America: A Shining Example, or an Iron Fist?

Many people have come to believe that America should be the leader of the world. I happen to disagree. I rather think that America should should be the world's example. For nearly one hundred years our foreign policy has been one of "leadership". For nearly one hundred years America's iron-fisted foreign policy has been mostly wrong.

Nine days after the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon in 2001, President George W. Bush spoke the following words

The course of this conflict is not known, yet its outcome is certain. Freedom and fear, justice and cruelty, have always been at war, and we know that God is not neutral between them.

Fellow citizens, we'll meet violence with patient justice -- assured of the rightness of our cause, and confident of the victories to come.

Patiently, invoking the name of God, and assured of the rightness of his cause, he proceeded to colonize Iraq.

The Doctrine and Covenants of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints teaches that the Constitution of the United States is an inspired document which contains principles that apply to everyone.

77 ...the laws and constitution of the people, which I have suffered to be established, and should be maintained for the rights and protection of all flesh, according to just and holy principles;
78 That every man may act in doctrine and principle pertaining to futurity, according to the moral agency which I have given unto him, that every man may be accountable for his own sins in the day of judgment.
79 Therefore, it is not right that any man should be in bondage one to another.
80 And for this purpose have I established the Constitution of this land, by the hands of wise men whom I raised up unto this very purpose, and redeemed the land by the shedding of blood.

An interesting--and nearly forgotten--principle enshrined in the Constitution is that no one should be in bondage to anyone else. This, ironically, includes the people of other countries.

Unfortunately, George W. Bush's policy of aggression and American Messianism is nothing new; it had its genesis with President Woodrow Wilson, who won a second term because "he kept us out of war"--and who then almost immediately embroiled us in a war that changed the American psyche in ways we hardly comprehend. Crisis after manufactured crisis has, through the years, allowed the United States to brand Arabs, Koreans, Japanese, Hispanics, Germans, and others with the yoke of a faux American liberty.

Prior to becoming President, Woodrow Wilson referred to America as "Christ's Army." In 1905 he claimed

There is a mighty task before us...and it welds us together. It is to make the United States a mighty Christian nation, and to Christianize the world.

Muhammad never said anything that brash. How would Wilson accomplish his task? Through the iron fist of government, of course.

As President, Wilson stirred up religious fervor for war and destruction. His adminsistration claimed such things as a:

"high and holy mission." His Secretary of the Interior, Franklin Lane, spoke of "the world of Christ" coming face to face with the world of force. The Creel Committee declared that the war was "a crusade not merely to re-win the tomb of Christ, but to bring back to earth the rule of right, the peace, goodwill to men and the gentleness He taught."

But it didn't turn out that way. The manufactured crisis of World War I allowed Wilson to bring more and more of American liberties under the auspices of the American state. And the land of the Constitution became a land where, by that same force Wilson claimed to eschew, men became compelled to follow government edict.

We are no longer a nation that sets an example. Beginning with Woodrow Wilson, and continuing to this day, while Americans themselves have remained the most compassionate and charitable people on the face of the earth, their "established" government has evolved until it has come to rule the world with an iron fist. You don't want American government, you Iraqis? Well, tough! How about a McDonalds on every corner? And we shall entertain you with the august echoes of the music of Britney Spears. The compassionate American scarcely

American foreign policy for the past 100 years, while claiming to foster freedom around the globe, has proven to be liberty's antithesis.

realizes how many times every day his government forces his compassion, let alone how many countries we through our military occupations coerce into becoming the spit and image of America. That's not liberty.

George Washington warned America against becoming involved in entangling alliances. Not to worry, we're merely involved in entangling dominions.

. . .

The Constitution was inspired by God and is meant to encourage liberty for all, but it was never meant to encourage the use of force to compel that liberty. Somehow, America's leaders have anointed themselves as God's

George Washington warned America against becoming involved in entangling alliances. Not to worry, we're merely involved in entangling dominions.

leaders on earth, and have, in their lust for power, desecrated the very document they claim to uphold. American foreign policy for the past 100 years, while claiming to foster freedom around the globe, has proven to be liberty's antithesis.

It's time once again for America to return to its constitutional roots. Let us set the example for all. Let us protect our liberties. But let us never again attempt to mold the rest of the world into a place where liberty only means what the American establishment says it is.