US Embarrassments in International Relations: A Few Highlights (or Lowlights, If You Will)

Will someone please send the United States Government a few copies of The Princess Bride?* Obviously not one of them has ever seen it. What kind of supposedly great nation-state starts or gets involved with not one but as many 10 land wars in Asia in a single century?!?! With Benjamin Netanyahu, Prime Minister of the State of Israel, in Washington last week trying to drum up support for #11, I thought this might be a nice time to remember some of the U.S. Government's finer moments in international relations.

A few of the more serious reasons to duck our heads in shame:

• Pretty much everything the US has ever done vis-a-vis the indigenous nations of this hemisphere.

• The slave trade. Actually, make that everything related to slavery.

• Most of what passes for U.S. immigration policy.

• Almost everything related to the Arab world, not to mention non-Arab Muslim states like Pakistan and Iran.

• Mexico, Chile, Cuba, Panama, Grenada, Nicaragua, El Salva—you know what? Let's just go ahead and throw in the whole of Latin America and the School of the Americas while we're at it. 

• 

  Remind me again... why does ISIL exist?

  Did I mention military intervention in Africa? No, of course not. I'm white.

• I'm not putting the internment of Japanese-Americans here because that was a domestic travesty. We interned our own people for the sole “crime” of being Japanese-American (good thing we learned from that mistake).
• Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib,and every US prison/torture chamber around the world.

And now, a few of the more fun:

• Then-President of the United States George Bush Sr. throwing up on the Prime Minister of Japan. Now, in fairness, the former was suddenly taken quite ill. Nevertheless, if you're going to projectile vomit onto someone at dinner, aim for your wife. She signed up for that shit when she married you. And your country never dropped nuclear bombs on her country.

• Barbara Bush kissing Denis Thatcher's hand. Points to Ms. Bush for spontaneity, sense of humor, and chivalry. But a) this was literally the only feminist-ish thing she ever did as First Lady, and b) if the Revolutionary war was fought for no other reason, it was fought so American women can enjoy a British gentleman being a British gentleman without it meaning he owns us. 

• Former Vice-President Dan Quayle representing the U.S. with deep thoughts like "the importance of the Middle East is that it keeps the Far East and the Near East from encroaching on each other.” Next time your son or daughter comes home from school depressed, believing they did a terrible job speaking in front of the class, just show them this link. Trust me: it will cheer them right up.

• George W. Bush's groping of Chancellor Angela Merkel (thanks to Joe Biden's recent grope of Stephanie Carter, among others, this is now a also a domestic—and bipartisan--embarrassment).

  

  Happy International Women's Day, Angela!

• And this week's fabulous humiliation: Speaker of the House John Boehner inviting the sitting Prime Minister of another country to try to undermine the President of the United States' efforts to avoid, at least for the time being, what would doubtless become yet another land war in Asia (not to mention giving said Prime Minister so many standing ovations it led Jon Stewart to conclude this about that).

Now you're probably wondering, why is Benjamin Netanyahu's visit listed with “the silly”? Look, when one of your own countrymen makes a dance mix of your speech, you've officially resigned as a public servant and become a circus clown. But don't feel bad, Bibi. At least you've got the U.S. Congress performing right along with you.

*On second thought, don't bother sending them the DVDs. They all supposedly watched The Battle of Algiers before invading Iraq, and we see how great that turned out. As the good book says, don't throw pearls before swine.