Thomas wrote:I liked this paragraph.
Fedral, quoting Dinesh D'Souza wrote:The immigrant cannot help noticing that America is a country where the poor live comparatively well. This fact was dramatized in the 1980s, when CBS television broadcast an anti-Reagan documentary, "People Like Us," which was intended to show the miseries of the poor during an American recession. The Soviet Union also broadcast the documentary, with the intention of embarrassing the Reagan administration. But it had the opposite effect. Ordinary people across the Soviet Union saw that the poorest Americans had television sets and cars. They arrived at the same conclusion that I witnessed in a friend of mine from Bombay who has been trying unsuccessfully to move to the United States for nearly a decade. I asked him, "Why are you so eager to come to America?" He replied, "Because I really want to live in a country where the poor people are fat."
I can also confirm the effect of the documentary on Russian people. Victor Jerofiev, a Russian author and former dissident, mentioned it in an article for the
Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, where I read it about 10 years ago.
good point, Thomas. but the greatness of America shown in this paragraph in my view is not the fact that poor people can become overweight, but that there's freedom of speech to allow critical documentaries to be shown--the same freedom i exercise in nitpicking this article. Thomas, when you came to Chicago for the a2k meeting, you ate at a few restaurants. do you recall anyone addressing the waiter as "Sir"?
Finn d'Abuzz wrote:Roxxxanne wrote:JustanObserver wrote:I'll tell you what's great about America.
Sending a man to the moon, being at the forefront of science and technology, having the most technologically advanced military in existence (wish we didn't use it as much as we do though), baseball, basketball, and New York City.
Happy 4th people.
I'll take San Francisco over NYC any day...driving down 101 from Marin into the GG bridge, is one of the most awesome sights in the world. First you catch a glimpse of Alcatraz, then the towers of the bridge then the whole city comes in view, it is spectacular. I get chills every time.
San Francisco is a wonderful place, but it is not, and never will be
The City : NYC.
Walk the streets of Manhattan and you can feel the New York buzz humming along your skin and in your chest. Never so in San Fran. Power rushes through the canyons of The Big Apple. It is
the American city.
San Francisco is always refered to as The City by Bay Area residents, you never say, I live in San Francisco. You always say I live in The City.
I don't know what the big deal is about the buzz, it makes the city feel alive, and unlike San Francisco, that city never sleeps but the trouble with New York is too many New Yorkers live there, in fact, too many
people live there. There are a lot of great things about NYC but it is far from The American City. It is, of course, unique. But it's on the East Coast. I will take the West Coast any day. And NYC doesn't even come close to the beauty of San Francisco and the Bay Area nor do New Yorkers share the liberated attitudes of San Franciscans.
yitwail wrote:Thomas, when you came to Chicago for the a2k meeting, you ate at a few restaurants. do you recall anyone addressing the waiter as "Sir"?
No -- the most idiomatic way of addressing a waiter seems to be "Excuuuuuse me?"
Amigo wrote:What's so great about America?
--------------------------------------------
The following timeline describes just a few of the hundreds of atrocities and crimes committed by the CIA. (1)
Jeez, that's a long list!
Look, I don't doubt that a good portion of that (if not all of it) rings true.
But this is a thread about "What's so
GREAT about America"! I'm sure that there would be no shortage of things to write about in a thread titled "What's so terrible about America" if we had one.
Clearly, this country has done more than it's fair share of bad things. But it's also done more than it's fair share of great things. These traits aren't mutually exclusive of one another.
America: It sucks
and rocks...at the same time!
It has come to my attention that one of my posts has been REMOVED! Prior to my last post I made another post which, for some reason, has been deleted! It would appear we have some Bush lover out there who does not like me being critical!
JustanObserver wrote:Amigo wrote:What's so great about America?
--------------------------------------------
The following timeline describes just a few of the hundreds of atrocities and crimes committed by the CIA. (1)
Jeez, that's a long list!
Look, I don't doubt that a good portion of that (if not all of it) rings true.
But this is a thread about "What's so
GREAT about America"! I'm sure that there would be no shortage of things to write about in a thread titled "What's so terrible about America" if we had one.
And just for comparison, Alexander Solshenizyn dedicated a three-volume, muliple-thousand-page novel just excarbating the Bolshevist's crimes from 1914 to 1918. If America's worst sins fit into a 2000-word list, that's pretty innocent by international standards.
NickFun wrote:It has come to my attention that one of my posts has been REMOVED! Prior to my last post I made another post which, for some reason, has been deleted! It would appear we have some Bush lover out there who does not like me being critical!
Trust me. There are no Bush loving mods on this forum.
There certainly are mods here who are conservative, and probably vote Republican. Whether or not they might be described as "Bush-loving" is, of course, another matter.
Nick, is it possible that anyone would have had grounds for reporting that post as a violation of TOS? If a mod thought it qualified as a violation, they would be obliged to remove it regardless of their personal political views.
I didn't report Nick's post, though I was offended by it.
Of course, I'm just one of those ignorent, fukn morons who are only tools for this administration which rivals the Nazi Party in Germany, or the Bolsheviks in the Soviet Union.
It's possibe Setana. However, my views were strictly politcal and did not use abusive language nor was I insulting. My post was simply removed. I would like an explantion from the moderator who removed it.
You can contact the moderators by using the 'contact us' thingie at the bottom right of the page, NickFun.
I would never have noticed the posts going missing if Nick hadn't pointed it out. Purely political, and not offensive? From Nicks perspective I'm sure he's a model of decorum. See if the moderator can put it back up as a new thread and lets poll the members on whether its offensive and a violation of the TOS. My guess is that the vote will be along strictly partisan lines, and frankly I expect there are more left-wing extremists here than those on the Right.
Of course, I'm just one of those pansy, ignorent, pseudo-intellectual, fukn morons who are only tools for this administration which rivals the Nazi Party in Germany, or the Bolsheviks in the Soviet Union. We've become used to having Nick, among others, constantly violate the TOS in their comments to and about Republican and conservative members of the site. If the TOS were strictly enforced, you might reduce the length of some threads significantly. Enforce the TOS consistently and without regard to who the violators are, please. I'm confident that almost all of us on the conservative side can and will conform to the TOS, especially if the provocations cease.
Asherman, I don't know what or who you are referring to in your post. I never used language like that and I won't. My post, as I recall, dealt with things we don't see here such as Iraqi family members crying over their loved ones. The pictures of those badly wounded who cannot get adequate medical care. The brutality of our administration as it has callously attacked another country without just cause and causing widespread grief and hardship. We created anarchy and the heinous pictures Finn pointed out in his post. I never attacked anyone personally. Maybe you are confusing me with someone else.
Yes, your postings do tend to focus on a general hatred for America, Americans and our elected government. I'm frequently offended by your blatant hatred of all I hold dear. As I said above, I wouldn't have noticed the disappearance of your post if you hadn't mentioned it. It is quite possible that you didn't violate the TOS, hence my suggestion that we all see it again. It is entirely possible that I have confused you with others. If so, please accept my apology.
Normally, you are not as personal in attacking others here as some (Frank Apsia, Cicero, F4F, Magginkat, Amigo, and a host of others). I believe that the TOS should be strictly enforced, and that it has not been. My perception is that the liberal wing of our correspondents are both more frequent and blatant violators of the TOS, and even more importantly civil discourse.
Lets clamp down on those whose total contribution is insulting others either directly or by inference.
BTW, all of the offensive terms I used above have been leveled at me personally by posters on this forum. In fairness, you've never directed the same sort of invective to me that some others have. I have never reported anyone for violation of the TOS, nor do I intend to in the future. Those who take that course are their own worst enemies in the long run, and I'm just mean enough to sell them the rope to hang themselves with. Still, its far past time for everyone to take a deep breath and chill their rhetoric. If you want to hate me, the TOS ain't going to make any difference. Howeverf, with less provocation perhaps our discussions will be both more productive and enjoyable.
What's so great about America? I think Carl Sandburg says it best:
Carl Sandburg
The people yes
The people will live on.
The learning and blundering people will live on.
They will be tricked and sold and again sold
And go back to the nourishing earth for rootholds,
The people so peculiar in renewal and comeback,
You can't laugh off their capacity to take it.
The mammoth rests between his cyclonic dramas.
The people so often sleepy, weary, enigmatic,
is a vast huddle with many units saying:
"I earn my living.
I make enough to get by
and it takes all my time.
If I had more time
I could do more for myself
and maybe for others.
I could read and study
and talk things over
and find out about things.
It takes time.
I wish I had the time."
The people is a tragic and comic two-face: hero and hoodlum:
phantom and gorilla twisting to moan with a gargoyle mouth:
"They buy me and sell me...it's a game...sometime I'll
break loose..."
Once having marched
Over the margins of animal necessity,
Over the grim line of sheer subsistence
Then man came
To the deeper rituals of his bones,
To the lights lighter than any bones,
To the time for thinking things over,
To the dance, the song, the story,
Or the hours given over to dreaming,
Once having so marched.
Between the finite limitations of the five senses
and the endless yearnings of man for the beyond
the people hold to the humdrum bidding of work and food
while reaching out when it comes their way
for lights beyond the prison of the five senses,
for keepsakes lasting beyond any hunger or death.
This reaching is alive.
The panderers and liars have violated and smutted it.
Yet this reaching is alive yet
for lights and keepsakes.
The people know the salt of the sea
and the strength of the winds
lashing the corners of the earth.
The people take the earth
as a tomb of rest and a cradle of hope.
Who else speaks for the Family of Man?
They are in tune and step
with constellations of universal law.
The people is a polychrome,
a spectrum and a prism
held in a moving monolith,
a console organ of changing themes,
a clavilux of color poems
wherein the sea offers fog
and the fog moves off in rain
and the labrador sunset shortens
to a nocturne of clear stars
serene over the shot spray
of northern lights.
The steel mill sky is alive.
The fire breaks white and zigzag
shot on a gun-metal gloaming.
Man is a long time coming.
Man will yet win.
Brother may yet line up with brother:
This old anvil laughs at many broken hammers.
There are men who can't be bought.
The fireborn are at home in fire.
The stars make no noise,
You can't hinder the wind from blowing.
Time is a great teacher.
Who can live without hope?
In the darkness with a great bundle of grief
the people march.
In the night, and overhead a shovel of stars for keeps, the people
march:
"Where to? what next?"
Nick, it could get worse. "Busted for wearing a peace T-shirt; has this country gone completely insane?"
Mike Ferner | July 5 2006
Friday afternoon, drinking a cup of coffee while sitting in the Jesse Brown V.A. Medical Center on Chicago's south side, a Veterans Administration cop walked up to me and said, "Okay, you've had your 15 minutes, it's time to go."
"Huh?" I asked intelligently, not quite sure what he was talking about.
"You can't be in here protesting," Officer Adkins said, pointing to my Veterans For Peace shirt.
"Well, I'm not protesting, I'm having a cup of coffee," I returned, thinking that logic would convince Adkins to go back to his earlier duties of guarding against serious terrorists.
Flipping his badge open, he said, "No, not with that shirt. You're protesting and you have to go."
Beginning to get his drift, I said firmly, "Not before I finish my coffee."
He insisted that I leave, but still not quite believing my ears, I tried one more approach to reason.
"Hey, listen. I'm a veteran. This is a V.A. facility. I'm sitting here not talking to anybody, having a cup of coffee. I'm not protesting and you can't kick me out."
"You'll either go or we'll arrest you," Adkins threatened.
"Well, you'll just have to arrest me," I said, wondering what strange land I was now living in.
You know the rest. Handcuffed, led away to the facility's security office, past people with surprised looks on their faces, read my rights, searched, and written up.
The officer who did the formalities, Eric Ousley, was professional in his duties. When I asked him if he was a vet, it turned out he had been a hospital corpsman in the Navy. We exchanged a couple sea stories. He uncuffed me early. And he allowed as to how he would only charge me with disorderly conduct, letting me go on charges of criminal trespass and weapons possession -- a pocket knife -- which he said would have to be destroyed (something I rather doubt since it was a nifty Swiss Army knife with not only a bottle opener, but a tweezers and a toothpick).
After informing me I could either pay the $275 fine on the citation or appear in court, Ousley escorted me off the premises, warning me if I returned with "that shirt" on, I'd be arrested and booked into jail.
I'm sure I could go back to officers Adkins' and Ousleys' fiefdom with a shirt that said, "Nuke all the hajis," or "Show us your tits," or any number of truly obscene things and no one would care. Just so it's not "that shirt" again.
And just for the record? I'm not paying the fine. I'll see Adkins and Ousley and Dubya's Director of the Dept. of Veterans Affairs, if he wants to show up, in United States District Court on the appointed date. And if there's a Chicago area attorney who'd like to take the case, I'd really like to sue them -- from Dubya on down. I have to believe that this whole country has not yet gone insane, just the government. This kind of behavior can't be tolerated. It must be challenged.
I was at the Jesse Brown V.A. Medical Center because I'm participating in the Voices for Creative Nonviolence's 30-day, 320-mile "Walk for Justice," from Springfield to North Chicago, Illinois, to reclaim funding for the common good and away from war.
Asherman, the word is "ignernt" . . . you don't do your head-in-the-sand, neo-imperialist, rightwing lunatic fringe cause any good when you make basic errors like that.
