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U.S. Society is screwed

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knewcleardaze said:
Privatized profits. Socialized losses.

The conservative motto.

53 x 11 said:
I reciently saw some Fox news clips where the prensenter was saying that 'progressives' were nazis, communists.

We might have snakes and spiders in Aus but at least we try not to put retards like this on TV

It's worse than that. There is a large segment of the population that is convinced they are doing holy battle with the forces of evil. That is not an exaggeration. They live in a fantasy world where the forces of socialism are threatening to destroy the American way of life and make Americans slaves of a one world government. This is all wrapped up with kooky religious undertones. The mixture of religion and nationalism is scary.

To make matters worse, all the extremists and conspiracy nutjobs have come out of the woodwork and mixed in so throughly with rightwing causes that their off the wall views have become mainstream conservative thought. Just the other day they marched on Washington, calling black Congressmen n!ggers and threatening gun violence if the healthcare bill is passed. We are witnessing a rebirth of the Ku Klux Klan.

Ob fat food: My favorite Haagen-Dazs flavor. Lehua Honey and Sweet Cream. Mmmmmm.

Lehua_Honey-300pt_000.jpg
 
Jul 11, 2009
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craig1985 said:
Have you ever watched Today Tonight or A Currant Affair?

I have tried to watch them. I find I have to be really, really, really drunk. Then I can get over anger for a while and find it really funny. But they are NOTHING like the stupidity that is coming out of the states. You can ad 60 minutes and Sunday Night to these programmes.

knewcleardaze said:
I've never heard of this Tracy Grimshaw. As per her pics on google, I dunno if it's a bad hair style, she's just plain unattractive, or both?

I think Gordon Ramsey called her a 'Fat Lesbian' in an interview. I thought that was very unfair on Lesbians.

Bro. I had a feeling it was getting that bad. Unfortunately my US news is limited to pbs radio and TV news and they seem to avoid the hysteria so you don’t really get a feel for what is going on.... I also try and aviod internet news for the obvious reasons.

What I can’t work out is why people are so frightened, terrified in fact, that the government wants to care for them, surely this is already going on to different degrees through the military, roads and other infrastructure and education.

I can easy see Edmund Burke (founder of Conservatism) agreeing with the current attempts to establish public health care, it is very obvious that the people who are driving the negative side of this debate have no knowledge of political theory or what the terms they are using actually mean.
 
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craig1985 said:
Because people will have to pay higher taxes? I would have no idea how they would survive in places like Norway, Sweden, and Finland.

Because the way we pay for health care,retirement,college the US taxes look low on the surface
 

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blackcat said:
too many reading Bentham.

What makes America great, is Reb Lodster. It is Michelin Star (three) cuisine. A public option is indeed socialism. Obama is a communist. I would only accept socialized Reb Lodster. A Reb Lodster in every hospital in N America.

The Cheddar Bay biscuits should be part of every school canteen, socialized school meals.

I second that! The Reb lodster is a cornerstone to a nutritional daily intake.
 
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I did an exchange year in the US in the State of Washington and the food they served there in the high school cafeteria was beyond ridiculous.

I also worked at Seattle Mariners games for fundraising and the food we served (hot dogs, nachos, pizza, elephant ears ...) was pretty unhealthy but most of it was good though.

I don't want to start a discussion about Pizza because I know everyone has a different taste, but I could imagine that American Pizza is much unhealthier than European pizza, because there's much less cheese, thinner crust, etc.
(I personally really don't like Papa John's/Murphy's, Domino's, Pizza Hut ...)

In general I often have the impression that for many Americans, food is a necessety, whereas for Europeans it's a hobby. Therefore, Americans try to get it done with as fast as they can, and Europeans spend 5 hours in a restaurant. And therefore, Europeans eat (a little) healthier and of course slower which is good.

(This is of course really stereotypical and I know that there are great, wonderful restaurants in the US where you can sit as long as you want and get great food!)
 
Good post Christian. I think you pretty much got it. But some towns in the US have a growing health-conscious part of the population. In my hometown of Portland there are dozens of healthy food places, many vegetarian or even vegan places, and even one gourmet vegan restaurant that's surprisingly excellent food. The natural health food supermarkets are also very successful here (Whole Foods, Natures, New Seasons, etc.).

To comment on the socialism thing. First, BroDeal touched on something when he wrote:
The mixture of religion and nationalism is scary.
The peculiar thing about this is that the level of nationalism doesn't stretch across borders, or apply to labor or any form of protectionism. The so called ultra-conservatives seem to have no concern about the fact that Saudi Arabia or China or Japan owns huge amounts of real estate in the country, and huge amounts of US currency/debt. They also have no concern at all about the way some Americans and US businesses use foreign tax shelters to avoid paying tax. Or the way many US companies have shipped jobs overseas in order to avoid paying for American workers, etc. Many of these other countries are socialist, communist, or in a case like Saudi Arabia, an Islamic monarchy/dictatorship. Either they strangely don't care, while being rabidly nationalist in the ways you note, or they don't know.

53 x 11 said:
What I can’t work out is why people are so frightened, terrified in fact, that the government wants to care for them, surely this is already going on to different degrees through the military, roads and other infrastructure and education.
Three comments on this. First, I think a lot of anti-government people view items such as infrastructure as a necessary evil. Next, our country is in a huge amount of debt. The only way we can pay for more items is through deficit financing (though it looks like health care overhaul may be a wash). So you end up with people like myself hesitant to have the government spend still more money, when we're already severely in debt.

However, many of the extreme conservatives would like to see most of this privatized as well. Hence, all roads, bridges, stop lights, plumbing, even education, would be built and paid for by individuals as they need it. Those who can't afford it, even to pool their money to have their streets paved, or educate their children are just going to have to work harder or learn how to make more money to afford it, or do without and accept poverty and the fact that working hard at a job where the owner takes in 99% of the income is just the way it is.

Strangely, the idea of unionizing to help wage earners is something the conservatives are adamantly against. Even private unions. They follow the super-wealthy conservatives in a mantra against unions, and against labor, even if they are the labor, and it is against their own financial interest.

craig1985 said:
Because people will have to pay higher taxes? I would have no idea how they would survive in places like Norway, Sweden, and Finland.
This is another peculiar one, as US citizens spend a much higher percentage of their income on health care than most any other nation with "socialized" medicine. They just don't pay it in taxes when paying for others who cannot afford it, they pay for it through insurance, hospital and physician costs. In the most extreme conservative view, some people feel as though the poor and infirm should get no health care if they cannot afford it. And if they can't afford it, that's what they get for not being born with a higher IQ, being more ruthless in life, or born into wealth.

As to taxes, yes people don't want to pay them. But a lot of people don't realize just how little they pay in taxes. This may be the oddest group of people of all. Those who are working poor, and when the tax year is over may only pay 5% of their income to taxes - some paying none at all. Yet they remain completely against all taxes, as if we eliminated all spending, and all taxes, the income they are left with would somehow privately pay for all of the education, health care, infrastructure, justice, military, etc. they currently benefit from.
 
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Christian said:
I did an exchange year in the US in the State of Washington and the food they served there in the high school cafeteria was beyond ridiculous.
I also worked at Seattle Mariners games for fundraising and the food we served (hot dogs, nachos, pizza, elephant ears ...) was pretty unhealthy but most of it was good though.

I don't want to start a discussion about Pizza because I know everyone has a different taste, but I could imagine that American Pizza is much unhealthier than European pizza, because there's much less cheese, thinner crust, etc.
(I personally really don't like Papa John's/Murphy's, Domino's, Pizza Hut ...)

In general I often have the impression that for many Americans, food is a necessety, whereas for Europeans it's a hobby. Therefore, Americans try to get it done with as fast as they can, and Europeans spend 5 hours in a restaurant. And therefore, Europeans eat (a little) healthier and of course slower which is good.

(This is of course really stereotypical and I know that there are great, wonderful restaurants in the US where you can sit as long as you want and get great food!)

Christian-unfortunately you were exposed to the worst of the Northwest. Schools are now taking the high-sugar beverages out of student's lunchtime but they still get revenue from Fast-food franchises that are allowed to sell their product to kids. My son would by a plate of fries and some candy. We made him eat better at home but it was a struggle. Now that he's a parent he suddenly understands...

You did hit it on the head about the cultural differences toward food perception. Americans seem to treat food as a utility or a reward; not an appropriately scaled and paced source of good nutrition. We're all occasionally guilty but this country's approach to food has been marketed into this abuse.
 
Oldman said:
Schools are now taking the high-sugar beverages out of student's lunchtime ..

They are?? A lot of places that are doing this outlaw soda but allow low quality fruit juices that are made by the soda makers. The fruit juices--if you can call a drink made from high fructose corn syrup with fruit flavoring a fruit juice--have a higher caloric density than the soda.
 
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BroDeal said:
They are?? A lot of places that are doing this outlaw soda but allow low quality fruit juices that are made by the soda makers. The fruit juices--if you can call a drink made from high fructose corn syrup with fruit flavoring a fruit juice--have a higher caloric density than the soda.

You may be right on the juices. But the soda makers are responding quickly to what they see as a potential outright ban. The school districts are in a bind for cash so I don't see any heroic adminstrators committing to wholesale improvement to the diet stream just yet. The garbage calories are cheaper and more accessible, plus the schools don't have to do much work.
 
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In all honesty, for all the snakes, spiders, Steve Irwins, and Cadel Evans' threating to behead anybody who dares to step on their dog, I would rather live in Australia then America. Unless I was super rich where I could wipe my backside with a $100 bill and think nothing of it.
 
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And the babes!

craig1985 said:
In all honesty, for all the snakes, spiders, Steve Irwins, and Cadel Evans' threating to behead anybody who dares to step on their dog, I would rather live in Australia then America. Unless I was super rich where I could wipe my backside with a $100 bill and think nothing of it.

Don't forget Olivia, and Nicole, and Dame Edna..... diid I leave anyone out?
 
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craig1985 said:
In all honesty, for all the snakes, spiders, Steve Irwins, and Cadel Evans' threating to behead anybody who dares to step on their dog, I would rather live in Australia then America. Unless I was super rich where I could wipe my backside with a $100 bill and think nothing of it.

Friends who have spent time in your country and New Zealand feel similarly; except that here we have the right to change things in the US. The poor get the bad end of the food chain here, no question. My wife has taught classes for an advocacy group called Operation Front Line on economic food preparation. The low-income class participants are given a budget and schooled on purchasing food selectively and creating a balanced diet from that. They had great results but the underlying lesson for her was that almost none of these adults had an idea what was nutritious. Starting with the school systems we're currently letting Fast Food commercial interests dictate diet, much like letting the drug dealers teach physical education.

As for your indictment of all things American...it is a big country with alot of cultural diversity. Writing off the entire lot based on what you see in your Rupert Murdoch controlled media means you are next...
 
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Alpe d'Huez said:
But some towns in the US have a growing health-conscious part of the population. In my hometown of Portland there are dozens of healthy food places, many vegetarian or even vegan places, and even one gourmet vegan restaurant that's surprisingly excellent food. The natural health food supermarkets are also very successful here (Whole Foods, Natures, New Seasons, etc.).

That is all very true as well! I think that many of the middle class and wealthier families in the US shop in supermarkets that sell good quality and healthy food. By where I lived we had a QFC, a Metropolitan Market and a place called Trader Joe's (I don't know if that is a chain) who sold great stuff. Fred Meyer's also has good things but mostly a lot of not so healthy products. It is cheaper though and that's why many peeople shop there of course, as well as in Wallmart.

I recently read a nice article in a German magazine about the restaurant scene in Portland and it sounded great! I'd say that there are far more vegetarian/vegan places in the US than in Europe. Therefore, the nice-restaurant-to-fast-food-place-ratio is pretty bad in the US. I lived in Tacoma/WA and they also had some really good (but also expensive) places.

Oldman said:
Schools are now taking the high-sugar beverages out of student's lunchtime but they still get revenue from Fast-food franchises that are allowed to sell their product to kids.

Well Coca Cola and all those things were already removed by that time (mind you, this was only 2006/2007), they only had this kind of flavored water; I think the brand's name was Dasani. I didn't like it very much but it wasn't sweet either.

It also took me a while to figure out one main difference in European/American eating habits: I was used to having my main meal for lunch, whereas in the US it's mostly dinner. I think in Europe this is still a tradition from when women had to stay at home and cooked for their husband and children at noon, and so it'll maybe disappear some day.

However the food was still gross. I remember they had hot dogs with fries and slices of pizza (and probably some other similar stuff that I can't remember). Maybe the cafeteria wasn't built or equiped to cook large amounts of good food, but they could still, in my opinion, have made healthy sandwiches for example.

What also sucked was that you were not allowed to leave school grounds during lunchtime; otherwise you could have gone to a nicer place and have gotten a good sandwich.
 
May 6, 2009
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Oldman said:
Friends who have spent time in your country and New Zealand feel similarly; except that here we have the right to change things in the US. The poor get the bad end of the food chain here, no question. My wife has taught classes for an advocacy group called Operation Front Line on economic food preparation. The low-income class participants are given a budget and schooled on purchasing food selectively and creating a balanced diet from that. They had great results but the underlying lesson for her was that almost none of these adults had an idea what was nutritious. Starting with the school systems we're currently letting Fast Food commercial interests dictate diet, much like letting the drug dealers teach physical education.

As for your indictment of all things American...it is a big country with alot of cultural diversity. Writing off the entire lot based on what you see in your Rupert Murdoch controlled media means you are next...

Well TBF Australia is actually know the fattest country in the world (based on per capita, averages, some bull crap).
 
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A quick surf on the interwebz suggests about 10 different candidates for 'fattest' nation, and Australia doesn't feature on some 'top 5' or 'top 10' lists. But we're told we're more than a wee bit chubby these days:

http://nutritionbusinessjournal.com/nutrition-industry/news/0624-fattest-nation-world-who/



Oldman said:
Friends who have spent time in your country and New Zealand feel similarly; except that here we have the right to change things in the US. The poor get the bad end of the food chain here, no question. ..... Starting with the school systems we're currently letting Fast Food commercial interests dictate diet, much like letting the drug dealers teach physical education.

As for your indictment of all things American...it is a big country with alot of cultural diversity. Writing off the entire lot based on what you see in your Rupert Murdoch controlled media means you are next...

Oldman, can you clarify the bits I bolded? Cheers.
 

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