Whether it’s winning wars or winning
Super Bowls – a primary component of the American ethos is doing ‘whatever it
takes’ to win.
Dick Nixon embodied this admirable trait
when he did whatever it took to win the Presidency (though it subsequently cost
him – but that’s politics I suppose). He also refused to give up during the
Vietnam War and bombed the hell out of Cambodia and Laos just to prove a point.
A more modern example would be the
Global War on Terror and George W. Bush’s vow to do ‘whatever it takes’ to win –
even shitting upon the very tenants of what makes America America through the
now exposed NSA surveillance program and a number of other draconian measures.
Extending this even further, we’ve
rationalized torture, drone strikes on American citizens, and a whole host of
other dystopian projects that would make even Goebbels feel uneasy.