American Values

....it happens very seldom

that the Economist is in agreement with Fidel Castro.   But too much is too much, also for the Ultra-liberals from my favourite newspaper.  They criticise explicitely the silly policy of the American government to fancy the production of Ethanol from maize.  This is not ecological, this is against free trade, this is against globalization

Ethanol | Castro was right | Economist.com

The Paper Route

This chapter is mostly about his experiences in the States, but very interesting as an Indian view on the USA

p.69

..My school was 80% "white" when I arrived and 80 percent black" when I left three years later"..
..

p.70
The classroom was filled eith lathes, tools and machines, and we learned to work with our hands. We learned to repair a window, make a table, unclog a sink. At the end of the year , we ha lost our fear of technology.

...

The rich, the poor and the growing gap between them

"AMERICANS do not go in for envy. The gap between rich and poor is bigger than in any other advanced country, but most people are unconcerned. Whereas Europeans fret about the way the economic pie is divided, Americans want to join the rich, not soak them. Eight out of ten, more than anywhere else, believe that though you may start poor, if you work hard, you can make pots of money. It is a central part of the American Dream.

The political consensus, therefore, has sought to pursue economic growth rather than the redistribution of income"

Europe, America , Value Differences

I agree completely with Timothy Garton Ash about the stupidness of constructing a contraposition between good Europe and bad America, or the other way round. But this should not lead to the conclusion that there are no differences of opinions, values and prospects. These differences are not between Europe and America but within both of them . I also feel uncomfortable between the division of the world in " liberal democracies" and the others. ALso within the liberal democracies there is debate about the direction of development.

Happy days are here again—or are they?

For the Americans in the middle, who have no strong partisan allegiances, we have failed to articulate a real plan or vision,” say Markos Moulitsas Zúniga and Jerome Armstrong, two of the most popular Democratic bloggers. “It's not that people know what we stand for and disagree; it's that they have no idea what we stand for,” say James Carville and Paul Begala, two of the architects of Bill Clinton's winning presidential campaign in 1992. The.....On most other issues, people tell pollsters that they prefer the Democrats.

Power Centres

The Americans are so far away from dominating the world. And weapons are completely useless for this goal (see Iraq) The World will develop 3 main power centres. Europe/NearEast/Mediterranean Idian/SouthAsia China/Japan/EastAsia. THere will be two regional power centers, Brazil and Southafrica. The United States will scale more with Regional Power Centres than with the World Power Centres.. The reason for this is both: ideological and economica

Verhaeltnis Deutschland Amerika

Womöglich ist das für Altatlantiker ein noch schlimmerer Schock als für die jetzt in Deutschland regierenden 68er. Joscha Schmierer, ein Freund Joschka Fischers aus linksradikalen Tagen und mittlerweile im Planungsstab des Auswärtigen Amtes, erklärt es so: Der klassische Nachkriegs- und Nato-Atlantizismus hat die Vereinigten Staaten immer bloß als Stabilitätsgaranten betrachtet, er hat „nur das ordnende Moment im Blick gehabt und das revolutionäre übersehen“. George W. Bushs Amerika aber ist keine Status-quo-Macht mehr, sondern eine Kraft der Veränderung, ein weltpolitischer Unruhestifter.

Chomsky on the right wing libertarians

Chomsky: The term libertarian as used in the US means something quite different from what it meant historically and still means in the rest of the world. Historically, the libertarian movement has been the anti-statist wing of the socialist movement. Socialist anarchism was libertarian socialism. In the US, which is a society much more dominated by business, the term has a different meaning. It means eliminating or reducing state controls, mainly controls over private tyrannies. Libertarians in the US don't say let's get rid of corporations. It is a sort of ultra-rightism.

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