I'd rather we keep the Americas dependent on us rather than China. I like having big wide oceans between us and any potential superpower adversary.

Having a Soviet puppet state 90 miles off Florida sucked enough

Oh yeah... having them depend on us is good and all. But it harms United States citizens and our nation's ability to function at times.

The Cons are starting to outweigh the Pros.

Anyway, a weak League of Nations without the US in large part led to WWII. Despite some interest here in a European War I still don't want to see my son called to die in one. Diplomacy is cheap, in blood and treasure.

What price maintaining the Monroe Doctrine?

Do we really want Chinese bases in Honduras and Nicaragua?

China desperately wants bases close to us to cause mischief like they feel we cause from The Philippines and Japan.

http://theconversation.com/hard-evidence-who-uses-veto-in-the-un-security-council-most-often-and-for-what-29907

The veto goes both ways

US has to maintain superiority in the hemisphere and the world

taking care of those nations amounts to cash and training, anything beyond that is "imperialism"

Problem is no one else wants us to

Humanitarian aid is imperialism?

Honduras is still suffering from some nasty hurricanes in years past

As ive had it explained to me yes

It's a mess and the source of most of that caravan that has everyone's undies in a bunch

Apparently its making the dependent on and subservient to whatever nation provides the aid

Yes, I hear that from the left

I actually am somewhat sympathetic to it

But it's still the wrong way to look at it

The idea is we want to teach a man to fish rather than give him a fish

That sounds great

Why would they fish in their pond when they can go a hundred miles to fish in someone elses pond and send the fish back home?

But if China is willing to give the man a fish and the man reciprocates by offering his home up, I'd rather be the one giving the fishes

But it shouldn't mean that we cut off aid just because we may seem to appear imperialistic

No we shouldnt cut off the aid

The mindset of the left is that anything the US does in terms of action abroad is imperialistic

I'm a bleeding heart but I make love to Henry Kissinger when it comes to geopolitical realism

And yes, that *should* be a scary image :p

No, foreign aid is stupid. Our government shouldn't be giving away our resources. Private individuals and interest groups sure. But not our government imo.

>finger guns
im fiscally conservative and socially liberal youve never debated someone like me

Billions for defense but not one cent for goodwill, eh?

Someone will give the aid

Might as well be us

No matter where you go, money equals power

Hey *highfives @Blackhawk342 *

You and me both

eyyyyy

It doesn't look good on us if we suddenly drop the ball

Plus the chinese have a bad habit of making their aid come in the form of infastructure projects