I wasn’t prepared for what came next. This woman, who had always cooed my name with love and laughed at almost everything I said, turned to me with a look that was equal parts disgust and disdain and said very angrily: “you’ll never amount to anything with ideas like that!”

This event came to mind while watching Bob Schieffer’s interview of Ron Paul on Face the Nation two Sundays ago. In it, Paul tells the long-time establishment reporter that there is a strong causal link between the way we as a nation conduct ourselves overseas (bribing, bullying, invading, occupying, assassinating and destroying) and the hostility that citizens of many foreign cultures have toward us.