America may well have not been transformed from a constitutional republic to an empire with military bases in more than 150 countries. Presidents and their propagandists would not have repeated the Lincolnian mantra that "all men everywhere are created equal" to "justify" foreign military intervention in hundreds of places in the name of "spreading democracy and freedom" (but in reality for the purpose of confiscating resources or imposing mercantilism on foreign lands by military force for the benefit of American corporations).
-Thomas DiLorenzo
http://lewrockwell.com/dilorenzo/dilorenzo251.html