America: The Grim Truth

America: The Grim Truth

www.informationclearinghouse.info

You have the worst quality of life in the developed world – by a wide margin.

If you had any idea of how people really lived in Western Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Canada and many parts of Asia, you’d be rioting in the streets calling for a better life. In fact, the average Australian or Singaporean taxi driver has a much better standard of living than the typical American white-collar worker.

I know this because I am an American, and I escaped from the prison you call home.

I have lived all around the world, in wealthy countries and poor ones, and there is only one countr

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i sure as hell would never want to live there.

as a teenager in school i did projects on america. i was fascinated by the country, so richly endowed by nature. i DO love americans and count some of them as friends, but somehow i never wanted to be part of their society. even at that early age i felt something was wrong.

now as an onlooker from oz and an eager consumer of world news, i witness the decline of empire and moral standards around the world, homo sapiens created economic woes, and the most ungodly behaviour by those politicians who never should have held positions of power in the first place.

perhaps they are the microbial scum that will bring the worlds present disease to an end soon enough. or whose behaviour will rid the planet of the cause.

www.informationclearinghouse.info
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reply to post by orangutang


oops, sorry mods, i'm a bit slow off the mark here. perhaps you could move my comments to the original post.

What's worse than us not having health care, is the bogus yet confusingly-massive bill they just rammed down our Congress' throats.

I know that this country is eat up with corruption, but I wouldn't want to live anywhere else, because we still have many unique freedoms and traditions relevant to upholding certain freedoms (for example our Bill of Rights), and the country at least here in VA is gorgeous.

In Oz you still have corruption, and many things Americans don't have to deal with. One of my buddies moved to Oz and was immediately complaining about higher taxes and having to struggle more to make ends meet, but I'm sure it's different for everyone. The one thing I am confident about is that the US, UK, and Australia are more alike than they are different and are ALL subject to more corruption and political abuses than we are proud of.

reply to post by orangutang

i sure as hell would never want to live there.

That's fine.

I spent a good share of my early days abroad. I spent over a year in Africa and compared to the US, I'm tempted to call it an armpit but I won't, but close.

I was in USSR over a month, Moscow and the Pamirs. The group I was with was so glad to get back to US soil we were, well, ecstatic.

Europe from the viewpoint of most Americans is too restrictive, regimented, controlled and who would ever want their health systems anyway except a freeloader. Great place to travel, great place to come home from. I speak French and German so I've given it the good old American try!

You people make good friends, I have and have had many.

And not all Americans are fat, out of shape or diabetic. I swear Canada is worse but I could be wrong. Eh?

Originally posted by plumranch
And not all Americans are fat, out of shape or diabetic. I swear Canada is worse but I could be wrong. Eh?

Yeah, I would think you're wrong considering I see roughly one very obese person per hundred healthy Canadians every time I walk on the street, go to the store or attend university.

Click here for more information.

America in many ways is still a shining example of what can be achieved among humans, what we see are mostly the bad examples. Don't get me wrong, I'm not tooting the statist horn or the social control model - nor am I saying anywhere else is better or worse only different. Europeans seem to have in large part come to peace with their governance, exceptions of course in the former eastern bloc and other areas still struggling after years of internal strife. One dane complained they tried western style tax cuts but the people were left wanting for critical social services arranged around the needs of the community instead of the budget - the few euros they saved in taxes weren't worth the cut in services like child care hours and "after work" medical care availability. But the more I hear of many protestations of excessive taxes, the more I see the underlying problem as somehow social responsibility isn't as important as personal condition when it comes to what we believe to be "principles" worth zealously defending.
If we perceived a different relationship between ourselves and governance it would be easier to manage our own expectations. One such perception is cash register justice we see so often here - it's all about collecting revenue not about conduct in the social order - and the convenient masquerade of love for law and order, a nation of laws... wears thin when it becomes so pervasively obvious it cannot be ignored.

gj

This isn't breaking news, nor is it anything but highly skewed bias. There are sob stories in all countries; our U.S. healthcare system isn't the best...but it's not the worst, but I don't think single-payer is the way to improve it...in fact our out of pocket medical expenses are far lower than most -socialized- countries like Switzerland...which is actually part of the problem.

uchicagolaw.typepad.com...

[edit on 8-4-2010 by yellowcard]

reply to post by yellowcard


You do know that the new American medical bill is not socialized, but is instead designed to force all Americans to pay medical premiums to private insurance companies or face large fines? A fine example of the neo-liberal capitalist agenda, to gain more money by forcing the people who cannot afford insurance to buy it or pay pennalties to the government (so it's a win-win for American government and corporations and yet another loss for its people).

It's like what Cheney once said, "you cannot truely appreciate freedom unless it has been taken away from you." Well, I think Americans cannot truely appreciate socialist health care unless they actually tried it.

Originally posted by Dimitri Dzengalshlevi
reply to post by yellowcard

 

You do know that the new American medical bill is not socialized, but is instead designed to force all Americans to pay medical premiums to private insurance companies or face large fines? A fine example of the neo-liberal capitalist agenda, to gain more money by forcing the people who cannot afford insurance to buy it or pay pennalties to the government (so it's a win-win for American government and corporations and yet another loss for its people).

It's like what Cheney once said, "you cannot truely appreciate freedom unless it has been taken away from you." Well, I think Americans cannot truely appreciate socialist health care unless they actually tried it.

You do know that you're a tool, right? Anyhow, I never said the current bill was socialized...the article in which we are commenting on is pro-single payer. There is nothing "neo-liberal" about the current healthcare bill, get your head our of Naomi Klein and the like's ass. The link in my post is a "neo-liberal" (which is actually just a libertarian) Gary Becker (former colleague of the now deceased Milton Friedman and Friedrich Hayek) and he is clearly against the bill...so is famous neo-liberal Milton Friedman. So, as I was saying you're a tool and haven't a clue as to what you're talking about.

[edit on 10-4-2010 by yellowcard]

reply to post by orangutang


I find the article to be true. The food and water standards of different countries are much better then America's.

Not to mention America still uses the Microwave bunch of people got a case of the lazys.

I hope this gets out.

good find

Edited for spelling

[edit on 10-4-2010 by Quickfix]

I find it incredible that many americans latch onto "The Bill of Rights" and "The Constitution"; as though these pieces of paper held any real and significant power. Your forefathers were SLAVE owners.

Please do NOT read this as any racial screed--it is nothing of the sort. I just think that this blind patriotic "America is the greatest nation on earth" spiel is more than obsolete. Just because you were born in a country does not mean it is TOTALLY AWESUM. America has produced McDonalds, Pepsi and Coke, but very few artists worth mentioning who didn't forsake their mother land and turn against it heralded from the states. You have the most technologically advanced military on earth, and yet the inability to design one means of lasting peace is astounding.

I am an Australian, and while I clearly recognise the blatant faults and inequities within "the system", I would never EVER choose to live in America because...well...I don't think, in this century, it even needs mentioning.

Originally posted by yellowcard

Originally posted by Dimitri Dzengalshlevi
reply to post by yellowcard

 

You do know that the new American medical bill is not socialized, but is instead designed to force all Americans to pay medical premiums to private insurance companies or face large fines? A fine example of the neo-liberal capitalist agenda, to gain more money by forcing the people who cannot afford insurance to buy it or pay pennalties to the government (so it's a win-win for American government and corporations and yet another loss for its people).

It's like what Cheney once said, "you cannot truely appreciate freedom unless it has been taken away from you." Well, I think Americans cannot truely appreciate socialist health care unless they actually tried it.

You do know that you're a tool, right? Anyhow, I never said the current bill was socialized...the article in which we are commenting on is pro-single payer. There is nothing "neo-liberal" about the current healthcare bill, get your head our of Naomi Klein and the like's ass. The link in my post is a "neo-liberal" (which is actually just a libertarian) Gary Becker (former colleague of the now deceased Milton Friedman and Friedrich Hayek) and he is clearly against the bill...so is famous neo-liberal Milton Friedman. So, as I was saying you're a tool and haven't a clue as to what you're talking about.

[edit on 10-4-2010 by yellowcard]

hahahaha, funny how you mentioned these people. Friedman is responsible for the neo-liberalist capitalism reform during the 70s and Hayek is on the opposite spectrum. Should do your homework.