Yep. It's a land of contradictions, no doubt. Some good, lotta bad, hopefully much in transition.

My pride in country took an enormous blow from 2000-2008 (not that I've ever been the flag-waviest fucker in town). For any one of my international Nexus pals the United States may have offended during this time, I apologize. As-salamu alaykum. Kunnen we allemaal gewoon langs?

Forgive me the tiniest bit of optimism that there could be a better tomorrow, though. I'd like to think that it's comin'. Plus, my six-dimensional octupusbird, Charlie received his introduction to spice on inauguration day (no kiddin' - though by no specific design), so he's extra invested (on a purely emotional level) in believing this to be the dawn of a new and improved USA.

Basically the american economy is a lie that was allowed to be created by our politicians because of the us dollar's status as the world reserve currency. We're supposed to print up US dollars send them out for goods and services and receive them back and when we've sent out more than we have that means we've used more goods and services than we've produced and need to regain control of our currency and suffer a recession to start producing enough goods and services for ourselves and then for the rest of the world, regaining control is done by increasing interest rates, less government spending, inflation, letting businesses that make bad investments fail and people lose jobs at companies that need to fail. Instead of all these things happening to allow us to regain control of our currency and allow the free market to begin to flourish again, we bailed out businesses that should've failed, we lowered interest rates, encouraged US citizens to buy things they cant afford, particularly houses. In essence we printed up IOUs to pay off IOUs and the trade defecit of the US is so large now its not even possible for the american people to pay it back. The current situation to maintain this fake econemy and artifically high standard of living is, big banks are borrowing money from the federal reserve at 0% interest and using it to buy up US treaseries that offer like 2% interest or higher.

The dollar is going to fall, interest rates will rise, and inflation will happen, the only question is how soon and to how high a degree.

There are youtube videos of peter schiff, ron paul, and many other economists explaining this.

If you hold US currency you need to get rid of it, buy real commodities or invest in countries who's standard of living has been kept artificially low to support the US artificially high standard of living, particularly china.

What happened to this stance?

^what I meant by that was that I dont trust the Us government simply just becasue he is in power..I did not trust them before and I dont now just becasue some man is in power..reguardless of how good his intention may be or not be..

I did not mean that Its becasue of Obama that I dont trust them.

Obama is just a man. Doesnt change much to me.

I dont know really what you thought I meant WS..did youthink I meant that it was beacuse of Obama that I dont trust theUS government?

That is how it reads...
It seems from the other posts in this thread, that I'm not alone in thinking that is what you meant too.


WS

meh..I'm all over the place today anyway..disreguard my posts..not sure where the hell I stand with obama and US politics.

It doesn't matter where in the world you are. Politics are fuckt and politicians are corrupted and don't know shit what they're doing. The global system is fuckt and I think it's all about to collapse. Politicians don't agree on any subject and can't work out any solutions for any problems. And there are problems stacking up at every nation. And I love it because I hate this system for it's injustice. And the fact that almost every weapon in the world is designed to kill humans. It's a sick world.

There is a large cultural divide in America. There are two camps and its not always divided by party or ethnic lines. One camp is driven by a religious and traditional conservative ideology. The other is not really driven by anything and is very diverse. I can't even classify the rest of America because it is so diverse the culture. But basically I have come to notice that there is normal what I think of as average American's just regular people from any backround who may or may not want the same things but who can tend to get along and want logical improvements in their country and the world.

Then there is this conservative christian movement who really one would like to think is on the fringe but is actually a huge portion of the population (less then half though).

http://www.greenbergresearch.com/index.php?ID=2398

I would recommend the above article. It explains the current wave of opposition to Obama and well progress in general and how its ideologically or culturally driven by a very "special" group of americans.



I used to like Ron Paul but now I am starting to think he is really naive and ignorant. He also promotes anti scientific propaganda. He is a supporter of the journal of american physicians and surgeons which is a fake journal (meaning its not really peer reviewed and its not accepted as such a journal) that promotes things like: anti vaccine rhetoric, denies the link between HIV and AIDS (seriously!), against all healthcare reform, and thinks climate change is a lie. How can I trust a guy who believes in such stupidity about economics? I have read many of the works of people who libertarians parrot like Hayek and Mises whose ideas are interesting and who have made some good points. But its also become apparent that conservatives even misinterpret the economic ideas of those they claim to be following. Its also foolish to accept the claims made by certain authors as facts when in some cases they are rather vague.

Also its important to note that both sides democrat and republican both only tell half the story about the crisis. The republicans only point out how the government messed it up and the democrats only point out how the market messed it up when it was in fact both messing it up and the same time and in cahoots with one another. This kind of rhetoric stops any intelligent discourse on the situation and how to avoid such things in the future and how to get a real economy again.

i think europeans always point their finger at the usa and say how fucked that country is, but as a matter of fact europe is just as bad. Same kind of politicians argueing, driven by ego, fame and money! I mean, this financial crisis is not even digested and bankers, worldwide, are gambling again with other people's money, receiving astronomical boni...the governements worldwide pumped billions of money in the banks about to go bankrupt, and for what:so that they continue this 'casino royal'! we really need a huge change in consciousness...every second kids are dying of starvation in the third world and here we are making and spending money by the billions, just ignoring that the world is dying a bit more every day! Like FE said, maybe Obama has good intentions, maybe he is giving a lot of people hope, so he's definatly creating some positive vibes...and very negative vibes on the other hand. As a president you are with both hands tight to the oil companies, the military, the people...everybody has his opinion,everybody wants his slice of the pie...when you change yourself the world turns out to be paradise, the garden of eden, otherwise it just stays this fucked up place we all have to go true to learn!
i think the best is everybody starts with themselfs because that is something you CAN!

word, teot...

Yes, i don't like anti-americanism.
And i hope that i did not give anybody the impression i am anti-american.
But i'm just worried because i see how powerfull the far-right is over there and that raises concern over the future.

I do not believe that obama is a saviour. But i get the serious impression that there are many people on the far right who would like to kill him, and given the history (jfk, but also oklahoma)that worries me a lot. Also because i don't know what would happen then.

I would not want to see american society collapse into chaos. But what happens if obama actually get's assasinated? And how large is the chance of that happening?

I've lived in both Europe and the USA for most of my life, and I can attest to some of the European hypocrisy towards xenophobia and ignorance in general, I think both have their fair share but it is fascinating how different the places are, it took me a very long time to realise that their were fundamental differences in mentality and you had to understand those before you understood each other... from my experience, I think humans are fundamentally the same.. but the cultural differences are stark, Europeans tend to be more multi cultural just because they are a collection of countries, but you'll hear racism and outright xenophobia towards regions outside of europe, for example, I have heard European's say "American's are racist", now obviously that's laughable because it's a multi-raced nation but beyond that it's outright hypocrisy to label a huge group of people like that, and in Europe there is a huge group of people that don't like immigration despite having signed up to share resources, that's where lack of education and ignorance comes in...

Europeans will complain about gun crime in the USA but the street violence in most of Europe is horrifying. America felt a lot safer and more free to me but there were a lot of stressed out people and I came to realise it's mostly about healthcare and social security in general, and this is another aspect of European misunderstanding, compared to Europe, most American's have virtually no social security, that means your fucked if you lose your job and you don't have any money/somewhere to crash... American's only get 10 days off a year, the work culture is completely different, lot of slavery still going on in the USA in my opinion (workers getting poorer, bosses getting richer), hopefully that will change in the future... but it doesn't suprise me when people go crazy in the USA, it's a tough life despite having more material goods, in some ways that's the problem, but that should be treated with sympathy and respect.

Europe is more down to earth, things are more correctly valued, so you don't end up with too many people getting rich for nothing, I do think the people are more culturally educated, more well versed in general matters, and in many cases have better taste (subjective opinion), but this is probably due to having a more mature culture... one thing I've noticed is that American's are not stupid (some Europeans believe this stereotype), they are more specialised in their thought processes, less generalised.... most American's don't have a passport. I do think Europeans are way too cynical, it's a cultural thing for sure, but I like the American spirit to reach high... sometimes naivety is a good thing, look at children, you don't want them to lose there childlike ignorance too soon.

Oh on the question of far right fundamentalism... it's an interesting one, a lot of it is media hype and the effect of polarisation in general, you can't have right without left after all, so the 2 sides tend to get painted clearly but the statistics show that most American's fall into the centre-left, going lefter but you'd think there were loads of NRA gun touting militiamen red necks running around... it's not like that and their issues are misunderstood as well, especially by Europeans... I think a lot of people look at the constitution gun nuts as crazy, but I don't think most of them are, for them it's a matter of principle, they want ultimate freedom given to them under the constitution and their is a fear that the government can take that away from them, most of them aren't preparing for the apocalypse... and to be honest with you, I can't say I blame them for holding on to principles tightly, because it's easy for a government to create something willingly or otherwise that causes society to collapse, it's happened many times... also you've got to remember a lot of these lines were drawn during the civil war and they've just stayed that way, that's why a lot of people vote republican despite bad candidates, but saying that, democracy kicked in eventually with Bush because he was so bad some of the lines actually got redrawn...

One interesting note, I only ever met 2 bush supporters whilst living on the east coast, and 1 was on the fence, that's out of meeting hundreds of people... doesn't say much, but its a very divided country based on geography.

must be interesting to have lived in europe and the usa...i would love to go to the states to build my own opinion because i must admit that i to still think sometimes in stereotypes about the usa. I think it is really dangerous to generalize...i mean the world is filled with individuals, no matter were you'll travel, tibet, the amazone, angola, hawaii, iceland, everywere you'll find jerks AND good people!I blame the media for a lot of false image building...
Given the history of the usa it wouldn't surprise me when obama gets killed...but i think this would be a very bad publicity stunt for the far right...it would just make the other side much stronger and turn obama into a messias.

I don't like the discussion about Obama assassination, don't get me wrong I think it's mostly being discussed in an adult manner, and I agree it would ultimately have a rebound effect, but you've to remember this kind of thing is a self-fulfilling prophecy and that's why we shouldn't talk about it too much, I've just read it therefore the idea has been planted in my head. If you want an example of this, look at school shootings, in statistics, it's actually verifiable that if a school shooting gets a certain amount of media coverage there will almost certainly be another shooting in a different place that same week... based on that data, most news stations no longer give much coverage to shootings, the mentions are kept to a minimum, it's considered responsible journalism, though some don't practice it... I dunno, maybe FOX

I think it's important to give people the priveledge of an open mind and open heart regardless of what country they were born/raised in.

I've met all kinds of people from all kinds of places and I've never met folk more dumb and close minded than some English folk I have met. Even then it's probably because I've met more english folk than others... and I live near norfolk which according to some journals has a higher concerntration of inbreeding than anywhere in the deep southern states of the USA.

Ignorance can only see ignorance, just remember that. It takes understanding to see true bullshit.

Also if anyone knows of a system of government that's got all the answers then let me know. We've evolved a fair bit but I think as a people we are far from perfection. Politicians are folk just like us, but they learn first hand in the most direct way that politics is "complicated".

teotenakeltje, sorry for honing in on your point but it sparked my interest when you said "I blame the media", it got me thinking about the fact that we mustn't generalise the media either, I think that's another problem with the world, we don't know who to trust any more, I mean, if I run a blog nowadays, technically, I'm then part of "the media", people have lost their sense of authority and leadership, experts aren't allowed to be experts any more, they've got to share the stage with laymen, and somehow we've gotten into this mindset that all things are a matter of opinion.

That's not necassarily a bad thing. It's freedom of speech at full power. It just means now, you can't just agree with folk blindly and have to actually stop, think and follow up before something becomes "knowledge".

It's just a shame that so many folk haven't figured that out yet.

It's the stuff missing that I'm concerned about, like you said not to agree with people blindly, which is true of coarse, but nowadays, you have a sea of information, you also have people manipulating information all over the place, no ones saying don't stop and think, I mean look at the healing thing, natural healing or whatever they're called have their own sets of facts and figures, and guess what, a crazy percentage of people believe their facts and figures over medical sciences... there is nobody there to arbitrate. I guess what I'm really saying if someone really is an expert, they really are an authority on a subject, then they should be given the authority and respect for that given subject... we've gotten into a weird place where even that can questioned... it's tough to describe.

Another example could be a shaman, those guys know their plants better than most organic lab scientists do...

Anti-americanism pisses me of, because in the end we're all humans and we all share the same world.
I like america and i feel that europeans and americans share pretty much the same values.

If my posts where read as prejudiced against americans, then that was realy not my intention. I feel that america is an important country and the world needs a strong america. You see that in the absence of a strong america, immediately all kind of satanic governments like that of iran start making nuclear wheapons, wich is something the world realy doesn't need.

I agree that it's dangerous to talk about the assasination of obama, because of it's possible self-fulfilling effect.
But 1-it's something i realy fear. 2-i have looked on some american far-right forums where people more or less speculate on how fantastic it would be if this would happen, and how much they themselves would like the be involved in it. 3-I believe that we must not look away from evil, because it won't go away that way.

I don't think there is a clear answer to the question "what attitude should we adopt in open democratic society's, towards powers that are essentially undemocratic, that pose a threat to our open democratic society?".
This is a question that aplies to muslim fundamentalism as well as to far-right, as to many other ideologies or organisations.

Ignoring is not a good answer to my believe. But decaring a total war isn't either, since that way we would destroy the open society ourselves.

So as long as there is not a clear answer, i think we should be realistic about there being powers of evil at work in our vulnerable and far from perfect world.