Reply #18: Your points about America's flawed policies are well-taken. [View All]

[Colorado Blue]

Part of our problem is not our IDEALS - but the fact that corporate interests have such an overwhelming voice in our foreign policy.

Corporations HAVE no ideals, except the bottom line. I believe we must curtail their power. Their economic vigor is vital to the global economy but by no means should they dictate policy.

This is not a new problem. I saw a movie the other night on the tube, called Khartoum. OK, don't laugh, it starred none other than the redoubtable CHARLETON HESTON, as the British General Gordon. So, ok, you're laughing. But listen, he actually LOST in this one:)

It showed scenes, wherein the British PM was trying to balance the poisons inherent in the situation: a Sudanese charismatic, a religious "mahdi", was threatening to beseige and destroy the city of Khartoum and murder its residents, enroute to his destiny in the mosques of Cairo, Arabia and Istanbul. Should Britain intervene? Should the interests of the British government be dictated by soldiers, adventurers, greedy businessmen? How much value should he place on the lives, including Egyptians, Europeans, and Sudanese, of the people in the city? Should he send a REAL army or just make a show for the press?

It really was on point I think, in the sense that it revealed the thoughts of a powerful leader in response to a situation very like the ones described, albeit on a MUCH smaller scale.

In the end, the PM at first sent Gordon, to try and salvage the situation. When that failed, and Gordon refused to abandon the people of Khartoum, he sent an army but ordered it to sit in Cairo. Political games were played, the army was finally sent - but it was much too late. The city was overrun, the inhabits who hadn't sought the protection of the Mahdi were killed, either in the city or fleeing, on the Nile.