![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Entry tags:
Hm, what a lovely combination of headlines...
Schwarzenagger vetoes gay marriage bills.
Oh, and there are still rumors circulating he's running for re-election and possibly later for President because obviously, the last actor we had for President just did such a great job.
Secondly, US image abroad has suffered.
Oh wow. Really? What with the hugest ever mass protests against one person and the fact that 58 percent in the BBC poll see Bush's re-election as a threat to world peace, I would have never guessed that America's actually unpopular now.
This isn't high school. It is not a case of being cool to be uncool. This is a case of a global community, of peer judgment and not of a bully stomping onto the playing field, stomping on the glasses of the geeks and insisting it's because they wreck grade curve so really, bullying them is okay!
Come on people. I lived in Europe. I remember how proud I felt to be able to tell people that I'm American. I remember daydreaming about living in America once I started college.
I don't even know when it was that I started realizing being American was a shameful thing; but I do know it had nothing to do with extra-marital blowjobs and quite a bit to do with someone's idea of diplomacy being to forget the soft words and rely on the big stick.
Oh, and there are still rumors circulating he's running for re-election and possibly later for President because obviously, the last actor we had for President just did such a great job.
Secondly, US image abroad has suffered.
Oh wow. Really? What with the hugest ever mass protests against one person and the fact that 58 percent in the BBC poll see Bush's re-election as a threat to world peace, I would have never guessed that America's actually unpopular now.
This isn't high school. It is not a case of being cool to be uncool. This is a case of a global community, of peer judgment and not of a bully stomping onto the playing field, stomping on the glasses of the geeks and insisting it's because they wreck grade curve so really, bullying them is okay!
Come on people. I lived in Europe. I remember how proud I felt to be able to tell people that I'm American. I remember daydreaming about living in America once I started college.
I don't even know when it was that I started realizing being American was a shameful thing; but I do know it had nothing to do with extra-marital blowjobs and quite a bit to do with someone's idea of diplomacy being to forget the soft words and rely on the big stick.
no subject
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_of_the_United_States#Requirements_to_hold_office
even though some people disagree with it. *shrug* It's not going to change anytime soon with our dear baka no kimi in office.
no subject
It's true. Some friends of mine and I have already discussed the possibility and why it wouldn't happen. Pity, too. I was thinking his re-election camptaign would be all "Ahll be bauk!"
Heh heh.
no subject
And if I'm not mistaken, the protest was against the Iraq War, not Bush. Not that many of the protestors wouldn't protest against Bush as well.
no subject
no subject
The whole topic made me think about when I was on the Greyhound bus on the way to or back from Illinois; there were two Americans sitting behind me, talking about the war. One was in the Army, and the other was a random girl he had met on the bus, and they were both bashing Bush and the war. My favourite part of what they were saying was when the girl said 'I sometimes think that other countries must think we're insane...I mean, really, what must they think', or something along those lines. Well yes. Quite.
no subject
I love that. Can I repost in an entry, crediting you of course? XD
no subject
Ooh, and you were in my dream last night...I was in some sort of play or group, I think, and you'd come and spend time with me during intervals...and then you went off with Numa and I had to work again...er yeaaaaaaaah.
no subject
AWWWWWWW! *adores you!* That's so cute. I'm missing you so much; studying for bio makes me think of us down by the lockers, remember?
no subject
no subject
no subject
Being an American isn't a shameful thing. Never has been. Never will be. Any more than it would be to be Chinese, where the government FORCES abortions on people who have too many children, or to be from Turkey, where the government does things mentioned in prior posts of yours.
There are only two groups of people who need to be ashamed right now, I think: the US Government and those who still blindly insist that Bush is doing everything right. The rest of us can and SHOULD be ashamed of what they're doing, supposidly in our name.
But to be ashamed of being American? Bah. Never. If, for no other reason, because I come from a country which has had 231 years of perfectly peaceful changes of power, where I can say that I am pissed off at the government and damn glad Bush can't run again, where one of the big debates right now is if the 2008 race for president is going to be between Hillary Clinton and Condoleeza Rice...
The fact of the matter is that for all Bush's screw-ups, and ooooooh are there many, he's DONE in three years. And, next year are the mid-term elections for congress and Bush has almost ASSURED the Democrats will take back congress, meaning he won't be able to get anything done. And he's proven time and time again he won't use the bully-pulpit to make his case, so come next November, he is effectively powerless.
The Continental Congress wasn't a bunch of idiots. If anybody fucks up as badly as Bush did, all they will do is castrate themselves because that's the way things were designed. It really does make politics survival of the fittest where even the top of the political food chain isn't safe. And that is a thing of beauty.
no subject
Honestly, I'd be ashamed to be Chinese or Turkish either. I hate the idea of having to associate myself with a country that can behave so shamefully. I'm a patriot. I want to be proud of my country. I want a country worth being proud of.
The rest of us can and SHOULD be ashamed of what they're doing, supposidly in our name.
Agreed. One of the few things that makes being an American decent is the ability to say "I'm American, yeah, but part of the fifty percent that didn't vote for Bush."
We lost outside sympathy when he got re-elected. The first time was a joke, and everyone knew that Bush had lost the popular vote. They felt sorry for America. The second time, after four years of having him in power and seeing what he could and STILL voting him in? Sorry. No pity there. As far as the world is concerned, we brought it upon ourselves. We voted for him, and now we're stuck with him, and that's devastatingly unfair to the fifty percent that didn't want to be run by an idiot who's trying to prove he can 'president' just as well as his father did.
If anybody fucks up as badly as Bush did, all they will do is castrate themselves because that's the way things were designed.
But in the meantime, he's fucking the country over, and it's a lot harder to reverse laws, especially recent laws, than it is to make them. Take the Patriot Act for example; do you really think that whoever comes after him is going to declare it void? He's destroyed America's reputation overseas, made us seem like a country of idiots and extremists, and chips away at basic rights as well as closing the separation between the church and the state. Yeah, he'll be gone in three years, but he'll have been in command for eight.
Eight years is an awfully long time; people can do a lot of damage in eight years.
no subject
Agreed on all accounts, however, there is not one single country that has ever NOT behaved in some horrificly shameful way. We just happen to be witnessing the US do it now. Doesn't make it right, it just means that I don't think it's worthy of saying I'm ashamed to be American.
Except that we don't elect presidents based on popular vote, so that is an irrelivant point.
Yeah, I do. I think that MOST Americans find it to be bullshit, and I think that since the Democrats are going to, I firmly believe, control the congress and presidency next time, I think the Patriot Act will be finished.
Well, and how is that untrue? Seriously, on the whole, I think that describes most of the country. I'll bet it's fairly accurate for the rest of humanity.
While, on the whole, I do agree with your sentiments, it's the conclusion that they lead you to I respectfully disagree with. And I do mean that I respect your opinion. I just don't feel the same. :)
no subject