h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

you guys do make a good spot of tea thats for sure!!

lol thats what i was thinking sa i typed it

ah, i'll defer to the americans on matters of coffee though

>>About Americans - of course there cant be blanket judgements - but I really still am curious how it is that the rest of the world is now clear that the war was all about the Bushes and the oil - how is it that that is tollerable to Americans?
Its been very positive to see a lot of debate coming through on American TV series' etc arround this topic - but from the sidelines . . . I guess we're just unclear how this situation was even allowed. I confess I'm still baffled. First Vietnam and then Irak - how does a population allow this kind of thing twice in a few decades?

I think its that that we really dont understand - how the government has been allowed to get away with all this . . . and remember - we dont get reports of any protests really - all we see in the international press is Americans supporting the whole process. So we're baffled.<<

guess what... we are too (americans). baffled. and frightened too. freaked out is more like it. basically somehow we have lost democracy here... if we ever really had it. lost the ability to choose what our government does. and evidently you guys are having problems too ... if youre getting news feeds only of americans supporting what bush and his cabal are doing in the world. because thats biased reporting and we are protesting...

Mmmm long-dead thread revival.

As I said w-a-a-a-y back at the start, I know some very nice Americans and their mother's. &

America as a concept, as a place as a political entity or whatever comes in for a lot of flack, some deserving but none ever proove that there is 'somethgin wrong' with America because most stands are not objective their are relatively dislocated.

I think therefore America is often misunderstood (in part explaining this conversation) For example the point about passports is fair, until you realise just how vast America as a country actually is and that one need never feel compelled to board a plane to tour some far flung city in Europe of further afield for some exorbitant cost when you could spend a lifetime exploring internally.

How we in Britain can be mystified at the American obsession with the car, until you realise outside of major cities public transport is next to extinct, what there is is remarkably poor and the tax and community zoning laws mean things tend to be very far away from each other not within easy walking distance. The collective fiefdom of state and federal operations make for confusing examples because local specifics vary so wildly, but with the caveat in place, don't assume that 'not taking the car' mean that busses or even pavements are automatically available.

This point of view that sees the mitigating factors, however it neither diminsihes my capacity for disgust or contempt or dislike for their government's foreign policy; the apparently casual abrogation of human rights which in which Britain has become increasingly complicit. But there are many ills in this world, and oh how I wish we would do away with all of them but we do not serve ourselves to look at America and chuckle into our sleeves because our goverment's are in some ways as bad and our history littered with examples as horrifying.

Which brings me back to my point about relative societies, they do things differently there. Boy does it show soemtimes, but it doesn't make them as a gestalt whole somehow 'wrong'

i may be wrong here, but i think the "international community" will see the american president as a true representative of the whole country, (now i appologise if your a bush supporter, im guessing your not)but a dumb warmonger isn't a great national image.

(at least when brittan was doing its dumb warmongering we did it in style, and didn't pretend we were doing it in the name of freedom)

(when i say "we" i mean the victorians)

don't worry yourself, if you were to come over here you wouldent get stoned or abused or anything. the words on an internet forum are not the veiws of the nation

wow

i like what you said clive. and well said too. im not fully awake but i got it!

please, gloaming, when i said earlier that we americans dont like what our government is doing... i admit i said it with trepidation... think about it... how does a takeover group do it? here, it was Kent state and a series of assassinations and questionable deaths of movers and shakers. and its still going on. they do it by intimidation and threats of violence to your own personal life. its not pretty. im even scared to post that here actually. im ashamed of being a coward. really, perhaps this is too heavy to talk about eh?

well, if that happend in brittan im pretty sure we'd be up in arms about it.

seriously, if thats the case, i recommend you leave.

i don't see why we need to argue about what's wrong with yanks or brits when there's something everyone can agree on:

what's wrong with AUSTRALIANS!!

Seriously, people should surely be judged on who they are, not where their passport says theyre from......

...And Britain isnt spelt Brittan......... *sigh*

hey, you're right,
it is spelt Britain.

oops

(i also agree with you're main comment)

I so enjoyed reading the last 27 postings - some of you chaps (and chapettes) are really funny .

Thanks for the input on Americans who feel its "all wrong" - I was hoping there really were a few of those. And yes, we do see Bush as the elected "representative" of your Nation (democracy and all - doubly so as he got elected TWICE).

We recently had a program interview here with a chap who wrote "Confessions of a Economic Hit man". In essence his book is about his job for 15 years - which was in essence to go arround the world, creating instability through corruption or the installment of loans that a country could not hope to repay, and then when the country got into trouble, to swoop in for the "Global Conglomerates" and buy up the mineral rights in those countries. He speaks of how Sadam Hussien started out as a CIA employee (hitman) 20 years ago and got elevated to head of the country by the US when that country destabilised. But then he stopped "playing ball" and got "greedy". Anyhow it was a real eye-opener - but the comment that stuck with me was his statement that:
"The most brilliant move of one Global Corporation was to get their CEO elected as the President of a globally dominant country" - and the program flashed to an image of Bush.

I'm starting to think that all we can really know clearly is that politics and economy is all smoke and mirrors and it would be fabulous if the real residents of this planet could take back its rulership" (if they ever had it - or for the first time if they havn't).

But Americans do need to understand that most of the rest of the world does hold a perception that they're just a war-mongering nation - and somehow, its got to be up to the American people to change that (democracy again).

The Brits are just daft but its obviously a successful kind of daft- whatever the locals complain about, its one of the nices countries to live in (in comparison with others arround the world). Crime, poverty, desperation is at least minimalised. I never can quite get my head arround the classist, racist stuff there tho. SA has fairly straight-forward social dynamics, but the UK?? Goodness I simply couldn't work out - why is it these people dont like those again???
And at least there's still ENERGY there, I mean the population still gets loudly abusive if the government does something they dont like . .

Every nation has its highs and lows I guess, we can all learn from each other. I reconn its about being citizens of the planet . . and look at what's good for all of us on this rock, not just a few. . . . we might be surprised at how much good that does.

Keep at all! This is a most fun thread

Keep passing open windows



Kosh

gw bush was not elected... either time. democracy is a myth here. our country has been taken over. (when? i have no idea.) maybe what we are seeing is actually a breakdown in their ability to keep that knowledge secret. personally, i think they just dont think its necessary to keep it secret anymore... which is pretty scary. furthermore bush is not a dumbie. that is part of the... act. and if you know anything about usa or california politics you would know that arnie wasnt voted in either.

yes there were alot of people here in the usa who seemed to buy into it and be gungho bush... i think that is a symptom of the beating our education system has taken in the last 40 years. our education system has been deliberately undermined... why? because an ignorent populace is easier to control. also, they get their soldiers (and this is no news to anyone anywhere its been going on since the dawn of time) from a populace they have brought to its knees economically. thing is now they dangle the carrot of education in front of those poor suckers to get em to join up.

im not saying anything everyone doesnt know already. im not even saying it well. but please... understand... we are as freaked out by all this as you and trying to figure out what to do. the thing is you see.... the thing is they KNOW we wont do anything ugly or wrong about it... that we will do the ethical thing. which takes time. and they think we are fools.

I thought this thread was gone...

what's wrong with americans?

- they let schools being overwhelmed by relious groups.

- Why the hell they have electoral colleges??????? shouldn't the people decide the president and that's it?!?!

- They have a middle country space full of ignorant rednecks!!!

- They don't know what happens to tax-payers money. Yesterday i saw 60 minutes and it was incredble: 800 million dollors spent in a useless coast guard boat. Money distributed between currupted officials and company CEO, and the the congress auditors couldn't do a thing!

- America and all world polititians(recently i am trying to think that the nordic countries are the less corrupt) are a bunch of imcompetent fulls, that live and propagate corruption! h2g2 ppl should be elected for pairlments :P

I find it very sad that this thread has returned. I do not find it in any way enjoyable.

Some of you may remember that I have tried very carefully here to emphasize the distinction between the people of the U.S. and the Government (and Government policies) of the U.S.

Strangely, there have been times that I have been shouted down as 'un-American' for criticizing U.S. government policies after carefully making the above-mentioned distinction.

Oh, well.

I realize now that perhaps in the past I have not been as emphatic as I should have been concerning the apalling ignorance of so many in the rest of the world concerning the particular challenges facing citizens of the U.S. who strive for change and reason. It is appalling that denizens of the internet can continue in their ignorant vision of the U.S. as a monolithic mass of jingoistic Bush support when so much of the English language internet is populated by sites hosting U.S. voices crying out in dissent. I recommend that non-U.S. surfers turn away from FoxNews and spend some time with Truthout, Newshounds, the Memory Hole , any of the thousands of other U.S. sites which show that so many Americans are not redneck, gun-toting, Republican, Arab waterboarders. Try spending a bit of time with NPR (government funded) or with Keith Olberman (on a big commercial network).

Sure, the U.S. education system has produced a couple of generations of people ignorant about the world. What excuse does the rest of the world have for its ignorance about the U.S.?i

Why is there an Electoral College? Google. Not only will you find out why it was there in the first place, you'll also find out why, despite strenuous efforts, it has been so difficult to replace. The same goes for most of the complaints that can be made about the U.S. If you have questions, frustrations, angers about things American, find out about them, understand them.

By no means, however, sinply accept them.

Understand in order to influence and improve.


This all from an individual who, as has been mentioned before, considers the Government (and its ancillaries) to be the greatest threat in the world to my country and its way of life.


'Better to light a single candle than to curse the darkness'




Now, that having been said, here's what I think is truly the gravest thing wrong with too many citizens of the U.S.:

'Americans just aren’t gullible enough to believe that they came from a fish' http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14122311/

"Some of you may remember that I have tried very carefully here to emphasize the distinction between the people of the U.S. and the Government (and Government policies) of the U.S."
-- If you think those things about your government: revolt.

- People of certain culture and geographical place MAKE the country they live in!

You sound like the "government people" are diferent from the others... if you talk in terms of better education and more economic power than most of the population that is correct. Vote for reasonable people then. Who don't like lobbies for example. If you don't like any of the candidates for president: try to be you the next candidate or at least make part in the running election of one you like. There is always a way to have a part in politics (democratic ones).

The "Greens" party are an emerging force in many countries of this world. New Democracy parties are becoming more and more commom. (minorities, i know, but a start for variety and social expression).

I must express that i admire america in many ways. The liberal culture, the multiplicity of different races and cultures,... But this recent years i think U.S.A is starting to need to take care of what it is doing.

Has for liberal tv shows i must say that i love the Daily News with john Stweart (hope i got it well righten)

peace

'Americans just aren’t gullible enough to believe that they came from a fish'

Sadly, many do seem gullible enough to believe lunatics such as Ken Ham

' If you think those things about your government: revolt', etc.



I never said a thing about *my* government, Kandarian. In case you didn't notice that big red maple leaf right at the top of my PS, I'm Canadian.

ZOMGOrzz! Teh problem with America is GWB is a dicktator and that he wnts to nuke Iraki kids and they r all redneks and dont no about teh rest of teh world!

Or conversely, what's wrong with people round here? This seems to be a mishmash of anti-Bush and anti-USA sentiment mixed in with some huge sweeping generalisations. Oh, and some truly eye-watering typing.

It's a country of 200 million plus people, spanning a few timezones and comprising 50-odd self administrating states. How can people generalise about that?