The Myanmar government is refusing international aid. A cyclone has killed over 22,000 people in the Southeast Asian country which is also known as Burma. The U.N. estimates that about 1 million people are now homeless in Myanmar, and that its entire lower delta region is basically underwater. Obviously, this is a major disaster which will require much help from around the world. Here is a related article:

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20080507/D90GR35G2.html

So, why is Myanmar's government blocking relief efforts? Because it is an isolated dictatorship. A dictatorship requires its people to be completely dependent on its government so that its regime can maintain power. If the people of Myanmar receive help from other countries and outside organizations, it may make them less dependent on their government. Even if the difference in dependency is miniscule and short-lived, the government will still see it as a threat. Of course, Myanmar's government is probably incapable of providing sufficient relief for its people, and probably wouldn't provide it even if they could.

As this disturbing drama plays out on the world stage, I think that American leftists ought to learn a lesson from it. This is what can happen in a totalitarian regime, and if America becomes a socialist country (as liberals apparently want it to), totalitarianism may be the only way to enforce the socialism.

I especially want to point this situation out to so-called "multiculturalists", who claim that America is evil and other cultures are better. "Multiculturalism" is really just a euphemism for anti-Americanism. People who subscribe to this philosophy actually tend to know suprisingly little about other world cultures, even though they claim to be experts on the subject. For the past seven years, I have been stunned at how little leftists tend to know about the cultures of Muslim countries, even after everything that has happened since 9/11. It also amazes me how little leftists seem to know about the ways of life in Communist countries. When the controversy over Elian Gonzalez erupted in 2000, I was shocked by how many liberals failed to understand that Cuba is vastly different than the United States. When I tried to explain to my liberal friends that Gonzalez escaped from an oppressive country, and that he would be placed under the control of Castro's government after the Clinton administration forced the boy's return to that country, they refused to believe me. After all the years of the Cold War, how can people be so ignorant about the ways of a Communist country that sits less than a hundred miles south of the Florida keys? As usual, liberals took the side of America's enemy.

The cultures of Third World dictatorships are another thing that so-called multiculturalists often seem clueless about. When liberals hear about the difficult lives that people live in such countries, they often find ways to somehow blame America. (That's what multiculturalism always boils down to).

So...this Myanmar situation is an opportunity for liberals to learn about what really goes on in some cultures. In a dictatorship, nothing is more important to the government than maintaining control over its people. In many cases, such regimes murder thousands, if not millions, of people in order to exert and maintain power. In the case of Myanmar, the government is willing to let its people continue to suffer, and perhaps die, rather than risk the possibility of those people becoming less dependent on the regime.

Meanwhile, America (the country which multiculturalists hate) is one of many countries around the world that seeks to help the people of Myanmar, but so far the Myanmar government is refusing to allow it.