November 24, 2006
In today's world where there are so many enemies afoot it's difficult to keep your eye on them all. America is like the number one college basketball team high atop the rankings that everyone is gunning to knock from their perch. The terrorists despise us. The Europeans envy us. Venezuela 's Hugo Chavez thinks our president is the devil himself. The America-haters among us would have us believe that so many enemies point to an inherent evil within the United States . They would be wrong.
Like UCLA basketball during the golden John Wooden era, America has achieved a dominance never before seen. While building a standard of living unmatched in human history, we have made enemies along the way who have tried different systems of government in search of the same goals but have failed. We have also made enemies of whole peoples who hate us for spreading our contagious form of freedom to the very people they try desperately to keep under their thumb. This shining city on the hill draws the eyes of millions of people who long to be propelled from the stone-age to the computer age but their dictatorial leaders stand in the way.
To oppressive regimes, we are dangerous. No brutal regime on earth knows that better than China . This is the regime that tries to pass itself off as the benevolent giant that merely longs to be left alone. But there are those among us who know better. One of them is Bill Gertz, a reporter for the Washington Times and the author of several books. Gertz wrote a piece for the Times recently where he revealed China is bulking up militarily, not to defend itself, but to take on the United States . China 's arsenal now includes missiles and naval weapons designed to sink American aircraft carriers. This news comes on the heels of reports that a Chinese submarine sailed undetected within five miles of the USS Kitty Hawk near Japan and was close enough to launch wake-homing torpedos or anti-ship cruise missiles. Some months back the media reported that China was developing weaponry designed to disrupt satellite communications. In this day and age of satellite-fed television and radio and satellite-linked telephone calls, such an attack could throw the entire country into chaos.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice recently expressed concern over China 's military buildup. “It's sometimes seemed outsized for China 's regional role,” Rice said, as if this was some new revelation. Of course they're bulking up. They plan to test American metal in the Taiwan Strait . The Chinese have long had their eye on Taiwan . Since 1979, we have vowed to protect Taiwan from the Chinese. That's where the showdown will be and I predict we will lose. Not by a hot battle with China but by cowering in the corner while China has its way with Taiwan . Why? Because we have created this monster.
When China rolls into Taiwan it will be our fault. We stock our stores with cheap Chinese goods with not a single thought as to how they're made (much with slave or near-slave labor). We have thrown our own workers under the bus in order to get at their cheap goods and, by return, avail our corporations to a billion and a half of their people.
Capitalism is good but capitalism without a conscience is devastating. Capitalism without a conscience puts profit above principle. It puts prosperity ahead of patriotism. Unbridled greed knows no loyalty to country. It's exactly what the Chinese were counting on and it's exactly what will bring us down unless we wake from our gormandizing hypnosis in time.