This just so sums up

[Dr Grump]

why the US is fucked. Been trying to articulate it for years but never been able to do so properly. And no, this is not anti-American. Like most people in the world, a strong US (as it used to be) is much better than a strong China. So here's the article and some of its highlights.

The Unraveling of America

Anthropologist Wade Davis writes about Covid-19 and its devastating impact on the international standing of the United States.

www.rollingstone.com

Some highlights:

1. But what surely does is the absolutely devastating impact that the pandemic has had on the reputation and international standing of the United States of America.
2. COVID has reduced to tatters the illusion of American exceptionalism.
3. For more than two centuries, reported the Irish Times, “the United States has stirred a very wide range of feelings in the rest of the world: love and hatred, fear and hope, envy and contempt, awe and anger. But there is one emotion that has never been directed towards the U.S. until now: pity.”
4. At its peak, Henry Ford’s Willow Run Plant produced a B-24 Liberator every two hours, around the clock. Shipyards in Long Beach and Sausalito spat out Liberty ships at a rate of two a day for four years
5. But freedom and affluence came with a price. The United States, virtually a demilitarized nation on the eve of the Second World War, never stood down in the wake of victory. To this day, American troops are deployed in 150 countries. Since the 1970s, China has not once gone to war; the U.S. has not spent a day at peace. President Jimmy Carter recently noted that in its 242-year history, America has enjoyed only 16 years of peace.
6. More than any other country, the United States in the post-war era lionized the individual at the expense of community and family. It was the sociological equivalent of splitting the atom. What was gained in terms of mobility and personal freedom came at the expense of common purpose. In wide swaths of America, the family as an institution lost its grounding. By the 1960s, 40 percent of marriages were ending in divorce. Only six percent of American homes had grandparents living beneath the same roof as grandchildren; elders were abandoned to retirement homes
7. The country of the 1950s resembled Denmark as much as the America of today. Marginal tax rates for the wealthy were 90 percent. The salaries of CEOs were, on average, just 20 times that of their mid-management employees. Today, the base pay of those at the top is commonly 400 times that of their salaried staff, with many earning orders of magnitude more in stock options and perks. The elite one percent of Americans control $30 trillion of assets, while the bottom half have more debt than assets.
8. Trump’s performance and America’s crisis deflected attention from China’s own mishandling of the initial outbreak in Wuhan, not to mention its move to crush democracy in Hong Kong.
9. The American president lives to cultivate resentments, demonize his opponents, validate hatred. His main tool of governance is the lie; as of July 9th, 2020, the documented tally of his distortions and false statements numbered 20,055.

These last three are my favourite and sum up every neocon loser on this board. Every..single..one...of...you.

As they stare into the mirror and perceive only the myth of their exceptionalism, Americans remain almost bizarrely incapable of seeing what has actually become of their country. The republic that defined the free flow of information as the life blood of democracy, today ranks 45th among nations when it comes to press freedom.

The American cult of the individual denies not just community but the very idea of society. No one owes anything to anyone. All must be prepared to fight for everything: education, shelter, food, medical care. What every prosperous and successful democracy deems to be fundamental rights — universal health care, equal access to quality public education, a social safety net for the weak, elderly, and infirmed — America dismisses as socialist indulgences, as if so many signs of weakness.


American politicians dismiss the Scandinavian model as creeping socialism, communism lite, something that would never work in the United States. In truth, social democracies are successful precisely because they foment dynamic capitalist economies that just happen to benefit every tier of society.

 

[Mac1958]

why the US is fucked. Been trying to articulate it for years but never been able to do so properly. And no, this is not anti-American. Like most people in the world, a strong US (as it used to be) is much better than a strong China. So here's the article and some of its highlights.

The Unraveling of America

Anthropologist Wade Davis writes about Covid-19 and its devastating impact on the international standing of the United States.

www.rollingstone.com

Some highlights:

1. But what surely does is the absolutely devastating impact that the pandemic has had on the reputation and international standing of the United States of America.
2. COVID has reduced to tatters the illusion of American exceptionalism.
3. For more than two centuries, reported the Irish Times, “the United States has stirred a very wide range of feelings in the rest of the world: love and hatred, fear and hope, envy and contempt, awe and anger. But there is one emotion that has never been directed towards the U.S. until now: pity.”
4. At its peak, Henry Ford’s Willow Run Plant produced a B-24 Liberator every two hours, around the clock. Shipyards in Long Beach and Sausalito spat out Liberty ships at a rate of two a day for four years
5. But freedom and affluence came with a price. The United States, virtually a demilitarized nation on the eve of the Second World War, never stood down in the wake of victory. To this day, American troops are deployed in 150 countries. Since the 1970s, China has not once gone to war; the U.S. has not spent a day at peace. President Jimmy Carter recently noted that in its 242-year history, America has enjoyed only 16 years of peace.
6. More than any other country, the United States in the post-war era lionized the individual at the expense of community and family. It was the sociological equivalent of splitting the atom. What was gained in terms of mobility and personal freedom came at the expense of common purpose. In wide swaths of America, the family as an institution lost its grounding. By the 1960s, 40 percent of marriages were ending in divorce. Only six percent of American homes had grandparents living beneath the same roof as grandchildren; elders were abandoned to retirement homes
7. The country of the 1950s resembled Denmark as much as the America of today. Marginal tax rates for the wealthy were 90 percent. The salaries of CEOs were, on average, just 20 times that of their mid-management employees. Today, the base pay of those at the top is commonly 400 times that of their salaried staff, with many earning orders of magnitude more in stock options and perks. The elite one percent of Americans control $30 trillion of assets, while the bottom half have more debt than assets.
8. Trump’s performance and America’s crisis deflected attention from China’s own mishandling of the initial outbreak in Wuhan, not to mention its move to crush democracy in Hong Kong.
9. The American president lives to cultivate resentments, demonize his opponents, validate hatred. His main tool of governance is the lie; as of July 9th, 2020, the documented tally of his distortions and false statements numbered 20,055.

These last three are my favourite and sum up every neocon loser on this board. Every..single..one...of...you.

As they stare into the mirror and perceive only the myth of their exceptionalism, Americans remain almost bizarrely incapable of seeing what has actually become of their country. The republic that defined the free flow of information as the life blood of democracy, today ranks 45th among nations when it comes to press freedom.

The American cult of the individual denies not just community but the very idea of society. No one owes anything to anyone. All must be prepared to fight for everything: education, shelter, food, medical care. What every prosperous and successful democracy deems to be fundamental rights — universal health care, equal access to quality public education, a social safety net for the weak, elderly, and infirmed — America dismisses as socialist indulgences, as if so many signs of weakness.


American politicians dismiss the Scandinavian model as creeping socialism, communism lite, something that would never work in the United States. In truth, social democracies are successful precisely because they foment dynamic capitalist economies that just happen to benefit every tier of society.

At this moment we're essentially a caricature of ourselves. The Ugly Americans.

And those who support this remain absolutely ignorant about how they're handing the keys to the very people they loathe.

 

[Dr Grump]

At this moment we're essentially a caricature of ourselves. The Ugly Americans.

And those who support this remain absolutely ignorant about how they're handing the keys to the very people they loathe.

Only a certain type of American.

 

[mudwhistle]

why the US is fucked. Been trying to articulate it for years but never been able to do so properly. And no, this is not anti-American. Like most people in the world, a strong US (as it used to be) is much better than a strong China. So here's the article and some of its highlights.

The Unraveling of America

Anthropologist Wade Davis writes about Covid-19 and its devastating impact on the international standing of the United States.

www.rollingstone.com

Some highlights:

1. But what surely does is the absolutely devastating impact that the pandemic has had on the reputation and international standing of the United States of America.
2. COVID has reduced to tatters the illusion of American exceptionalism.
3. For more than two centuries, reported the Irish Times, “the United States has stirred a very wide range of feelings in the rest of the world: love and hatred, fear and hope, envy and contempt, awe and anger. But there is one emotion that has never been directed towards the U.S. until now: pity.”
4. At its peak, Henry Ford’s Willow Run Plant produced a B-24 Liberator every two hours, around the clock. Shipyards in Long Beach and Sausalito spat out Liberty ships at a rate of two a day for four years
5. But freedom and affluence came with a price. The United States, virtually a demilitarized nation on the eve of the Second World War, never stood down in the wake of victory. To this day, American troops are deployed in 150 countries. Since the 1970s, China has not once gone to war; the U.S. has not spent a day at peace. President Jimmy Carter recently noted that in its 242-year history, America has enjoyed only 16 years of peace.
6. More than any other country, the United States in the post-war era lionized the individual at the expense of community and family. It was the sociological equivalent of splitting the atom. What was gained in terms of mobility and personal freedom came at the expense of common purpose. In wide swaths of America, the family as an institution lost its grounding. By the 1960s, 40 percent of marriages were ending in divorce. Only six percent of American homes had grandparents living beneath the same roof as grandchildren; elders were abandoned to retirement homes
7. The country of the 1950s resembled Denmark as much as the America of today. Marginal tax rates for the wealthy were 90 percent. The salaries of CEOs were, on average, just 20 times that of their mid-management employees. Today, the base pay of those at the top is commonly 400 times that of their salaried staff, with many earning orders of magnitude more in stock options and perks. The elite one percent of Americans control $30 trillion of assets, while the bottom half have more debt than assets.
8. Trump’s performance and America’s crisis deflected attention from China’s own mishandling of the initial outbreak in Wuhan, not to mention its move to crush democracy in Hong Kong.
9. The American president lives to cultivate resentments, demonize his opponents, validate hatred. His main tool of governance is the lie; as of July 9th, 2020, the documented tally of his distortions and false statements numbered 20,055.

These last three are my favourite and sum up every neocon loser on this board. Every..single..one...of...you.

As they stare into the mirror and perceive only the myth of their exceptionalism, Americans remain almost bizarrely incapable of seeing what has actually become of their country. The republic that defined the free flow of information as the life blood of democracy, today ranks 45th among nations when it comes to press freedom.

The American cult of the individual denies not just community but the very idea of society. No one owes anything to anyone. All must be prepared to fight for everything: education, shelter, food, medical care. What every prosperous and successful democracy deems to be fundamental rights — universal health care, equal access to quality public education, a social safety net for the weak, elderly, and infirmed — America dismisses as socialist indulgences, as if so many signs of weakness.


American politicians dismiss the Scandinavian model as creeping socialism, communism lite, something that would never work in the United States. In truth, social democracies are successful precisely because they foment dynamic capitalist economies that just happen to benefit every tier of society.

If we could just get rid of all of the Democrats....this pattern of lowered expectations would immediately go away.

 

[Dr Grump]

why the US is fucked. Been trying to articulate it for years but never been able to do so properly. And no, this is not anti-American. Like most people in the world, a strong US (as it used to be) is much better than a strong China. So here's the article and some of its highlights.

The Unraveling of America

Anthropologist Wade Davis writes about Covid-19 and its devastating impact on the international standing of the United States.

www.rollingstone.com

Some highlights:

1. But what surely does is the absolutely devastating impact that the pandemic has had on the reputation and international standing of the United States of America.
2. COVID has reduced to tatters the illusion of American exceptionalism.
3. For more than two centuries, reported the Irish Times, “the United States has stirred a very wide range of feelings in the rest of the world: love and hatred, fear and hope, envy and contempt, awe and anger. But there is one emotion that has never been directed towards the U.S. until now: pity.”
4. At its peak, Henry Ford’s Willow Run Plant produced a B-24 Liberator every two hours, around the clock. Shipyards in Long Beach and Sausalito spat out Liberty ships at a rate of two a day for four years
5. But freedom and affluence came with a price. The United States, virtually a demilitarized nation on the eve of the Second World War, never stood down in the wake of victory. To this day, American troops are deployed in 150 countries. Since the 1970s, China has not once gone to war; the U.S. has not spent a day at peace. President Jimmy Carter recently noted that in its 242-year history, America has enjoyed only 16 years of peace.
6. More than any other country, the United States in the post-war era lionized the individual at the expense of community and family. It was the sociological equivalent of splitting the atom. What was gained in terms of mobility and personal freedom came at the expense of common purpose. In wide swaths of America, the family as an institution lost its grounding. By the 1960s, 40 percent of marriages were ending in divorce. Only six percent of American homes had grandparents living beneath the same roof as grandchildren; elders were abandoned to retirement homes
7. The country of the 1950s resembled Denmark as much as the America of today. Marginal tax rates for the wealthy were 90 percent. The salaries of CEOs were, on average, just 20 times that of their mid-management employees. Today, the base pay of those at the top is commonly 400 times that of their salaried staff, with many earning orders of magnitude more in stock options and perks. The elite one percent of Americans control $30 trillion of assets, while the bottom half have more debt than assets.
8. Trump’s performance and America’s crisis deflected attention from China’s own mishandling of the initial outbreak in Wuhan, not to mention its move to crush democracy in Hong Kong.
9. The American president lives to cultivate resentments, demonize his opponents, validate hatred. His main tool of governance is the lie; as of July 9th, 2020, the documented tally of his distortions and false statements numbered 20,055.

These last three are my favourite and sum up every neocon loser on this board. Every..single..one...of...you.

As they stare into the mirror and perceive only the myth of their exceptionalism, Americans remain almost bizarrely incapable of seeing what has actually become of their country. The republic that defined the free flow of information as the life blood of democracy, today ranks 45th among nations when it comes to press freedom.

The American cult of the individual denies not just community but the very idea of society. No one owes anything to anyone. All must be prepared to fight for everything: education, shelter, food, medical care. What every prosperous and successful democracy deems to be fundamental rights — universal health care, equal access to quality public education, a social safety net for the weak, elderly, and infirmed — America dismisses as socialist indulgences, as if so many signs of weakness.


American politicians dismiss the Scandinavian model as creeping socialism, communism lite, something that would never work in the United States. In truth, social democracies are successful precisely because they foment dynamic capitalist economies that just happen to benefit every tier of society.

If we could just get rid of all of the Democrats....this pattern of lowered expectations would immediately go away.

They're not the problem. The biggest problem is the US has no sense of community. It's all about 'me, me, me"...Read the fucking article Mud....you're smart enough to get it. Most on the right aren't.

 

[there4eyeM]

Summing it up Trump charges America 9 hundred thousand for security use of his golf courses Trump is nothing but a grifter

Well, also a golfer.

 

[pknopp]

I've noted for a very long time that we are the most violent country on the planet.

 

[Dr Grump]

I've noted for a very long time that we are the most violent country on the planet.

No. You're not. Maybe most violent first-world country. There are definitely more violent places than the US. South Africa. Brazil. Somalia. To name a few.

 

[pknopp]

I've noted for a very long time that we are the most violent country on the planet.

No. You're not. Maybe most violent first-world country. There are definitely more violent places than the US. South Africa. Brazil. Somalia. To name a few.

They keep it internal so my point stands.

 

[Votto]

why the US is fucked. Been trying to articulate it for years but never been able to do so properly. And no, this is not anti-American. Like most people in the world, a strong US (as it used to be) is much better than a strong China. So here's the article and some of its highlights.

The Unraveling of America

Anthropologist Wade Davis writes about Covid-19 and its devastating impact on the international standing of the United States.

www.rollingstone.com

Some highlights:

1. But what surely does is the absolutely devastating impact that the pandemic has had on the reputation and international standing of the United States of America.
2. COVID has reduced to tatters the illusion of American exceptionalism.
3. For more than two centuries, reported the Irish Times, “the United States has stirred a very wide range of feelings in the rest of the world: love and hatred, fear and hope, envy and contempt, awe and anger. But there is one emotion that has never been directed towards the U.S. until now: pity.”
4. At its peak, Henry Ford’s Willow Run Plant produced a B-24 Liberator every two hours, around the clock. Shipyards in Long Beach and Sausalito spat out Liberty ships at a rate of two a day for four years
5. But freedom and affluence came with a price. The United States, virtually a demilitarized nation on the eve of the Second World War, never stood down in the wake of victory. To this day, American troops are deployed in 150 countries. Since the 1970s, China has not once gone to war; the U.S. has not spent a day at peace. President Jimmy Carter recently noted that in its 242-year history, America has enjoyed only 16 years of peace.
6. More than any other country, the United States in the post-war era lionized the individual at the expense of community and family. It was the sociological equivalent of splitting the atom. What was gained in terms of mobility and personal freedom came at the expense of common purpose. In wide swaths of America, the family as an institution lost its grounding. By the 1960s, 40 percent of marriages were ending in divorce. Only six percent of American homes had grandparents living beneath the same roof as grandchildren; elders were abandoned to retirement homes
7. The country of the 1950s resembled Denmark as much as the America of today. Marginal tax rates for the wealthy were 90 percent. The salaries of CEOs were, on average, just 20 times that of their mid-management employees. Today, the base pay of those at the top is commonly 400 times that of their salaried staff, with many earning orders of magnitude more in stock options and perks. The elite one percent of Americans control $30 trillion of assets, while the bottom half have more debt than assets.
8. Trump’s performance and America’s crisis deflected attention from China’s own mishandling of the initial outbreak in Wuhan, not to mention its move to crush democracy in Hong Kong.
9. The American president lives to cultivate resentments, demonize his opponents, validate hatred. His main tool of governance is the lie; as of July 9th, 2020, the documented tally of his distortions and false statements numbered 20,055.

These last three are my favourite and sum up every neocon loser on this board. Every..single..one...of...you.

As they stare into the mirror and perceive only the myth of their exceptionalism, Americans remain almost bizarrely incapable of seeing what has actually become of their country. The republic that defined the free flow of information as the life blood of democracy, today ranks 45th among nations when it comes to press freedom.

The American cult of the individual denies not just community but the very idea of society. No one owes anything to anyone. All must be prepared to fight for everything: education, shelter, food, medical care. What every prosperous and successful democracy deems to be fundamental rights — universal health care, equal access to quality public education, a social safety net for the weak, elderly, and infirmed — America dismisses as socialist indulgences, as if so many signs of weakness.


American politicians dismiss the Scandinavian model as creeping socialism, communism lite, something that would never work in the United States. In truth, social democracies are successful precisely because they foment dynamic capitalist economies that just happen to benefit every tier of society.

It is mind boggling to me that you blame a lack of community on lowering taxes on the rich. How is a hand full of rich guys destroying the lack of community exactly? How are you connecting those dots exactly? So if we take the wealth of a minute number within society we will have community again? How so? For example, in Pol Pot's killing fields of Chicago, how will community return if we cut down Bezos and Gates, who are democrats BTW, make us return to community?

Had it ever dawned on you Brown shirts that the lack of community you feel can be traced to the actions of the Left. Marxism is all about replacing the family unit and dependence on distant uncaring political figures for their collective salvation. So instead of the family needing each other to survive, we now have Big Brother to pay to have grandma or grandpa put away some where out of sight. Instead of telling women that they can have children out of wedlock because Big Brother will be there to help them pay for everything, perhaps telling them Big Brother will not be there might change the cycle of poverty known as single parent homes. And instead of closing down churches and schools because of Covid but turning your heads when Left wing riots run our streets, perhaps those institutions are what was holding society together, what is left of it, that is.

People like you make me sick. People like you ARE the problem.

 

[pknopp]

why the US is fucked. Been trying to articulate it for years but never been able to do so properly. And no, this is not anti-American. Like most people in the world, a strong US (as it used to be) is much better than a strong China. So here's the article and some of its highlights.

The Unraveling of America

Anthropologist Wade Davis writes about Covid-19 and its devastating impact on the international standing of the United States.

www.rollingstone.com

Some highlights:

1. But what surely does is the absolutely devastating impact that the pandemic has had on the reputation and international standing of the United States of America.
2. COVID has reduced to tatters the illusion of American exceptionalism.
3. For more than two centuries, reported the Irish Times, “the United States has stirred a very wide range of feelings in the rest of the world: love and hatred, fear and hope, envy and contempt, awe and anger. But there is one emotion that has never been directed towards the U.S. until now: pity.”
4. At its peak, Henry Ford’s Willow Run Plant produced a B-24 Liberator every two hours, around the clock. Shipyards in Long Beach and Sausalito spat out Liberty ships at a rate of two a day for four years
5. But freedom and affluence came with a price. The United States, virtually a demilitarized nation on the eve of the Second World War, never stood down in the wake of victory. To this day, American troops are deployed in 150 countries. Since the 1970s, China has not once gone to war; the U.S. has not spent a day at peace. President Jimmy Carter recently noted that in its 242-year history, America has enjoyed only 16 years of peace.
6. More than any other country, the United States in the post-war era lionized the individual at the expense of community and family. It was the sociological equivalent of splitting the atom. What was gained in terms of mobility and personal freedom came at the expense of common purpose. In wide swaths of America, the family as an institution lost its grounding. By the 1960s, 40 percent of marriages were ending in divorce. Only six percent of American homes had grandparents living beneath the same roof as grandchildren; elders were abandoned to retirement homes
7. The country of the 1950s resembled Denmark as much as the America of today. Marginal tax rates for the wealthy were 90 percent. The salaries of CEOs were, on average, just 20 times that of their mid-management employees. Today, the base pay of those at the top is commonly 400 times that of their salaried staff, with many earning orders of magnitude more in stock options and perks. The elite one percent of Americans control $30 trillion of assets, while the bottom half have more debt than assets.
8. Trump’s performance and America’s crisis deflected attention from China’s own mishandling of the initial outbreak in Wuhan, not to mention its move to crush democracy in Hong Kong.
9. The American president lives to cultivate resentments, demonize his opponents, validate hatred. His main tool of governance is the lie; as of July 9th, 2020, the documented tally of his distortions and false statements numbered 20,055.

These last three are my favourite and sum up every neocon loser on this board. Every..single..one...of...you.

As they stare into the mirror and perceive only the myth of their exceptionalism, Americans remain almost bizarrely incapable of seeing what has actually become of their country. The republic that defined the free flow of information as the life blood of democracy, today ranks 45th among nations when it comes to press freedom.

The American cult of the individual denies not just community but the very idea of society. No one owes anything to anyone. All must be prepared to fight for everything: education, shelter, food, medical care. What every prosperous and successful democracy deems to be fundamental rights — universal health care, equal access to quality public education, a social safety net for the weak, elderly, and infirmed — America dismisses as socialist indulgences, as if so many signs of weakness.


American politicians dismiss the Scandinavian model as creeping socialism, communism lite, something that would never work in the United States. In truth, social democracies are successful precisely because they foment dynamic capitalist economies that just happen to benefit every tier of society.

It is mind boggling to me that you blame a lack of community on lowering taxes on the rich. How is a hand full of rich guys destroying the lack of community exactly? How are you connecting those dots exactly? So if we take the wealth of a minute number within society we will have community again? How so? For example, in Pol Pot's killing fields of Chicago, how will community return if we cut down Bezos and Gates, who are democrats BTW, make us return to community?

It's not a problem with someone that has money, it's a problem of what the country does to make sure the rich continues to get more and more money. It's not mostly through production. It's through Socialist actions of the Federal Reserve.

Quit the actions of the Federal Reserve and I'll quit defending those protesting.

Had it ever dawned on you Brown shirts that the lack of community you feel can be traced to the actions of the Left. Marxism is all about replacing the family unit and dependence on distant uncaring political figures for their collective salvation. So instead of the family needing each other to survive, we now have Big Brother to pay to have grandma or grandpa put away some where out of sight. Instead of telling women that they can have children out of wedlock because Big Brother will be there to help them pay for everything, perhaps telling them Big Brother will not be there might change the cycle of poverty known as single parent homes. And instead of closing down churches and schools because of Covid but turning your heads when Left wing riots run our streets, perhaps those institutions are what was holding society together, what is left of it, that is.

People like you make me sick. People like you ARE the problem.

Nobody puts grandpa and grandma out of sight. People have to work two jobs to survive today. It's a good thing that someone who is elderly can have someone look after them. As for the rest..........

"The King will reply, 'Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.'

Matthew 25:40

 

[eddiew]

Summing it up Trump charges America 9 hundred thousand for security use of his golf courses Trump is nothing but a grifter

Well, also a golfer.

The pos even cheats at that

 

[eddiew]

why the US is fucked. Been trying to articulate it for years but never been able to do so properly. And no, this is not anti-American. Like most people in the world, a strong US (as it used to be) is much better than a strong China. So here's the article and some of its highlights.

The Unraveling of America

Anthropologist Wade Davis writes about Covid-19 and its devastating impact on the international standing of the United States.

www.rollingstone.com

Some highlights:

1. But what surely does is the absolutely devastating impact that the pandemic has had on the reputation and international standing of the United States of America.
2. COVID has reduced to tatters the illusion of American exceptionalism.
3. For more than two centuries, reported the Irish Times, “the United States has stirred a very wide range of feelings in the rest of the world: love and hatred, fear and hope, envy and contempt, awe and anger. But there is one emotion that has never been directed towards the U.S. until now: pity.”
4. At its peak, Henry Ford’s Willow Run Plant produced a B-24 Liberator every two hours, around the clock. Shipyards in Long Beach and Sausalito spat out Liberty ships at a rate of two a day for four years
5. But freedom and affluence came with a price. The United States, virtually a demilitarized nation on the eve of the Second World War, never stood down in the wake of victory. To this day, American troops are deployed in 150 countries. Since the 1970s, China has not once gone to war; the U.S. has not spent a day at peace. President Jimmy Carter recently noted that in its 242-year history, America has enjoyed only 16 years of peace.
6. More than any other country, the United States in the post-war era lionized the individual at the expense of community and family. It was the sociological equivalent of splitting the atom. What was gained in terms of mobility and personal freedom came at the expense of common purpose. In wide swaths of America, the family as an institution lost its grounding. By the 1960s, 40 percent of marriages were ending in divorce. Only six percent of American homes had grandparents living beneath the same roof as grandchildren; elders were abandoned to retirement homes
7. The country of the 1950s resembled Denmark as much as the America of today. Marginal tax rates for the wealthy were 90 percent. The salaries of CEOs were, on average, just 20 times that of their mid-management employees. Today, the base pay of those at the top is commonly 400 times that of their salaried staff, with many earning orders of magnitude more in stock options and perks. The elite one percent of Americans control $30 trillion of assets, while the bottom half have more debt than assets.
8. Trump’s performance and America’s crisis deflected attention from China’s own mishandling of the initial outbreak in Wuhan, not to mention its move to crush democracy in Hong Kong.
9. The American president lives to cultivate resentments, demonize his opponents, validate hatred. His main tool of governance is the lie; as of July 9th, 2020, the documented tally of his distortions and false statements numbered 20,055.

These last three are my favourite and sum up every neocon loser on this board. Every..single..one...of...you.

As they stare into the mirror and perceive only the myth of their exceptionalism, Americans remain almost bizarrely incapable of seeing what has actually become of their country. The republic that defined the free flow of information as the life blood of democracy, today ranks 45th among nations when it comes to press freedom.

The American cult of the individual denies not just community but the very idea of society. No one owes anything to anyone. All must be prepared to fight for everything: education, shelter, food, medical care. What every prosperous and successful democracy deems to be fundamental rights — universal health care, equal access to quality public education, a social safety net for the weak, elderly, and infirmed — America dismisses as socialist indulgences, as if so many signs of weakness.


American politicians dismiss the Scandinavian model as creeping socialism, communism lite, something that would never work in the United States. In truth, social democracies are successful precisely because they foment dynamic capitalist economies that just happen to benefit every tier of society.

It is mind boggling to me that you blame a lack of community on lowering taxes on the rich. How is a hand full of rich guys destroying the lack of community exactly? How are you connecting those dots exactly? So if we take the wealth of a minute number within society we will have community again? How so? For example, in Pol Pot's killing fields of Chicago, how will community return if we cut down Bezos and Gates, who are democrats BTW, make us return to community?

Had it ever dawned on you Brown shirts that the lack of community you feel can be traced to the actions of the Left. Marxism is all about replacing the family unit and dependence on distant uncaring political figures for their collective salvation. So instead of the family needing each other to survive, we now have Big Brother to pay to have grandma or grandpa put away some where out of sight. Instead of telling women that they can have children out of wedlock because Big Brother will be there to help them pay for everything, perhaps telling them Big Brother will not be there might change the cycle of poverty known as single parent homes. And instead of closing down churches and schools because of Covid but turning your heads when Left wing riots run our streets, perhaps those institutions are what was holding society together, what is left of it, that is.

People like you make me sick. People like you ARE the problem.

When you figure out what's causing those riots you'll become more readable Frankly, I have little hope

 

[22lcidw]

why the US is fucked. Been trying to articulate it for years but never been able to do so properly. And no, this is not anti-American. Like most people in the world, a strong US (as it used to be) is much better than a strong China. So here's the article and some of its highlights.

The Unraveling of America

Anthropologist Wade Davis writes about Covid-19 and its devastating impact on the international standing of the United States.

www.rollingstone.com

Some highlights:

1. But what surely does is the absolutely devastating impact that the pandemic has had on the reputation and international standing of the United States of America.
2. COVID has reduced to tatters the illusion of American exceptionalism.
3. For more than two centuries, reported the Irish Times, “the United States has stirred a very wide range of feelings in the rest of the world: love and hatred, fear and hope, envy and contempt, awe and anger. But there is one emotion that has never been directed towards the U.S. until now: pity.”
4. At its peak, Henry Ford’s Willow Run Plant produced a B-24 Liberator every two hours, around the clock. Shipyards in Long Beach and Sausalito spat out Liberty ships at a rate of two a day for four years
5. But freedom and affluence came with a price. The United States, virtually a demilitarized nation on the eve of the Second World War, never stood down in the wake of victory. To this day, American troops are deployed in 150 countries. Since the 1970s, China has not once gone to war; the U.S. has not spent a day at peace. President Jimmy Carter recently noted that in its 242-year history, America has enjoyed only 16 years of peace.
6. More than any other country, the United States in the post-war era lionized the individual at the expense of community and family. It was the sociological equivalent of splitting the atom. What was gained in terms of mobility and personal freedom came at the expense of common purpose. In wide swaths of America, the family as an institution lost its grounding. By the 1960s, 40 percent of marriages were ending in divorce. Only six percent of American homes had grandparents living beneath the same roof as grandchildren; elders were abandoned to retirement homes
7. The country of the 1950s resembled Denmark as much as the America of today. Marginal tax rates for the wealthy were 90 percent. The salaries of CEOs were, on average, just 20 times that of their mid-management employees. Today, the base pay of those at the top is commonly 400 times that of their salaried staff, with many earning orders of magnitude more in stock options and perks. The elite one percent of Americans control $30 trillion of assets, while the bottom half have more debt than assets.
8. Trump’s performance and America’s crisis deflected attention from China’s own mishandling of the initial outbreak in Wuhan, not to mention its move to crush democracy in Hong Kong.
9. The American president lives to cultivate resentments, demonize his opponents, validate hatred. His main tool of governance is the lie; as of July 9th, 2020, the documented tally of his distortions and false statements numbered 20,055.

These last three are my favourite and sum up every neocon loser on this board. Every..single..one...of...you.

As they stare into the mirror and perceive only the myth of their exceptionalism, Americans remain almost bizarrely incapable of seeing what has actually become of their country. The republic that defined the free flow of information as the life blood of democracy, today ranks 45th among nations when it comes to press freedom.

The American cult of the individual denies not just community but the very idea of society. No one owes anything to anyone. All must be prepared to fight for everything: education, shelter, food, medical care. What every prosperous and successful democracy deems to be fundamental rights — universal health care, equal access to quality public education, a social safety net for the weak, elderly, and infirmed — America dismisses as socialist indulgences, as if so many signs of weakness.


American politicians dismiss the Scandinavian model as creeping socialism, communism lite, something that would never work in the United States. In truth, social democracies are successful precisely because they foment dynamic capitalist economies that just happen to benefit every tier of society.

At this moment we're essentially a caricature of ourselves. The Ugly Americans.

And those who support this remain absolutely ignorant about how they're handing the keys to the very people they loathe.

As individuals, in religious ways, God gave each of us.. free choice. As a citizen of a nation...... we have free choice. Basing decisions on that with our flaws can make things better or worse. People who make things worse, tend to scream the loudest. In all of this, there are people who take advantage of others. In all ways at all economic levels. So when condemning people, get them first.

 

[healthmyths]

why the US is fucked. Been trying to articulate it for years but never been able to do so properly. And no, this is not anti-American. Like most people in the world, a strong US (as it used to be) is much better than a strong China. So here's the article and some of its highlights.

The Unraveling of America

Anthropologist Wade Davis writes about Covid-19 and its devastating impact on the international standing of the United States.

www.rollingstone.com

Some highlights:

1. But what surely does is the absolutely devastating impact that the pandemic has had on the reputation and international standing of the United States of America.
2. COVID has reduced to tatters the illusion of American exceptionalism.
3. For more than two centuries, reported the Irish Times, “the United States has stirred a very wide range of feelings in the rest of the world: love and hatred, fear and hope, envy and contempt, awe and anger. But there is one emotion that has never been directed towards the U.S. until now: pity.”
4. At its peak, Henry Ford’s Willow Run Plant produced a B-24 Liberator every two hours, around the clock. Shipyards in Long Beach and Sausalito spat out Liberty ships at a rate of two a day for four years
5. But freedom and affluence came with a price. The United States, virtually a demilitarized nation on the eve of the Second World War, never stood down in the wake of victory. To this day, American troops are deployed in 150 countries. Since the 1970s, China has not once gone to war; the U.S. has not spent a day at peace. President Jimmy Carter recently noted that in its 242-year history, America has enjoyed only 16 years of peace.
6. More than any other country, the United States in the post-war era lionized the individual at the expense of community and family. It was the sociological equivalent of splitting the atom. What was gained in terms of mobility and personal freedom came at the expense of common purpose. In wide swaths of America, the family as an institution lost its grounding. By the 1960s, 40 percent of marriages were ending in divorce. Only six percent of American homes had grandparents living beneath the same roof as grandchildren; elders were abandoned to retirement homes
7. The country of the 1950s resembled Denmark as much as the America of today. Marginal tax rates for the wealthy were 90 percent. The salaries of CEOs were, on average, just 20 times that of their mid-management employees. Today, the base pay of those at the top is commonly 400 times that of their salaried staff, with many earning orders of magnitude more in stock options and perks. The elite one percent of Americans control $30 trillion of assets, while the bottom half have more debt than assets.
8. Trump’s performance and America’s crisis deflected attention from China’s own mishandling of the initial outbreak in Wuhan, not to mention its move to crush democracy in Hong Kong.
9. The American president lives to cultivate resentments, demonize his opponents, validate hatred. His main tool of governance is the lie; as of July 9th, 2020, the documented tally of his distortions and false statements numbered 20,055.

These last three are my favourite and sum up every neocon loser on this board. Every..single..one...of...you.

As they stare into the mirror and perceive only the myth of their exceptionalism, Americans remain almost bizarrely incapable of seeing what has actually become of their country. The republic that defined the free flow of information as the life blood of democracy, today ranks 45th among nations when it comes to press freedom.

The American cult of the individual denies not just community but the very idea of society. No one owes anything to anyone. All must be prepared to fight for everything: education, shelter, food, medical care. What every prosperous and successful democracy deems to be fundamental rights — universal health care, equal access to quality public education, a social safety net for the weak, elderly, and infirmed — America dismisses as socialist indulgences, as if so many signs of weakness.


American politicians dismiss the Scandinavian model as creeping socialism, communism lite, something that would never work in the United States. In truth, social democracies are successful precisely because they foment dynamic capitalist economies that just happen to benefit every tier of society.

At this moment we're essentially a caricature of ourselves. The Ugly Americans.

And those who support this remain absolutely ignorant about how they're handing the keys to the very people they loathe.

You copied but your source doesn't give any link to this statement: "The American cult of the individual denies not just community but the very idea of society. No one owes anything to anyone. All must be prepared to fight for everything: education, shelter, food, medical care."

What is the source of that observation because FACT 1.3 million people disagree with you!!!

The U.S. is the No. 1 most generous country in the world for the last decade
Published: Dec. 7, 2019 at 2:01 p.m. ET
A global survey asked 1.3 million people whether they had helped a stranger or donated money or time to charity recently

That’s the conclusion of the World Giving Index, a ranking that measured how likely residents of 128 countries were to practice acts of generosity.

The index, from the U.K.-based nonprofit Charities Aid Foundation, is based on Gallup’s World Poll surveys of 1.3 million people.

Between 2009 and 2018, interviewers asked respondents whether they had done the following in the last month: helped a stranger or someone they didn’t know who needed help, donated money to charity, or volunteered their time to an organization.

The U.S. is the No. 1 most generous country in the world for the last decade

A global survey asked 1.3 million people whether they had helped a stranger or donated money or time to charity recently.

www.marketwatch.com

 

[Mac1958]

why the US is fucked. Been trying to articulate it for years but never been able to do so properly. And no, this is not anti-American. Like most people in the world, a strong US (as it used to be) is much better than a strong China. So here's the article and some of its highlights.

The Unraveling of America

Anthropologist Wade Davis writes about Covid-19 and its devastating impact on the international standing of the United States.

www.rollingstone.com

Some highlights:

1. But what surely does is the absolutely devastating impact that the pandemic has had on the reputation and international standing of the United States of America.
2. COVID has reduced to tatters the illusion of American exceptionalism.
3. For more than two centuries, reported the Irish Times, “the United States has stirred a very wide range of feelings in the rest of the world: love and hatred, fear and hope, envy and contempt, awe and anger. But there is one emotion that has never been directed towards the U.S. until now: pity.”
4. At its peak, Henry Ford’s Willow Run Plant produced a B-24 Liberator every two hours, around the clock. Shipyards in Long Beach and Sausalito spat out Liberty ships at a rate of two a day for four years
5. But freedom and affluence came with a price. The United States, virtually a demilitarized nation on the eve of the Second World War, never stood down in the wake of victory. To this day, American troops are deployed in 150 countries. Since the 1970s, China has not once gone to war; the U.S. has not spent a day at peace. President Jimmy Carter recently noted that in its 242-year history, America has enjoyed only 16 years of peace.
6. More than any other country, the United States in the post-war era lionized the individual at the expense of community and family. It was the sociological equivalent of splitting the atom. What was gained in terms of mobility and personal freedom came at the expense of common purpose. In wide swaths of America, the family as an institution lost its grounding. By the 1960s, 40 percent of marriages were ending in divorce. Only six percent of American homes had grandparents living beneath the same roof as grandchildren; elders were abandoned to retirement homes
7. The country of the 1950s resembled Denmark as much as the America of today. Marginal tax rates for the wealthy were 90 percent. The salaries of CEOs were, on average, just 20 times that of their mid-management employees. Today, the base pay of those at the top is commonly 400 times that of their salaried staff, with many earning orders of magnitude more in stock options and perks. The elite one percent of Americans control $30 trillion of assets, while the bottom half have more debt than assets.
8. Trump’s performance and America’s crisis deflected attention from China’s own mishandling of the initial outbreak in Wuhan, not to mention its move to crush democracy in Hong Kong.
9. The American president lives to cultivate resentments, demonize his opponents, validate hatred. His main tool of governance is the lie; as of July 9th, 2020, the documented tally of his distortions and false statements numbered 20,055.

These last three are my favourite and sum up every neocon loser on this board. Every..single..one...of...you.

As they stare into the mirror and perceive only the myth of their exceptionalism, Americans remain almost bizarrely incapable of seeing what has actually become of their country. The republic that defined the free flow of information as the life blood of democracy, today ranks 45th among nations when it comes to press freedom.

The American cult of the individual denies not just community but the very idea of society. No one owes anything to anyone. All must be prepared to fight for everything: education, shelter, food, medical care. What every prosperous and successful democracy deems to be fundamental rights — universal health care, equal access to quality public education, a social safety net for the weak, elderly, and infirmed — America dismisses as socialist indulgences, as if so many signs of weakness.


American politicians dismiss the Scandinavian model as creeping socialism, communism lite, something that would never work in the United States. In truth, social democracies are successful precisely because they foment dynamic capitalist economies that just happen to benefit every tier of society.

At this moment we're essentially a caricature of ourselves. The Ugly Americans.

And those who support this remain absolutely ignorant about how they're handing the keys to the very people they loathe.

You copied but your source doesn't give any link to this statement: "The American cult of the individual denies not just community but the very idea of society. No one owes anything to anyone. All must be prepared to fight for everything: education, shelter, food, medical care."

What is the source of that observation because FACT 1.3 million people disagree with you!!!

The U.S. is the No. 1 most generous country in the world for the last decade
Published: Dec. 7, 2019 at 2:01 p.m. ET
A global survey asked 1.3 million people whether they had helped a stranger or donated money or time to charity recently

That’s the conclusion of the World Giving Index, a ranking that measured how likely residents of 128 countries were to practice acts of generosity.

The index, from the U.K.-based nonprofit Charities Aid Foundation, is based on Gallup’s World Poll surveys of 1.3 million people.

Between 2009 and 2018, interviewers asked respondents whether they had done the following in the last month: helped a stranger or someone they didn’t know who needed help, donated money to charity, or volunteered their time to an organization.

The U.S. is the No. 1 most generous country in the world for the last decade

A global survey asked 1.3 million people whether they had helped a stranger or donated money or time to charity recently.

www.marketwatch.com

I don't know what that has to do with my point, but great.

 

[healthmyths]

why the US is fucked. Been trying to articulate it for years but never been able to do so properly. And no, this is not anti-American. Like most people in the world, a strong US (as it used to be) is much better than a strong China. So here's the article and some of its highlights.

The Unraveling of America

Anthropologist Wade Davis writes about Covid-19 and its devastating impact on the international standing of the United States.

www.rollingstone.com

Some highlights:

1. But what surely does is the absolutely devastating impact that the pandemic has had on the reputation and international standing of the United States of America.
2. COVID has reduced to tatters the illusion of American exceptionalism.
3. For more than two centuries, reported the Irish Times, “the United States has stirred a very wide range of feelings in the rest of the world: love and hatred, fear and hope, envy and contempt, awe and anger. But there is one emotion that has never been directed towards the U.S. until now: pity.”
4. At its peak, Henry Ford’s Willow Run Plant produced a B-24 Liberator every two hours, around the clock. Shipyards in Long Beach and Sausalito spat out Liberty ships at a rate of two a day for four years
5. But freedom and affluence came with a price. The United States, virtually a demilitarized nation on the eve of the Second World War, never stood down in the wake of victory. To this day, American troops are deployed in 150 countries. Since the 1970s, China has not once gone to war; the U.S. has not spent a day at peace. President Jimmy Carter recently noted that in its 242-year history, America has enjoyed only 16 years of peace.
6. More than any other country, the United States in the post-war era lionized the individual at the expense of community and family. It was the sociological equivalent of splitting the atom. What was gained in terms of mobility and personal freedom came at the expense of common purpose. In wide swaths of America, the family as an institution lost its grounding. By the 1960s, 40 percent of marriages were ending in divorce. Only six percent of American homes had grandparents living beneath the same roof as grandchildren; elders were abandoned to retirement homes
7. The country of the 1950s resembled Denmark as much as the America of today. Marginal tax rates for the wealthy were 90 percent. The salaries of CEOs were, on average, just 20 times that of their mid-management employees. Today, the base pay of those at the top is commonly 400 times that of their salaried staff, with many earning orders of magnitude more in stock options and perks. The elite one percent of Americans control $30 trillion of assets, while the bottom half have more debt than assets.
8. Trump’s performance and America’s crisis deflected attention from China’s own mishandling of the initial outbreak in Wuhan, not to mention its move to crush democracy in Hong Kong.
9. The American president lives to cultivate resentments, demonize his opponents, validate hatred. His main tool of governance is the lie; as of July 9th, 2020, the documented tally of his distortions and false statements numbered 20,055.

These last three are my favourite and sum up every neocon loser on this board. Every..single..one...of...you.

As they stare into the mirror and perceive only the myth of their exceptionalism, Americans remain almost bizarrely incapable of seeing what has actually become of their country. The republic that defined the free flow of information as the life blood of democracy, today ranks 45th among nations when it comes to press freedom.

The American cult of the individual denies not just community but the very idea of society. No one owes anything to anyone. All must be prepared to fight for everything: education, shelter, food, medical care. What every prosperous and successful democracy deems to be fundamental rights — universal health care, equal access to quality public education, a social safety net for the weak, elderly, and infirmed — America dismisses as socialist indulgences, as if so many signs of weakness.


American politicians dismiss the Scandinavian model as creeping socialism, communism lite, something that would never work in the United States. In truth, social democracies are successful precisely because they foment dynamic capitalist economies that just happen to benefit every tier of society.

Finally... the USA is such a disturbing, dysfunctional country only as a "cult of the individual"... please explain this fact:
Nearly 3 times as many people want to move to this "cult of the individual" country as the next most desired location to move to.
Again... where are YOUR facts because these FACTs seem to dispute your thesis.

More Than 750 Million Worldwide Would Migrate If They Could

Fifteen percent of the world's adults -- or more than 750 million people -- say they would like to move to another country if they had the opportunity. This is up from previous years, but still shy of the record high of 16% set between 2007 and 2009.

news.gallup.com

 

[pknopp]

why the US is fucked. Been trying to articulate it for years but never been able to do so properly. And no, this is not anti-American. Like most people in the world, a strong US (as it used to be) is much better than a strong China. So here's the article and some of its highlights.

The Unraveling of America

Anthropologist Wade Davis writes about Covid-19 and its devastating impact on the international standing of the United States.

www.rollingstone.com

Some highlights:

1. But what surely does is the absolutely devastating impact that the pandemic has had on the reputation and international standing of the United States of America.
2. COVID has reduced to tatters the illusion of American exceptionalism.
3. For more than two centuries, reported the Irish Times, “the United States has stirred a very wide range of feelings in the rest of the world: love and hatred, fear and hope, envy and contempt, awe and anger. But there is one emotion that has never been directed towards the U.S. until now: pity.”
4. At its peak, Henry Ford’s Willow Run Plant produced a B-24 Liberator every two hours, around the clock. Shipyards in Long Beach and Sausalito spat out Liberty ships at a rate of two a day for four years
5. But freedom and affluence came with a price. The United States, virtually a demilitarized nation on the eve of the Second World War, never stood down in the wake of victory. To this day, American troops are deployed in 150 countries. Since the 1970s, China has not once gone to war; the U.S. has not spent a day at peace. President Jimmy Carter recently noted that in its 242-year history, America has enjoyed only 16 years of peace.
6. More than any other country, the United States in the post-war era lionized the individual at the expense of community and family. It was the sociological equivalent of splitting the atom. What was gained in terms of mobility and personal freedom came at the expense of common purpose. In wide swaths of America, the family as an institution lost its grounding. By the 1960s, 40 percent of marriages were ending in divorce. Only six percent of American homes had grandparents living beneath the same roof as grandchildren; elders were abandoned to retirement homes
7. The country of the 1950s resembled Denmark as much as the America of today. Marginal tax rates for the wealthy were 90 percent. The salaries of CEOs were, on average, just 20 times that of their mid-management employees. Today, the base pay of those at the top is commonly 400 times that of their salaried staff, with many earning orders of magnitude more in stock options and perks. The elite one percent of Americans control $30 trillion of assets, while the bottom half have more debt than assets.
8. Trump’s performance and America’s crisis deflected attention from China’s own mishandling of the initial outbreak in Wuhan, not to mention its move to crush democracy in Hong Kong.
9. The American president lives to cultivate resentments, demonize his opponents, validate hatred. His main tool of governance is the lie; as of July 9th, 2020, the documented tally of his distortions and false statements numbered 20,055.

These last three are my favourite and sum up every neocon loser on this board. Every..single..one...of...you.

As they stare into the mirror and perceive only the myth of their exceptionalism, Americans remain almost bizarrely incapable of seeing what has actually become of their country. The republic that defined the free flow of information as the life blood of democracy, today ranks 45th among nations when it comes to press freedom.

The American cult of the individual denies not just community but the very idea of society. No one owes anything to anyone. All must be prepared to fight for everything: education, shelter, food, medical care. What every prosperous and successful democracy deems to be fundamental rights — universal health care, equal access to quality public education, a social safety net for the weak, elderly, and infirmed — America dismisses as socialist indulgences, as if so many signs of weakness.


American politicians dismiss the Scandinavian model as creeping socialism, communism lite, something that would never work in the United States. In truth, social democracies are successful precisely because they foment dynamic capitalist economies that just happen to benefit every tier of society.

At this moment we're essentially a caricature of ourselves. The Ugly Americans.

And those who support this remain absolutely ignorant about how they're handing the keys to the very people they loathe.

You copied but your source doesn't give any link to this statement: "The American cult of the individual denies not just community but the very idea of society. No one owes anything to anyone. All must be prepared to fight for everything: education, shelter, food, medical care."

What is the source of that observation because FACT 1.3 million people disagree with you!!!

The U.S. is the No. 1 most generous country in the world for the last decade
Published: Dec. 7, 2019 at 2:01 p.m. ET
A global survey asked 1.3 million people whether they had helped a stranger or donated money or time to charity recently

That’s the conclusion of the World Giving Index, a ranking that measured how likely residents of 128 countries were to practice acts of generosity.

The index, from the U.K.-based nonprofit Charities Aid Foundation, is based on Gallup’s World Poll surveys of 1.3 million people.

Between 2009 and 2018, interviewers asked respondents whether they had done the following in the last month: helped a stranger or someone they didn’t know who needed help, donated money to charity, or volunteered their time to an organization.

The U.S. is the No. 1 most generous country in the world for the last decade

A global survey asked 1.3 million people whether they had helped a stranger or donated money or time to charity recently.

www.marketwatch.com

It's easy to give away money when you are the only country in the world that can just print it. We are also the most violent.

The money we give away by and large is to bribe countries to do as we say at that. If they don't we bomb them.

 

[eddiew]

why the US is fucked. Been trying to articulate it for years but never been able to do so properly. And no, this is not anti-American. Like most people in the world, a strong US (as it used to be) is much better than a strong China. So here's the article and some of its highlights.

The Unraveling of America

Anthropologist Wade Davis writes about Covid-19 and its devastating impact on the international standing of the United States.

www.rollingstone.com

Some highlights:

1. But what surely does is the absolutely devastating impact that the pandemic has had on the reputation and international standing of the United States of America.
2. COVID has reduced to tatters the illusion of American exceptionalism.
3. For more than two centuries, reported the Irish Times, “the United States has stirred a very wide range of feelings in the rest of the world: love and hatred, fear and hope, envy and contempt, awe and anger. But there is one emotion that has never been directed towards the U.S. until now: pity.”
4. At its peak, Henry Ford’s Willow Run Plant produced a B-24 Liberator every two hours, around the clock. Shipyards in Long Beach and Sausalito spat out Liberty ships at a rate of two a day for four years
5. But freedom and affluence came with a price. The United States, virtually a demilitarized nation on the eve of the Second World War, never stood down in the wake of victory. To this day, American troops are deployed in 150 countries. Since the 1970s, China has not once gone to war; the U.S. has not spent a day at peace. President Jimmy Carter recently noted that in its 242-year history, America has enjoyed only 16 years of peace.
6. More than any other country, the United States in the post-war era lionized the individual at the expense of community and family. It was the sociological equivalent of splitting the atom. What was gained in terms of mobility and personal freedom came at the expense of common purpose. In wide swaths of America, the family as an institution lost its grounding. By the 1960s, 40 percent of marriages were ending in divorce. Only six percent of American homes had grandparents living beneath the same roof as grandchildren; elders were abandoned to retirement homes
7. The country of the 1950s resembled Denmark as much as the America of today. Marginal tax rates for the wealthy were 90 percent. The salaries of CEOs were, on average, just 20 times that of their mid-management employees. Today, the base pay of those at the top is commonly 400 times that of their salaried staff, with many earning orders of magnitude more in stock options and perks. The elite one percent of Americans control $30 trillion of assets, while the bottom half have more debt than assets.
8. Trump’s performance and America’s crisis deflected attention from China’s own mishandling of the initial outbreak in Wuhan, not to mention its move to crush democracy in Hong Kong.
9. The American president lives to cultivate resentments, demonize his opponents, validate hatred. His main tool of governance is the lie; as of July 9th, 2020, the documented tally of his distortions and false statements numbered 20,055.

These last three are my favourite and sum up every neocon loser on this board. Every..single..one...of...you.

As they stare into the mirror and perceive only the myth of their exceptionalism, Americans remain almost bizarrely incapable of seeing what has actually become of their country. The republic that defined the free flow of information as the life blood of democracy, today ranks 45th among nations when it comes to press freedom.

The American cult of the individual denies not just community but the very idea of society. No one owes anything to anyone. All must be prepared to fight for everything: education, shelter, food, medical care. What every prosperous and successful democracy deems to be fundamental rights — universal health care, equal access to quality public education, a social safety net for the weak, elderly, and infirmed — America dismisses as socialist indulgences, as if so many signs of weakness.


American politicians dismiss the Scandinavian model as creeping socialism, communism lite, something that would never work in the United States. In truth, social democracies are successful precisely because they foment dynamic capitalist economies that just happen to benefit every tier of society.

At this moment we're essentially a caricature of ourselves. The Ugly Americans.

And those who support this remain absolutely ignorant about how they're handing the keys to the very people they loathe.

As individuals, in religious ways, God gave each of us.. free choice. As a citizen of a nation...... we have free choice. Basing decisions on that with our flaws can make things better or worse. People who make things worse, tend to scream the loudest. In all of this, there are people who take advantage of others. In all ways at all economic levels. So when condemning people, get them first.

1000 a day DEAD?? and you AH's won't wear masks ,keep safe distances??? Take your free choice and shove it back up trumps butt

 

[Votto]

why the US is fucked. Been trying to articulate it for years but never been able to do so properly. And no, this is not anti-American. Like most people in the world, a strong US (as it used to be) is much better than a strong China. So here's the article and some of its highlights.

The Unraveling of America

Anthropologist Wade Davis writes about Covid-19 and its devastating impact on the international standing of the United States.

www.rollingstone.com

Some highlights:

1. But what surely does is the absolutely devastating impact that the pandemic has had on the reputation and international standing of the United States of America.
2. COVID has reduced to tatters the illusion of American exceptionalism.
3. For more than two centuries, reported the Irish Times, “the United States has stirred a very wide range of feelings in the rest of the world: love and hatred, fear and hope, envy and contempt, awe and anger. But there is one emotion that has never been directed towards the U.S. until now: pity.”
4. At its peak, Henry Ford’s Willow Run Plant produced a B-24 Liberator every two hours, around the clock. Shipyards in Long Beach and Sausalito spat out Liberty ships at a rate of two a day for four years
5. But freedom and affluence came with a price. The United States, virtually a demilitarized nation on the eve of the Second World War, never stood down in the wake of victory. To this day, American troops are deployed in 150 countries. Since the 1970s, China has not once gone to war; the U.S. has not spent a day at peace. President Jimmy Carter recently noted that in its 242-year history, America has enjoyed only 16 years of peace.
6. More than any other country, the United States in the post-war era lionized the individual at the expense of community and family. It was the sociological equivalent of splitting the atom. What was gained in terms of mobility and personal freedom came at the expense of common purpose. In wide swaths of America, the family as an institution lost its grounding. By the 1960s, 40 percent of marriages were ending in divorce. Only six percent of American homes had grandparents living beneath the same roof as grandchildren; elders were abandoned to retirement homes
7. The country of the 1950s resembled Denmark as much as the America of today. Marginal tax rates for the wealthy were 90 percent. The salaries of CEOs were, on average, just 20 times that of their mid-management employees. Today, the base pay of those at the top is commonly 400 times that of their salaried staff, with many earning orders of magnitude more in stock options and perks. The elite one percent of Americans control $30 trillion of assets, while the bottom half have more debt than assets.
8. Trump’s performance and America’s crisis deflected attention from China’s own mishandling of the initial outbreak in Wuhan, not to mention its move to crush democracy in Hong Kong.
9. The American president lives to cultivate resentments, demonize his opponents, validate hatred. His main tool of governance is the lie; as of July 9th, 2020, the documented tally of his distortions and false statements numbered 20,055.

These last three are my favourite and sum up every neocon loser on this board. Every..single..one...of...you.

As they stare into the mirror and perceive only the myth of their exceptionalism, Americans remain almost bizarrely incapable of seeing what has actually become of their country. The republic that defined the free flow of information as the life blood of democracy, today ranks 45th among nations when it comes to press freedom.

The American cult of the individual denies not just community but the very idea of society. No one owes anything to anyone. All must be prepared to fight for everything: education, shelter, food, medical care. What every prosperous and successful democracy deems to be fundamental rights — universal health care, equal access to quality public education, a social safety net for the weak, elderly, and infirmed — America dismisses as socialist indulgences, as if so many signs of weakness.


American politicians dismiss the Scandinavian model as creeping socialism, communism lite, something that would never work in the United States. In truth, social democracies are successful precisely because they foment dynamic capitalist economies that just happen to benefit every tier of society.

It is mind boggling to me that you blame a lack of community on lowering taxes on the rich. How is a hand full of rich guys destroying the lack of community exactly? How are you connecting those dots exactly? So if we take the wealth of a minute number within society we will have community again? How so? For example, in Pol Pot's killing fields of Chicago, how will community return if we cut down Bezos and Gates, who are democrats BTW, make us return to community?

It's not a problem with someone that has money, it's a problem of what the country does to make sure the rich continues to get more and more money. It's not mostly through production. It's through Socialist actions of the Federal Reserve.

Quit the actions of the Federal Reserve and I'll quit defending those protesting.

Had it ever dawned on you Brown shirts that the lack of community you feel can be traced to the actions of the Left. Marxism is all about replacing the family unit and dependence on distant uncaring political figures for their collective salvation. So instead of the family needing each other to survive, we now have Big Brother to pay to have grandma or grandpa put away some where out of sight. Instead of telling women that they can have children out of wedlock because Big Brother will be there to help them pay for everything, perhaps telling them Big Brother will not be there might change the cycle of poverty known as single parent homes. And instead of closing down churches and schools because of Covid but turning your heads when Left wing riots run our streets, perhaps those institutions are what was holding society together, what is left of it, that is.

People like you make me sick. People like you ARE the problem.

Nobody puts grandpa and grandma out of sight. People have to work two jobs to survive today. It's a good thing that someone who is elderly can have someone look after them. As for the rest..........

"The King will reply, 'Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.'

Matthew 25:40

Well according to the extremist Left wing democrats, places like the former USSR, Venezuela, and North Korea, where you are not allowed to have money unless you run government, should be an oasis of community, but that does not seem to be the case, now does it.

In fact, Marxism has murdered more people last century than any other religion or ideology, hands down, even fascism.