It is going to take some time to 'right' it again. One has to believe that the world wants peace. If one doesn't believe other nations are sincere, there can be a door left open to debate about the Nobel Peace Prize.
I know the world wants peace. I am confident the world wants peace. How? Easy.
The United States and Russia have been moving toward this venue of peaceful coexistance for quite some time now. It has been difficult through the years of The Cold War to stop both the USSR and the USA from posturing at each other. It was such a joke. The Cold War was like throwing stones at each other and it didn't make sense. The only thing The Cold War did was to allow the growth of hatred and fuel the industrial complexes of war machines. It is insane.
The USA and Russia share a program where by missiles armed with uranium are disarmed and the uranium is returned to be processed into fuel for energy. We have been doing that a long time.
The USA and Russia has been sharing the International Space Station as 'comrades' for a long, long time.There are former leaders of Russia (at the time it was the USSR) that teach in the USA. They are friends to our society and stand as examples of vast outreach to bring understanding to us and to the leaders such as Prime Minister Putin and the current President Dmitriy Anatolyevich Medvedev.
China has never truly been confrontation to the USA. They have been allies of Russia since at least the year 2000 and more like for as long as they shared a border. There has never truly been a threat from China so much as they securing their own borders. Countries are allowed a 'National Defense Strategy.'
In many ways, that is what Iran is doing. They are solely the only major Shi'ite nation on Earth and they want to be 'as homeland status' no different than Israel. The Shi'ites had it very tough under the rule of Hussein. They will feel more comfortable when the USA footprint in Iraq is gone or near gone and they can feel as though their people will be secure on Earth as well. The problem with the Iranian issues is somewhat the same as with North Korea, Pakistan and India and Israel in that they should NOT have nuclear weapons. And of course, Israel will deny it. Someday Israel too will have to face the fact that their 'National Security' is better served without these weapons.
There are only five 'legal' nuclear countries and they have the right to 'contain' the growth of proliferation. It was an agenda before all this mess got out of control and out of control it is. Absolutely. It isn't as though President Obama has some strange and foreign 'pie in the sky' idea. This is a path that was abandoned for the past eight years. It is a well worn path for most of the major nations of Earth. It is time to return to that path, but, it had to be 'secured' by the words of the President of the USA. If we aren't a partner in Non-Proliferation, no one else will be either.
What is so incredibly unbelievable about the aggressive demands of the Bush/Cheney years is they claim to be Christians. There is such a thing as "The Christian Doctrine of Peace" (click here). The Neocons of the USA liked to bask in the light of their religious zealotry, but, they never wanted to practice it. They had no plans to, they wanted the domination of the world's resources. China was never viewed as a country to trust with ouR debt, it was viewed by the Neocons, the Right Wing, the Republicans as a National Security Issue now that they carried so much of the USA debt.
The willingness of China to extend the USA credit was viewed as a weakness by the Republicans and their people a place for fiscal exploitation by The West. There is the belief by many that have money, it takes war to obtain more. More control, more resources to exploit, more domination of the 'world forum' and the ability to do exactly what occurred last year at the end of the Bush White House.
Some lessons are learned hard in this world. It is my sincere hope and desire the people of the USA find the confidence they need again to believe peace and prosperity are possible. They have to demand it through their elections. What is so unbelievable is that people still think they did the right thing by lying to so many others as demonstrated by the health care issue and defaming the Democrats and the President when everything they stated was true. The Right Wing of the political system of the USA likes to say, "Who drank the Kool-Aid?" They need to look in the mirror and realize how victimizing they are, how out of touch they are and how misdirected their value system truly is.
But, I like Mike's letter. It is sincere as is most of his life. He has been pivotal stopping the unfettered escalation of hate in the USA and leanings toward violence. "Bowling for Columbine" is an absolutely magnificent portrayal of the extremes of violence in the USA culture and how it fuels permission for our out of control military industrial complex that needs justification by the act of war. He opened my eyes. I, no different than he, no different than many others in the USA want the wars to end. But, we have to believe in a man in the White House that sincerely wants peace and the end of violence just as much if not more than we do.
I'll say it again. President Barak Obama is a man of peace. He is not a man of 'weakness.' He has been walking this path for many, many years. He has dedicated himself through achievement that should have set him on a different path, but, he never left us. We never knew he was coming. But, he was determined to arrive.
It is too good to be true. But, now that it is true, we need to embrace what is rightfully ours to embrace that we have advocated and marched and died for along the way. Those students at Kent State would be proud of their President and now we can more proud of them than ever before. We need to remember whom we are in this world and we need to trust the men and women that have never been deterred from the path.
Peace.
