Comment by wkat4242 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by wkat4242 | Hacker News Reader

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It's different because it's all about that now. The Clintons had their scandals, the "pay to play" lists etc. We all know they are in bed with the moneymen. But it didn't define their administration, and they were pretty hush-hush about it.

Trump on the other hand is completely open about this. He even brags about making money from deals, something that was previously considered a huge conflict of interest. He appoints people based on loyalty alone, not knowledge or experience. He bullies countries into compliance with mafia tactics ("appease me or else..." tariffs or even war like venezuela and greenland). It's a huge moral shift where that is no longer unthinkable. The US used to have values. It was a country that was at least trying to be the good guy.

Also, the constitution used to be holy. Now Trump is flaunting the 1st amendment on a daily basis (limiting LGBTIQ+ speech, establishing America as a "christian country" which is explicitly forbidden). I think all these developments are very concerning. I don't live in America but considering it is still a big world power it does worry me.

I love the spirit of your comments but IMO it is misguided

The US used to have values. It was a country that was at least trying to be the good guy.

This really is all wrong. One might think this based on pitches from different times but all Empires are evil by their definition and America has always been that, always

> This really is all wrong. One might think this based on pitches from different times but all Empires are evil by their definition and America has always been that, always

Again, the problem with this train of logic is you inevitable condemn everyone and everything as evil, at which point the word completely loses its meaning. Evil is only useful as a term if there are actually things that are not evil.

America has certainly done immoral, unethical and frankly evil things. It's also done moral, beautiful and even heroic things. It's a big complicated entity made up of literally millions of people and trying to summarize it as "good or evil" is pointless.

The reason this nuance matters is that we want, need to encourage doing good and the first step to doing that is to actually be able to distinguish between good and evil.

> It's also done moral, beautiful and even heroic things

give me a list of these “beautiful and heroic things” - very interested to read them

Ok, I'll play:

> We estimate that over the past two decades, USAID-funded programmes have helped prevent more than 91 million deaths globally, including 30 million deaths among children.

How about that? Or are you going to come up with some excuse that somewhere, somehow, an american also benefitted from saving all these lives and therefor it doesn't count?

[1] https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6...

I mean you are making this too easy that I can copy&paste above the fold..:

The core reason for creating USAID in 1961, under President John F. Kennedy, was to consolidate and revamp U.S. foreign aid into a single, more strategic agency to counter Soviet influence during the Cold War, promote democracy and free-market principles, and fulfill America's moral and economic role as a global leader. It aimed to separate economic aid from military assistance and make it more effective in fostering development, spreading U.S. values, and creating stable partners, distinct from the bureaucracy of the State Department.

How can you copy and paste from wikipedia but not even read the entire comment you're replying to?

didn’t copy and paste from wikipedia (though I can if needed) - wasn’t expecting to read USAID as american spreading goodness out of our pure hearts but here we are, have read crazier things than that for sure

At no point did the phrase "goodness of pure hearts" appear in my text.

That doesn't make usaid saving 90 million lives less great.

Also, remember how america is not a single person? It is in fact millions of people? You want to tell me with a straight face that every single employee of usaid is working entirely out of some kind of dispassionate desire to increase american foreign influence?

I don't get why it is so difficult to understand that countries (and people) and do both good and bad things over their existences and if we actually want a better future we should encourage the good things being done which means we need to actually be able to recongize good vs bad.

1 in 5 children are hungry in America right this moment, we don’t do a single fucking thing because we are “good” - can’t believe there are people (you are probably in majority) that still believe this nonsense. wild wild stuff

My point, which you keep missing, is that nobody is actually "good" or "bad". They do good and bad actions.

America actually does quite a bit for hungry children, both within and without her borders. Is it enough? Perhaps not, but that doesn't somehow make what they do bad.

just do a simple thing - ballpark how many lives of innocent people has America taken, lets just say since WWII. then lets see after you ballpark this whether you still think we are (or ever were) “good guys”

Sure: define innocent.

The major difference is the disappearance of shame.

However, the greatest enablement was the overblown cynicism large swaths of the american elites had towards the national proclaimed values. When you think everything is cynical even when it is not then the next step is to have governments that are completely cynical.

so it is shame that is important? As long as we are shameful of corruption etc it is good but once the shame goes away we gonna draw the line?

No, what they said is we had less corruption when people were ashamed of it.

This should be political slogan for 2026/28 election - “Bringing Shame Back to Politics”

yes, when politicians aren't ashamed of corruption, corruption has no self imposed limits

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