President Obama, the Next Roosevelt

Philippines. As Under Secretary of Navy Roosevelt aggressively backed intervention. The conflict initially began under the auspices of liberating Philippines from Spain. After "liberation" the brutality of the US occupation sparked resistance. War ravaged the islands for years as the US occupiers slaughtered nearly two million people.*


  

"All that this country desires is to see the neighboring countries stable, orderly, and prosperous. Any country whose people conduct themselves well can count upon our hearty friendship. If a nation shows that it knows how to act with reasonable efficiency and decency in social and political matters, if it keeps order and pays its obligations, it need fear no interference from the United States. Chronic wrongdoing, or an impotence which results in a general loosening of the ties of civilized society, may in America, as elsewhere, ultimately require intervention by some civilized nation, and in the Western Hemisphere the adherence of the United States to the Monroe Doctrine may force the United States, however reluctantly, in flagrant cases of such wrongdoing or impotence, to the exercise of an international police power."


                            --President Roosevelt, "Roosevelt Corollary"




President Roosevelt rewrote the Monroe Doctrine to give the United States full rights to intervene in the Western Hemisphere as European colonies fell. The United States wanted to bring about "desirable and orderly" outcomes. It also wished to expand "decency" by enforcing "greater obligations" upon their own new colonies. Roosevelt believed Anglo-Saxon nations were burdened with the task of teaching "lesser peoples" what the "ties of civilized society" meant, no matter how many of them had to die.


In 1948 the United States globalized the Roosevelt Corollary. With the fall of the Soviet Union the ability to implement this policy anywhere it deemed fit was accomplished.


In 2008 many "progressives" heralded Obama as the "next Roosevelt". President Obama chose to favor another Roosevelt. They deserve credit for having the last name right.




* Conservative estimates of death toll of US intervention from 1890-1913 in Philippines start at 1.5 million and go much higher.


Link detailing criminal nature of US intervention---http://bulatlat.com/news/4-33/4-33-crimes.html