“The essence of the American dream is the understanding that we are here on this earth and in this land for a higher purpose…Anything that stands in the way of the dream, we must fight. Anything that enhances the dream, we must support.” Steve Forbes could not have said it better. The American Dream is continuing to prosper and flourish since our founding fathers sat together in a room and created a document in which every man may follow. For years the idea of the American Dream has been sturdy, however, as America aged so did the idea of the American Dream. America and her citizens started to rouse from their long slumber and realize that the dream does not swab away the realism of their waking life. Because of this, Foreigners have been reluctant in believing in the United States; but one must understand that it is not the American Dream but so many other factors such as Wealth, Influence, jealousy, and imperialism. However, one must not forget the debate on the United States attendance in Iraq and its activities as an “imperial bully” and its domination culturally in the United States.
Foreigners do not understand the actions America took to go directly into the war in Iraq. America is a world power and for Saddam Hussein to have the audacity attack us in such a way is highly disrespectful. The incident on September 9, 2011 was such a tragedy that affected not only America but worldwide. The Bush administration had no choice but to seize this opportunity and attack; the world did not oppose to the idea of invading Iraq. Bush and his colleagues were heroes; in foreigners eyes, America was doing the right thing protecting the American Nation and defending her honor.
However as the years progressed and the dream misconstrued and the purpose of us being in Iraq seemed to wean Foreigners started to believe that “...large majorities believed the war on terror to be about establishing U.S. World Domination” (Abramasky 103). We are in Iraq neither to impose our power; nor to place an idea of world domination but, to contain the threat and to keep or rather prevent something like the 9/11 incident to happen again.
Nevertheless, one can understand why foreigners would question America’s business in another country. When a country questions another country’s actions it is but one of two things: One the country is in trepidation for the other country’s loyalty or the other country is longing for the other country’s power. This reasoning unquestionably pertains to both France and England. Britain and France are both out rightly culturally jealous of the economic and intellectual achievements of the United States. Britain has always had a significant amount of animosity towards the United States since America emancipated from them. The biggest reason would be the American version of the English language (England was once a world power as well); America took the content of the original English Language and molded it to fit Americans way of life and her culture. France is an utterly different matter. France’s animosity can be rooted from when she was a world power herself. When France was a world power everything was, French the diet, the clothing even the language had started to take on a French appeal to things. In fact, some of the American English Language has taken certain words from the French language for example, cliché. When an American goes to France the American will not be treated as a guest; the American will be treated as a rat that invaded a house. The French would expect the American to speak French when interacting with French men. If one were to read an American newspaper article in a French restaurant one would either be serviced badly or not to be serviced at all. In his essay, “Waking up from The American Dream” Abramsky states, “In short, a growing anxiety brought on by having another country and culture dictating ones place in the society of nations” (Abramsky 105). When it really boils down to it, The French and the British think the United States has usurped them of their position as a world power, thus creating a certain animosity towards Americans and their Ideology of the American Dream.
With this pertained Jealousy, it is assumed that foreign countries would believe America’s Actions in behaving like an imperialist bully. However, one must ask himself what is imperialism. Imperialism is a policy that pertains to a country’s power and influence militarily and diplomatically. As stated in Sasha Abramsky’s essay “Waking Up from the American Dream”, “In so doing, perhaps they cannot but step on the sensibilities of smaller, less powerful dare I say it, less imperial nations and peoples.” (Abramsky 106). As Abramsky states there, it cannot be helped that smaller nations of smaller imperialistic orders are seeing America as a bully. Comparing to their culture and their governmental status it is safe to say that calling America an imperialist bully is only a defense mechanism in response to jealousy.
Compared to the Anti-American essay of Sasha Abramsky, Paul Johnson and his essay “America’s New Empire for Liberty” talks solely on supporting the American Dream. Apart from Abramsky stating a simple that America invaded Iraq under good intentions and are no longer welcome, Johnson makes a valid argument that America has every right and authority to overrun Iraq; and American soldiers are to stay there as long as she needs in order to eradicate the menace from its immediate source. There is no one other than Samantha Power who wrote a book called The Responsibility to Protect. Her theory elucidates the idea of America marching into territory that has created inhumane actions towards its own people is in the United States duty as a world power.