil baron...or a neocon. Or both. Makes sense now, huh?

Plus, the huge debt and gigantic government of the current administration are both directly opposed to old-school conservatism (as is the standard mantra of "the protection of privacy"--long valued by conservatives--that is being abused by the domestic spying program of the current administration. Talk about Big Brother..jeez, old-school "privacy conservatives" are rolling in their graves.

Truly, much of the behavior of the current administration is not conservative; I wish it were. But this entry is not intended to be a critique of the Bush administration. That can come later.

So, as far as the video in this posting goes, let's just say that I like to consider as much as possible in the world. It's the only way to get to the truth.

Peace,

Mike