Sanctions, imprisonment, and the monster of Empire

It's interesting that the sanctions against Russia are selective while in the rest of the world sanctions are geared to punish entire populations! In America and all over the world, Americans are wrongfully punishing people while the majority of her citizens either don't care or think these innocents are guilty - if only guilty of negative feelings about the US.
I wonder when or if the tide will turn against the common American - the tourist no longer welcomed, people no longer saying, "I love Americans, but I hate their government." Because it is we, the common American, who sit on our asses while our government runs amok through the agencies of the CIA, the NSA, and all the other spying agencies, now shown to include the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). The website homepage of the USAID reads -

WHAT WE DO

USAID is the lead U.S. Government agency that works to end extreme global poverty and enable resilient, democratic societies to realize their potential.

Ask Cuba, eh?
The Empire is corrupt. The world gave President Obama the Nobel Peace Prize as a downpayment, not as a reward and he did not earn the prize, but who knows what he has done? Maybe he stopped an invasion of Iran, maybe he stopped WWIII -  for now. I still believe Obama is a tragic figure and living proof that no president can turn things around until Americans rise up en masse and elect a Congress worth their honorific jobs. The entire Republican Party is one of two things - insane or crazed manipulators. This has been obvious for so long that it's the shame of the Democratic Party not to have prevented the right wing takeover, but then it is the shame of us all that, at the end of WWII, we believed that we faced an even larger threat than that we had just defeated - and the buildup of the Military/Industrial/Secrecy Complex began in ernest through the agency of the true "Daddy  Bush" - Prescott Bush, the insane Howard Hughes, and other American fascists and crazies.
Now that Military/Industrial/Secrecy Complex has a strangle hold on us all and it has added another branch -  the Prison Complex. When will it end? How will it end? All I think is that it cannot end well. Too many turning points missed - Eisenhower, who was the only leader who had the cache to stop the Military/Industrial/Secrecy Complex but who chose only to name it and play golf, LBJ, the tragic figure who did not lead a withdrawal from Viet Nam, the election of Nixon, the failure of the Democratic Party to support Jimmy Carter leading to the election of Reagan, the kowtowing of Clinton to the Republican agenda, including the consolidation of a formerly vibrant American media into the disgusting corporate arm of  empire, Al Gore's refusal to call for the supremacy of democracy over the power of a monarchical "Supreme" Court, and ... the beat goes on.

Americans would act more Christian if we were atheists

America has yet another story of an innocent man, falsely accused and imprisoned, then freed. This one  involves an added tragedy - a serious heart attack one day after his release. David Ranta served 23 years as an innocent man. His life was robbed. The criminal "justice" system fails yet again and all the American "news" consumer wants to do is shake their collective head and say 'what a shame. Well these things happen.' It's a wonder to me that these men don't seek revenge after they are released, but then 23 years is such a long time. Plenty of time to realize the futility of revenge.
Now it would be another thing entirely if it were an entire nation, an entire culture who were unjustly punished. I imagine a child who has grown up in Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan - any country upon whom the United States has placed sanctions. Sanctions that have caused hunger and physical suffering to the innocent as a means to force the ruling elite into line. What a sick and antidemocratic notion! We will make your children suffer because we don't like your leaders. Where is the justice in American foreign policy? Where are the Christians who actually believe and act according to the words of Jesus Christ?
Former Congressman Ron Paul was in North Carolina for a Republican presidential debate in 2012. There, right in the heart of America's famous "Bible Belt" he said that we should approach the wielding of power overseas with a nod to the Golden Rule. That is we should, 'Do unto others as you would have others do unto you.' The Republican audience laughed at him. You see, American Christians don't believe in the words of Christ. They have believed the propaganda of the Military/Industrial/Secrecy/Prison Complex for so long that they have given their immortal souls to an immoral cabal. That cabal was named by Republican President Dwight David Eisenhower. He called it the Military/Industrial Complex. We must now add the word Secrecy to this because America's CIA and innumerable other secret agencies (even secret PRIVATE corporate agencies) control and coordinate the actions of the cabal. We must now add the word Prison to this because America now has secret prisons scattered throughout the world. AND we have laws in some parts of the United States that actually forbid considering exculpatory new evidence in cases where innocent people are imprisoned - even facing the death penalty.
President Obama was cheered in Israel for declaring that Israelis should empathize with the Palestinian people, that they, too, deserve a country. In America, Christians cheer the Israeli MILITARY for each and every action it takes, no matter how severe or counterproductive to peace. They WANT to continue paying for military actions. They WANT the children of Iran to suffer until Iranian leaders submit to the U.S. Military/Industrial/Secrecy/Prison Complex. (Notice that the U.S. allows North Korea to have and test nuclear weapons, but goes into fits over a nuclear Iran.) They WANT to lock up their fellow Americans even for crimes that do not occur in the physical world - thought crimes - evil minds.
I think America would act more Christian if we all were atheists.
I am Contrary.