[quote=@Lunamaria]
[@Vilageidiotx]
[@The Nexerus]
we should be footing the bill. We are the world's most developed country. America is the symbol of world wellness and morality. As such, we should be the ones who should most invest in the well-being of others. It's why we have such a big military -- why members of our military are the most educated soldiers on the planet. For the past sixty years, we have taught ourselves in schools that america's virtuous place in the world [i]is[/i] a symbol as well as a real force.

If we suddenly decide that we are no longer responsible for the well-being of others (japan, europe, everywhere else where we have military bases and military presence), we might as well start teaching in our schools that the wars that we've fought since and including World War II (Korean, Vietnam) were also [i]wrong[/i] as well. How can we suddenly decide it's no longer our duty or our task when our very history has shown ourselves to be exactly the opposite? When the people in charge of our nation and thus the people who voted those politicians in have decided that we ought to take a very active role in maintaining the world's well-being?
[/quote]

What you are advocating is basically Imperialism. We are not that. We were never supposed to be that. It's entirely emotional, impractical, and suggests that somehow all the nations of the world are our children.

We aren't a symbol, we are people. I'm not sure exactly where you are coming from to be honest. Either the titles you have conferred are opinions, or somebody has made an attempt to rate them. For instance, we are not the most developed nation according to the Human Development Index. [url=http://hdr.undp.org/en/countries]That would be Norway.[/url] So if we are going to say that development can be quantified, then we are the fifth most developed nation. 

But the thing is, we still have the world's largest economy as far as nations go. We can achieve amazing things. We can be the greatest place on the planet, but we have to make an effort. We have to shed the symbolism and the buzzwords. And part of that means drawing away all the patriotic fluff that doesn't do anything for us. I think that money spent maintaining foreign bases would be better spent in the United States maintaining and bettering the lives of people here. A lot of people think the same, and that is across the isle, not limited to political party.