My brother and mother have an opinion about America

[MrL_JaKiri]

Originally posted by Structural Integrity

And because that whole sodding foreign policy is fecked up, and America only displays arrogance and idiocy (movie stars running for governor? cmon!) towards the outside world, people start to hate the country and it's inhabitants.

''''''RONALD REAGAN'''''

[Radical Edward]

where facts are few, experts are many.

[JonnyBGood]

All the Americans I know personally are pretty ****ing a) stupid or b) irritating. That's about 7 or 8 people.

[Iceaxe]

Considering there are about 200-300 million people in America its pretty arrogant to judge all Americans by the few you know.... (not aimed necessarily at you jonny since you're not labeling all Americans in your post)

And who's to say actors can't be good politicians too? (That said it doesn't mean I support Arnold, heh).

[JonnyBGood]

Originally posted by Iceaxe
Considering there are about 350 million people in America its pretty arrogant to judge all Americans by the few you know.... (not aimed necessarily at you jonny since you're not labeling all Americans in your post)

This was aimed at someone earlier in the thread you said you should only judge americans by those you actually know. I was pointing out that'd be rather stupid if you met your first american and didn't like him.

[queball]

When did the population of America balloon to 350 million?

[Iceaxe]

Whether its 250 or 350 million is irrelevant to my point....

[Structural Integrity]

Originally posted by Iceaxe
Considering there are about 200-300 million people in America its pretty arrogant to judge all Americans by the few you know.... (not aimed necessarily at you jonny since you're not labeling all Americans in your post)

And who's to say actors can't be good politicians too? (That said it doesn't mean I support Arnold, heh).

Right... what do you expect people to do then? Come over to the US and shake hands?
Your president is the person foreign people see as representative of your country.
Your foreign policy is what foreign people see as how the US thinks of them.
What the media presents to us is what we see from life in the US.

When I see a news bulletin I see a fool representing your country.
When I see your foreign policy I see you undermining foreign governments and being very aggressive towards some countries.
When I see what the media is showing us of the US, I see a load of nonsense and idiocy.

Now, you can point your finger at the rest of the world for being arrogant, but in my opinion, expecting the random Joe to investigate what the US is REALLY about is just naive.
Don't you think it's the task of the US government and media to reflect the US as a steady and reasonable country with nice and reasonable inhabitants?

[Salt]

It's quite amusing to see people blaming America for their own country's economic woes. Obviously if Americans are all stupid/greedy/ignorant/etc then doesn't that make your country rather foolish for depending on people like these for your economic success?

[wu_trax]

Originally posted by Salt
It's quite amusing to see people blaming America for their own country's economic woes. Obviously if Americans are all stupid/greedy/ignorant/etc then doesn't that make your country rather foolish for depending on people like these for your economic success?

look, it quite simple: all world wide economies depend on each other. if now the biggest one of these has a problem they all are affected.

[Salt]

I don't deny that all world economies depend on each other to some extent. However, there is no one that forces you to do a majority of your business with the US.

[wu_trax]

Originally posted by Salt
I don't deny that all world economies depend on each other to some extent. However, there is no one that forces you to do a majority of your business with the US.

actually, we dont. it still has some influence if there arent other markets to compensate though.

[Archi]

Heh heh it is a matter of simple greed. America is the largest consumer in the world. The only markets that are comparable are Russia, China, and India however the consumers in those countries dont have the capital for the consumer goods that make the world go around (yet).

In other words if the rest of the world wasnt trying to make a buck off of us we wouldnt be having this conversation. When the almighty American consumer stops buying the whole world feels the pinch (the Great Depression is a prime example). If say, the German or British economies tanked it would cause a ripple but would have no lasting effect on the U.S. Needless to say this does put a bee in the bonnet of many countries that have no choice but to rely on American economic stability to keep their own economies afloat.

This is especially true since Sweden rejected the Euro (the biggest currency in competion with the U.S. atm) and now it seems Denmark and the UK will reject it as well (unless I am reading the BBC page wrong).

[wu_trax]

this is pretty much true. (although the EU and Japan are a much bigger markets than china or russia right now)
if your country would manage to sell some goods here we wouldnt have this conversation neither. but unfortunatly it doesnt and wont be able to do so in the near future, because china fixed its exchangerates and thus ALWAYS has a competitive advantage to us-companies.
now this means the dollar will went down the toilet as soon as the us isnt able to attract enough foreign invesments to balance the amount of money it consumes too much.
this results in recession in the trading partners of the us and gives an advatage to us-companies (well, it would, if there wasnt china (and the rest of asia, which basicly does the same thing, although by other methods))
good for the us? no, because there now is noone left to buy their goods anymore.

now follows either protectionism all around the world or a global depression / deflation and the whole story. but no matter what will happen it will result in dropping standas of living for everyone and there is nothing that can be done about it.

[JonnyBGood]

Originally posted by Archi

There are 300 million people using the euro currently. There are 292 million people in the USA. If the EU tanked the USA would be ****ed. If the USA tanked the EU would be ****ed.









PS Worst pissing contest ever.

[queball]

When did the EU population drop to 300 million?

[wu_trax]

Originally posted by queball
When did the EU population drop to 300 million?

i think that happened when uk decided not to join the euro.

[queball]

Oh, I get it. Still, I think we'd do ok without the US.

[wu_trax]

Originally posted by queball
Oh, I get it. Still, I think we'd do ok without the US.

on the long run, probably, but the short term effects would be quite extreme.

[Tactitus]

Originally posted by Structural Integrity
Right... what do you expect people to do then? Come over to the US and shake hands?

Sure. Come on over!

And Americans should go over there too.

I think face to face communication is still the best way to understand other people. I don't trust governments or media to accurately represent my opinions or anyone elses; and I don't think you should either.

Of course, few have the time or money to travel extensively and we all have to rely on media and governments for information. But they are imperfect and they all have their own limitations and agendas. They never give you the whole story.

[JonnyBGood]

Originally posted by Tactitus
I think face to face communication is still the best way to understand other people. I don't trust governments or media to accurately represent my opinions or anyone elses; and I don't think you should either.

I just thought of the Americans I've met on holidays to Ireland.



"Oh my god, you speak English!" is perhaps one of the greatest comments I've ever heard.

[queball]

Originally posted by JonnyBGood
I just thought of the Americans I've met on holidays to Ireland.



"Oh my god, you speak English!" is perhaps one of the greatest comments I've ever heard.

Were they upset they wasted their money on Teach Yourself Gaelic books?

[Archi]

When I traveled around Germany I had a blast. The people were all nice to me (except for one that I wanted to thump on). People bought me drinks wherever I went it seemed. So I think you have a point there about face to face exchange of ideas, and not relying on media to make your decisions about a country.

Speaking of media. I have been hitting the BBC website a lot lately and the antics of Berulsconi have made me chuckle. So I guess the U.S. isnt the only political circus in town

[JonnyBGood]

Originally posted by queball
Were they upset they wasted their money on Teach Yourself Gaelic books?

To be honest I'm not sure what they were thinking. I guess one can't fault their inductive reasoning. In Europe Norwegians speak Norwegian, the English speak English, the french french, the spanish spanish. Ah well, on the bright side of things some of them think we're a third world country and aren't surprised by the shoddy merchandise we horrendously overcharge them for.

[HobbieRogue4]

Originally posted by MrL_JaKiri
I've met three americans.

They've all been tossers.

Does that include ragey?

[meaple]

get over it hobbiepenis

[MrL_JaKiri]

Originally posted by HobbieRogue4
Does that include ragey?

She doesn't count as an american, she's some sort of hybrid welsh thing.

[HobbieRogue4]

Originally posted by MrL_JaKiri
She doesn't count as an american, she's some sort of hybrid welsh thing.

I disagree. It's not as if one cannot be a citizen of two nations (joke joke!).

[Intrepid00]

Originally posted by Marilyn Manson
Oh, do be quiet. Hayek was spouting off this sort of emotional ideological argument regarding immediate collapse and doom half a century ago. Instead we had several decades of complete prosperity.

Try and base your predictions on reality and not on the predicted ideological inevitability of something, eh?

I don't know, the fiscal reports for the US welfare shows its going to collapse, but don't worry. We saved it so now you don't get your money till your 65+ and when its my turn I am sure it will be 75+.

Goody, I put in thousands and thousands of dollars over a lifetime to collect a 1/3 of it. **** this, I could invest that large chunk of change out of my pay better.

Nodrog proably has the same viewpoint on this. Its like your pissing a bucket to fill it but it has a hole in the bottom:/

[wu_trax]

Originally posted by Intrepid00
I don't know, the fiscal reports for the US welfare shows its going to collapse, but don't worry. We saved it so now you don't get your money till your 65+ and when its my turn I am sure it will be 75+.

Goody, I put in thousands and thousands of dollars over a lifetime to collect a 1/3 of it. **** this, I could invest that large chunk of change out of my pay better.

Nodrog proably has the same viewpoint on this. Its like your pissing a bucket to fill it but it has a hole in the bottom:/

now imagine this:
you save money on your own and invest it in stocks. once you are 65 you sell these stocks. but, unfortunatly, at that time lots of people turn 65 and want to sell their stocks. result: prices drop and you dont get much more than now :/.

[Tactitus]

Originally posted by wu_trax
now imagine this:
you save money on your own and invest it in stocks. once you are 65 you sell these stocks. but, unfortunatly, at that time lots of people turn 65 and want to sell their stocks. result: prices drop and you dont get much more than now :/.

Well you shouldn't be heavily invested in stocks at age 65. As you approach retirement, you should be transitioning to investments that concentrate on capital preservation and avoiding the higher growth/higher risk investments.

[wu_trax]

well, everything becomes 'high risk' if lots of people want to sell it.

[Archi]

Goody, I put in thousands and thousands of dollars over a lifetime to collect a 1/3 of it. **** this, I could invest that large chunk of change out of my pay better.

Heh heh that is exactly what Dubyah wants to do to help maintain the solvency of social security.

Because the big problem is going to be when the baby boomers retire. Since there are more of them than Gen x'ers, the poor gen x'ers are going to get the carp taxed out of them, for the simple reason that they rarely vote. I dont know about the EU, but the Elderly are the largest voting block in the US and both Congress and the president are terrified of upsetting them by pushing back the registration age, or cutting services.

[Intrepid00]

Originally posted by wu_trax
now imagine this:
you save money on your own and invest it in stocks. once you are 65 you sell these stocks. but, unfortunatly, at that time lots of people turn 65 and want to sell their stocks. result: prices drop and you dont get much more than now :/.

Pfft, hardly. People sell stocks every day and turn 65 everyday. Under your theory the stock market would be something along -1000000 points by retirement.

Besides, like someone previsouly said high risk investment is for the you and low risk is for the old.

[Texan]

Originally posted by queball
When did the population of America balloon to 350 million?

Those extra 70 million people are Arab muslims who moved to the United States for a better life. Unfortunately, they were not counted in the last census.:eek:

[Texan]

Originally posted by JonnyBGood
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Ah well, on the bright side of things some of them think we're a third world country and aren't surprised by the shoddy merchandise we horrendously overcharge them for.

All of the Irish people I have met were great. I'm sure there are some ****heads in Ireland, but the ones I met in Germany were all pleasant and friendly. I also admire what Ireland has done with its economy. Certainly, it is a first world country now, but I would not have put it in that category a couple of decades ago.

The Walloons should take a lesson from the Irish. Of course, the Walloons are too arrogant and ignorant to do so. That is my opinion, and I may be wrong.