Views of the US election from non-US folk

Interesting Nihm.. thanks for those links

http://216.239.39.104/search?q=cache:EXw3bRg74v0J:www.gao.gov/new.items/d02294.pdf+un+peacekeeping&hl=en#24



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UN_peacekeeping

It's because the 160th nightstalkers didn't go to Rwanda, they went to Somalia.

If you check the UN Peacekeeping website for the past missions in Somalia, you'll find a mention of the US among the "Contributors of Military and Civilian Police Personnel" for UNOSOM II.

I don't know how many Americans of the 160th there were in Somalia in total, but the data given for UNOSOM II mentions a full total of some 15,000 UN peacekeepers, plus international staff. So if you know how many Americans of the 160th there were, you can roughly calculate the proportion they constituted of the total.

I also don't know how many Americans died in Somalia, but in total the UN peacekeepers apparently suffered 151 fatalities there. Again, if you know the American number you can calculate how big a share of the suffering the US took.

And no US troops in Rwanda then, that would be right.

(One can generally trust a site like the UN's to give the right credits - they would never get away with giving the wrong numbers, too many Member States checking what they put up. ;-))

Nice avatar nimh, it only took you 7,480 posts to get it. :wink:

Also, if someone copies/pastes a long quote from another website but omits to provide a link, and you're not sure whether to trust it, you can simply copy a sentence from it into Google between quotation marks, and you'll usually find it straight away.

(Best of course is to use a sentence that is specific to the article - you wont find the source back by Googling for "The US also deploys units" - but you get the drift.)

Thanks Pan, its not forever, but it fits for now. Thanks to Craven who made it.

Thanks for reminding me about posting courtesy nimh. I was remiss in not linking. I apologize Vet.

Eh, the reminder was actually intended to point the other way - it's not that hard to find a text back with Google if you really feel that insecure about its origins, once you know the trick with the quotation marks. But either way I'm glad to be of help ;-)

No derail, no!

(Sides not equally bad. Electoral process based on name-calling and entertainment value bad. Election run like professional wrestling bad.)

Oh. Well, yeah, I agree with that.

That was easy.

Carry on, furriners!

Panz that source was from national geographics..

coincidence... Hubby read that exact same thing today while he was at some office...

Needl;ess to say he was steaming mad at some of the "facts"

Semms they listed the US soldiers as not being in some of those places... hehe and they are

Nihm actually they did ......I have 2 army buddies that went....

Nime check the defense almanac as well for information on deaths and us participation

I can say there are quite a few places our soldiers go that arent listed anywhere... to this day I dont know where my husband went with SF....hes not suupposed to say anything to his own wife...

Look at me...I've trampled all over your non-US thread...gosh we're a pushy bunch.

I'm gonna take a recess and sit and liten to the "furriners" take.

sorry as well to the out of towners... I shall withdrawl

early withdrawl results in a penalty...right AV?

There too much internal politicking here in Mexico for the media to follow the US elections as close as it usually has.

A huge majority of Mexicans prefer Kerry (a natural Democrat tendency), but this time (as in 2000 with Gore) not with much enthusiasm.

Iraq has hurt Bush's image a lot. He wasn't much liked before that, either.
But Bush is from Texas, and at least Texans know a little about the vicinity. Kerry is seen as the guy from the remote Northern regions, who don't care about Mexico.
Bush is good for oil prices. Perhaps too good. As exporters -and with a government whose budget depends somehow on oil revenues- we want a "just" price for oil (a high price, that is), but not so high that it hinders the growth of the US economy (and their imports of manufactured goods from Mexico).
Bush is more pro-free trade. So are most Mexicans. Yet others say Kerry is better, since this means we'll renegociate some elements of NAFTA they consider harmful to both nations.

All in all, the main issue for American elections here is the chance of a migration agreement. "Only 4 debate minutes to migration" was a headline after Debate 3.
Whoever delivers the agreement, is the one we favor.
Bush has somewhat backed down from his previous positions, because most conservatives are anti-immigrant, and Kerry has a better position now... but he's from New England, doesn't really care, and Bush is from Texas... perhaps a bad signable deal is better that a beautiful deal we never sign... back to the circle.

Bush isn't really from Texas; that's just the image he likes to portray...

Bush and Kerry are both New Englanders at heart...

Cycloptichorn

Bush is a Connecticut Yankee in OK Corral.
He's as preppy as his dad.
Yep.

But his people have been able to sell the Texan cowboy image.

bien hecho...interesting stuff

Actually, I think Armyvet did the trampling - you and Nimh simply attempted to introduce the facts after the event.

Msolga, Fbaezer, folks (I ask Ozzians and fbaezer especially cos we are having/have just had elections of our own) - here's an interesting one - from what you ar eable to observe, do you think the US is more damagingly divided over this election than our countries are/were?