> Perhaps the reason nobody has responded that way is because nobody has yet asserted that. If that's how you read Gortman's post, then ok, but that's not how I read it. Basically, he's saying every man should serve his country. Well, I believe that in general, this is true. I completely disagree with the way he goes about justifying his apparent believe that military service is the most admirable or most desireable way to do this, however.

See the clarification I posted on that. I can't help but find it slightly ironic that the people who've replied to disagree with me are the ones whos posts I've agreed with more than the others :p


> Seems to me nobody here was suggesting that. In fact, if you'd actually read the posts, you'd realize that most of us are agreeing with you that it's patently ridiculous for "every able bodied man" to join the army. Nobody is seriously suggesting that War is Good and that everyone should join the army so that we can have more wars. In fact, Stephen's post sums up things quite nicely. Wars aren't what made us great.

Agreed. Have read them, may have missed some points in some of them, or interpreted in odd manners.

> But let me ask you this. If Osama's men had flown a plane into the Sydney Opera House and a couple of large buildings in your country and killed thousands of Australians, how do you think you would have reacted? Do you think Australians would have been content to sit back and say "Well, that sucked. But let's not try to go find the people who did this, as that might mean some of us would die, or we might have to kill some other people. Worse, some innocent people might be accidentally hit! That would be terrible. Let's just sit here."

Australians in general might have reacted differently, I'm not sure that I would have. I'd almost certainly be *more* upset than I am (especially if I knew some affected), but I still doubt that the solution being sought is the *right* one. I feel that removing the _desire_ to kill people in my country (or wherever) is probably more effective in the long term than attempting to remove the _ability_ of being able to. Not that the latter is a bad thing, but I just don't see how any attempt is being made at the former in conjunction.


> Now you're just being antagonistic. There's any number of reasons we're refusing to join the international court, but I don't think any of them have anything to do with us being God's chosen country. Hell, I don't even believe in God, so I certainly don't think we're God's chosen country or any BS like that. I *do* think we're the greatest country on Earth, but hell, I live here, I'm biased. There's no doubt we're the strongest militarily. There's little doubt that our economy (at least until recently) was the strongest and most stable. But when it comes down to saying "The US is the greatest nation in the world" I base that on one simple fact--there's no other place I'd rather live. And judging by the number of immigrants we get each year, a lot of people agree with me.

Yep, that was antagonistic, and the main part I was slightly retracting in the clarification I posted in reply to my original. The reason I have a problem with the strongest part is that it seems from over here that George Bush is increasingly using that as a good excuse to thumb his nose at the rest of the world (and our PM is happily toadying along wherever he can).