Reflection+The+American+Expansionist+and+Imperialist

The American Expansionist and Imperialist

=REFLECTION THE AMERICAN EXPANSIONIST AND IMPERIALIST =

The American expansionism and imperialism has been rooted in our history since the birth of our nation. John Winthrop and the Puritans who traveled with him on the Arabella thought of themselves as God's chosen ones. They built a city on a hill where God would find them to be righteous. Americans have carried through the years this same idea that America is a city on a hill and that their culture is superior to others. This idea has sparked our imperialistic traits to try an intervene in other nations because we feel like it is our responsibility to make other countries more like us. Manifest destiny and the hope to travel west in search of a new hope and a new life has always encouraged our country to look to the west and to other nations to expand the United States either ideally or physically. In the case of Vietnam we were afraid of communism because it was not American and wanted to stop it immediately before it spread around the world. The cartoon and the picture of the Iraq soldiers help to illustrate the mess that we are in today, because of our American expansionist and imperialist traits. The counting of the costs of the war in Iraq helps to describe how willing the United States is to go into imperialistic war s even if it costs a lot of money. The books also give a taste of America's imperialistic ways. The Cartoon and McCain's clip from Hard Ball with Chris Mathews show the American people the true reason of why we are in Iraq: for oil and greed. We give the United States the image that we think that we are superior and intolerant of other cultures and ideas that are different from our own, every time that we try to replace a culture with ours. We have given the image off that we are only looking out for our best interests even if it means at the expanse of other cultures, peoples, and countries.