"The U.S. Can Stuff It!"

While in The Westin Bayshore Hotel in Vancouver in late June, I struck up a conversation with a friendly 60 ish man and his wife. They said they were from Australia and asked where I'm from. "Los Angeles," I replied. At that instant there was a sharp visible change in this man's demeanor as his smile disappeared, his face turned red and his eyes flashed in anger.

"The U.S. can stuff it," he proclaimed, to the embarrassment of his wife. But I was curious why he felt this way and I asked him. He said the U.S. abuses its allies and readily makes enemies. He views the U.S. as a warlike nation and described its conduct as arrogant without using that word.

He also felt the U.S. does Israel's bidding, another nation he finds warlike and abusive. He spoke of making his voice clear to the U.S. government, which I encouraged him to do. But after listening to him, it was apparent all he would do is grow angrier potentially to the point of irrationality. So I smiled and wished him and his wife a nice day as we went our separate directions.

One can easily be critical of the U.S.'s brutal military policies and I have been an anti-war activist, having conducted 303 peace vigils over the last six years, ending in January of 2012. But it is unproductive to spew venom at individual Americans and worse when one knows little about the other person's ideas and actions in the first place.

Dick