Are American Citizens Recklessly Courageous?

Hey Guys! I need help here, are Americans recklessly courageous? Within a very short spell of time, the world is awash with Americans doing things that make you wonder whether these people have any sense of fear for their lives. I live in Uganda, and even in my own country, I know where in this country I, by virtue of being a Northerner, can find friends and enemies or where danger is endemic even if nobody cared where I hailed from. For example, in North eastern Uganda, there is a Pastoral tribe called the Karamojong who are generally armed with illegal guns and they stage ambushes on trucks and other motorists to loot or just kill people for ritual honor. Before I make a move towards this region, I take serious precautions and I certainly take advise a lot. This does not make me coward or does it?

Back to the cases generated by American Citizens abroad, I find their behavior really smacking of reckless courage and a little bit of carelessness on their parts. We all know America is a free nation but that does not allow Americans to feel free and safe everywhere they go.

Lets start with the case of the American Journalists who strayed into North Korea knowing just how dangerous these people are. Crossing the borders or even coming that close meant that they were filled with a certain amount of courage that made them unconscious of the dangers their actions would bring to their persons. As we all know, they all got arrested and jailed, and it had to take the personal intervention of Mr. Clinton to see them freed. In my view, the gallons and gallons of aviation fuel bought with American dollars to fly over to Pyongyang was some expenditure that could have been routed to needy Americans who are yearning for the stimulus package in these hard Economic times.

Not long after the Korean incident, there was this case of an American man swimming across a lake upto the home of a jailed Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi! Had this man never heard about Burma and the military Junta there who kill to survive? Did he expect to get away unnoticed? Was this courage or sheer lack of intuition? Now I hear a Senator has again flown over to Burma, and by yesterday they were seen shaking hands with the Burmese Military leaders and there is a high chance that the American may be freed. Why should American citizens lose so completely the sense of personal danger and do things that make them look a little reckless?

The most surprising one  of them all was the case of two American tourists who strayed into Iran even after many warnings from their guides that they were risking by approaching the Iranian Border. As we talk now, they are in custody for some “macho” behavior that has sadly put them into trouble. I wonder whether they rue over their actions. Sometimes I am persuaded to believe that this super power position of America as country is rubbing the American citizens the wrong way. Now another plane will soon be flying to Tehran to rescue the American citizens. I think the State Department has a lot of seminars to run across the 52 states of America to educate the citizens about going out into the world with too much of the American sense of freedom and Liberty. Elsewhere, having an American citizen in a national Prison generates some kind of national pride to the leaders who parade these American captives.