Not everyone hates Obama. He's made and/or supported some rather controversial changes to national policy regarding health insurance, same-sex marriage, etc. This has made a very vocal minority very angry, and they like to yell about him every chance they get. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not his biggest fan either, but I still respect him for trying to help the people who formerly didn't have much of a chance in this country.
To me, I cannot fathom a country where everyone doesn't have access to basic healthcare, hospital services, schools and colleges and basic access to welfare.
The way I see it everyone has a right to access basic human necessities and even though it is in no way perfect in its current form, it is a lot better than nothing at all.
The U.S. has a few issues that seem to be very deeply set in their psyche. For Australians, it's booze. A lot of people here will drink until they're unconscious. They get into drunken brawls, they glass each other. It's more common among the younger people but it is a problem. For the U.S. it's guns. The obsession with owning and carrying them when owning and carrying them is only exacerbating the problem.
You have bigger guns so the police get bigger guns. You think, oh no, the neighbor has a bigger gun so I'll get a bigger gun. What if a random guy breaks in and he has a bigger gun? What if there is a group? I'd better get 11 pistols 4 assault rifles a shot gun and a sniper rifle and stash them around my house and car. Meanwhile the police have gotten tanks because they don't know how heavily armed the next criminal is going to be. . .
It's an arms race among your own citizens and government agencies. If I lived in the U.S. and wanted to go on a crime spree I could wait until people go to work and break in. What are the odds I'd find a gun to steal? Even breaking into cars. Ton's of people keep pistols in their cars?!
EDIT: /Rant/ And don't even get me started on gay marriage. That's a basic human right. Who someone else marries is their own business and absolutely none of anyone elses. The Government isn't the moral guardians of peoples love lives and the Church, don't even make me laugh. The Church has no right to be the moral compass of a burrito stand after what its been up to the last few thousand years. /Rant/
It's down to theology. Many fundamentalist Christians in the US buy into a doctrine called "prosperity theology". The believe that wealth is a blessing from God. If you are blessed by God (i.e. rich) you must be a good person, and if you aren't (i.e. poor) it must be because you are a bad person. Ergo, it is wrong to help the poor because they are being punished by God. To help them would be to go against God's will.
It's amazing how popular theology becomes when it tells people what they want to hear...
what you've described is more like mainstream calvinism, and prosperity theology is something much more specific - it's god giving you literal money (after you donate, of course...)
Well my president Jacob Zuma has done it again. He has managed to top his previous record of stupidest thing that's possible for a president to do. The last incredibly stupid thing he did was have sex with a HIV positive women"she charged him with rape, but he was acquitted. It was probably rape.", while wearing no protection, then proceeding to take a shower to stop himself from catching the disease. Now he has met with Omar al-Bashir the president of Sudan to strengthen ties between our two countries. The problem is Omar al-Bashir is a war criminal wanted everywhere in the world besides Sudan. The man is genocidal fascist madman and we are getting into bed with him. Why in the nine hells would any politician in their right mind be seen in the same city as Bashir? Let alone publically dealing with the man, it's like he wants us to be on every bodies shit list.
Well, I'm Danish. Apparently there are rumours going around world wide that we treat refugees from Syria worse than our dogs. Because we've refused to take the quotas the EU have recently proposed (because we've already taken in more than that quota demands, even before they started talking about quotas). And we also have a derogation against common European immigration- and asylum-laws as well.
We've especially taken a beating from Germany and Sweden over the last 5 years or so every time our politicians have debated the need for reinstating border control. The rhetoric from our two closest neighbours has consistently been along the lines of "Even thinking it automatically earns you the honorary title of "The Scum Of Humanity", you savages". That's rich, coming from Germany... errrhhh, moving on.
Now the politicians in Sweden are talking about reinstating border control in Sweden, and Germany has already done exactly that. European politics are bizarre, and the people who run that circus even more so.
But I suspect that's part of the job description for politicians in general. Both on a national and continental level...
"Even thinking it automatically earns you the honorary title of "The Scum Of Humanity", you savages". That's rich, coming from Germany... errrhhh, moving on.
You should check your calendar , it's 2015, not 1933
"Even thinking it automatically earns you the honorary title of "The Scum Of Humanity", you savages". That's rich, coming from Germany... errrhhh, moving on.
You should check your calendar , it's 2015, not 1933
I did. You should check pretty much everything official from Germany and Sweden about what kind of people consider border control the last couple of years or so. In their mind, that is.
Nietzsche was right, eternal return exists, history is doomed to repeat itself I LIKE HOW our voivode literally let the nazis have an anti-immigrant demonstration in the center of the city even though it got banned by it's president
You have to be stupid to become a politician. Any intelligent person would realise that running a country was beyond thier abilities.
Or desperate, I guess. I've always considered congressman my fallback career. Move to one of those districts here some complete buffoon has been running unopposed for years and seem mildly competent for the first three months. Easy money.
It's down to theology. Many fundamentalist Christians in the US buy into a doctrine called "prosperity theology". The believe that wealth is a blessing from God. If you are blessed by God (i.e. rich) you must be a good person, and if you aren't (i.e. poor) it must be because you are a bad person. Ergo, it is wrong to help the poor because they are being punished by God. To help them would be to go against God's will.
It's amazing how popular theology becomes when it tells people what they want to hear...
Yeah, like no one actually believes this. Not a single person I have ever met
Yeah well, one person can't rule a country. That's what a government is for.
Genghis khan did pretty well
If butchering his population and burning down complete cities that didn't listen to his rules is considered "pretty well" then lets go back to the silk road.
Canada can start with the razing of Toronto. No one likes that dirty city anyway.
I did. You should check pretty much everything official from Germany and Sweden about what kind of people consider border control the last couple of years or so. In their mind, that is.
Dont know what you're getting at. What people? Why are border controls in such a situation a bad thing ? (denmark ceased the train route to germany for days, in angst of additional people coming over )
The politicians probably doesnt do the best job possible, but the german people show very much engagement towards the refugees, disregarding the few loudmouths
Moved the conversation from @CaloNord 's wall since I didn't want to clog things up in the comments section. I invite @Anduin@deltago and @wubble as well as Calo to join in.
The whole point of my tongue-in-cheek statement is that all I hear about is how the US is too involved int he affairs of others (which I agree is true) but no one seems to have a problem talking about US domestic policy (which has little to no effect on anyone else). I didn't like it when Obama lectured the Germans in regards to Greece and I certainly didn't like our "spread democracy in the Middle East" talking points when it came to Iraq, Libya or Egypt. This is why I tried to keep things light and not say much other than ask questions when CaloNord spoke about Australia's PM (though I would hate his immigration policies in the US) and when everyone was talking about the Scottish referendum in prior pages. Not my place to scold.
Anduin is spot on about it being about cultural differences. Guns have been a part of American culture since our countries conception. Most Americans are okay with gun ownership.... but a significant majority of Americans, including myself, also want sensible gun control policies such as background checks and bans on automatic weapons. Unfortunately policy is created by special interest groups and a small minority of highly motivated people.
Comparing New Zealand, which is an island (of what, like five million people) to the US is not persuasive. Many factors lead to gun violence. The US is the largest economy in the world, as multicultural and diverse as anyone save for maybe our neighbors up North, has 13 of the 100 biggest Urban centers in the world (Germany, Canada and the UK have one each) and there has been a war on drugs for quite awhile. The vast majority of our gun crimes occur in major urban centers, usually drug-related and gang-related. These cities are usually poor and segregated. An interesting article I dug up from right after the Sandy Hook shooting highlights this: http://www.citylab.com/crime/2012/12/geography-us-gun-violence/4171/
Memphis is on that list and might be a city many of you never have heard of, but it would actually be the 4th largest urban area in the UK, and is certainly bigger than Auckland. Its not even top 40 in the States.
Drug-related violence just decimates places like that. Our governments war on drugs basically incentivizes violence between the sources of drugs at every level. Its the best thing that has ever happened to the major drug cartels, and the US's close proximity to their bases of operation doesn't help. I don't think people in Europe or in New Zealand appreciate how difficult a task it is to keep out the drug flow from South America. It is a war much more unwinnable than Iraq or Afghanistan. We've been in Iraq for over a decade... we've been fighting the cartels for almost five.
The fact that its so easy to by a gun, and in some cases a semi-automatic one, makes all these problems so much worse. Most gang-related violence happens with illegally purchased weapons, but this is why you need more regulations on dealerships and all gun purchases. The MAIN argument against moderate but necessary gun regulations has been the "slippery slope" argument from many on the right that says "first background checks then they come for our hunting rifles" which is just nonsense (same exact argument used by many on the left with late-term abortion). I find this the problem of using highly emotionally charged incidents like the one in Oregon this week as a catalyst for this conversation, as many people will ignore the political reality that handgun bans will not happen and then stimulate the crazies that buy into the slippery slop argument.
Also, it seems funny that people only care when white college students die, while devastated inner cities go unnoticed.
Anyway, I hope my stream of consciousness and garbled message does a little to inform people who are not policy wonk nerds about the state of the gun debate in the US and gives a little perspective. Hopefully this will show that we in the States are not a bunch of crazy savages ready to exchange lead salvos at the slightest provocation! I have to get back to my studies now but I'd like to see what you all think about this and what your positions are in regards to our policies when I get back.
Comments
The way I see it everyone has a right to access basic human necessities and even though it is in no way perfect in its current form, it is a lot better than nothing at all.
The U.S. has a few issues that seem to be very deeply set in their psyche. For Australians, it's booze. A lot of people here will drink until they're unconscious. They get into drunken brawls, they glass each other. It's more common among the younger people but it is a problem. For the U.S. it's guns. The obsession with owning and carrying them when owning and carrying them is only exacerbating the problem.
You have bigger guns so the police get bigger guns. You think, oh no, the neighbor has a bigger gun so I'll get a bigger gun. What if a random guy breaks in and he has a bigger gun? What if there is a group? I'd better get 11 pistols 4 assault rifles a shot gun and a sniper rifle and stash them around my house and car. Meanwhile the police have gotten tanks because they don't know how heavily armed the next criminal is going to be. . .
It's an arms race among your own citizens and government agencies. If I lived in the U.S. and wanted to go on a crime spree I could wait until people go to work and break in. What are the odds I'd find a gun to steal? Even breaking into cars. Ton's of people keep pistols in their cars?!
EDIT: /Rant/ And don't even get me started on gay marriage. That's a basic human right. Who someone else marries is their own business and absolutely none of anyone elses. The Government isn't the moral guardians of peoples love lives and the Church, don't even make me laugh. The Church has no right to be the moral compass of a burrito stand after what its been up to the last few thousand years. /Rant/
It's amazing how popular theology becomes when it tells people what they want to hear...
I'm quietly sitting in the corner awaiting the age of enlightenment. Hasn't happened yet. . .
South African politics make no sense.
We've especially taken a beating from Germany and Sweden over the last 5 years or so every time our politicians have debated the need for reinstating border control. The rhetoric from our two closest neighbours has consistently been along the lines of "Even thinking it automatically earns you the honorary title of "The Scum Of Humanity", you savages". That's rich, coming from Germany... errrhhh, moving on.
Now the politicians in Sweden are talking about reinstating border control in Sweden, and Germany has already done exactly that. European politics are bizarre, and the people who run that circus even more so.
But I suspect that's part of the job description for politicians in general. Both on a national and continental level...
It's fun-fun reading for the whole family.
I LIKE HOW our voivode literally let the nazis have an anti-immigrant demonstration in the center of the city even though it got banned by it's president
is this what it's like being australian
Canada can start with the razing of Toronto. No one likes that dirty city anyway.
Dont know what you're getting at. What people?
Why are border controls in such a situation a bad thing ? (denmark ceased the train route to germany for days, in angst of additional people coming over )
The politicians probably doesnt do the best job possible, but the german people show very much engagement towards the refugees, disregarding the few loudmouths
'All hail President Huckabee!'
The whole point of my tongue-in-cheek statement is that all I hear about is how the US is too involved int he affairs of others (which I agree is true) but no one seems to have a problem talking about US domestic policy (which has little to no effect on anyone else). I didn't like it when Obama lectured the Germans in regards to Greece and I certainly didn't like our "spread democracy in the Middle East" talking points when it came to Iraq, Libya or Egypt. This is why I tried to keep things light and not say much other than ask questions when CaloNord spoke about Australia's PM (though I would hate his immigration policies in the US) and when everyone was talking about the Scottish referendum in prior pages. Not my place to scold.
Anduin is spot on about it being about cultural differences. Guns have been a part of American culture since our countries conception. Most Americans are okay with gun ownership.... but a significant majority of Americans, including myself, also want sensible gun control policies such as background checks and bans on automatic weapons. Unfortunately policy is created by special interest groups and a small minority of highly motivated people.
Comparing New Zealand, which is an island (of what, like five million people) to the US is not persuasive. Many factors lead to gun violence. The US is the largest economy in the world, as multicultural and diverse as anyone save for maybe our neighbors up North, has 13 of the 100 biggest Urban centers in the world (Germany, Canada and the UK have one each) and there has been a war on drugs for quite awhile. The vast majority of our gun crimes occur in major urban centers, usually drug-related and gang-related. These cities are usually poor and segregated. An interesting article I dug up from right after the Sandy Hook shooting highlights this: http://www.citylab.com/crime/2012/12/geography-us-gun-violence/4171/
Memphis is on that list and might be a city many of you never have heard of, but it would actually be the 4th largest urban area in the UK, and is certainly bigger than Auckland. Its not even top 40 in the States.
Drug-related violence just decimates places like that. Our governments war on drugs basically incentivizes violence between the sources of drugs at every level. Its the best thing that has ever happened to the major drug cartels, and the US's close proximity to their bases of operation doesn't help. I don't think people in Europe or in New Zealand appreciate how difficult a task it is to keep out the drug flow from South America. It is a war much more unwinnable than Iraq or Afghanistan. We've been in Iraq for over a decade... we've been fighting the cartels for almost five.
The fact that its so easy to by a gun, and in some cases a semi-automatic one, makes all these problems so much worse. Most gang-related violence happens with illegally purchased weapons, but this is why you need more regulations on dealerships and all gun purchases. The MAIN argument against moderate but necessary gun regulations has been the "slippery slope" argument from many on the right that says "first background checks then they come for our hunting rifles" which is just nonsense (same exact argument used by many on the left with late-term abortion). I find this the problem of using highly emotionally charged incidents like the one in Oregon this week as a catalyst for this conversation, as many people will ignore the political reality that handgun bans will not happen and then stimulate the crazies that buy into the slippery slop argument.
Also, it seems funny that people only care when white college students die, while devastated inner cities go unnoticed.
Anyway, I hope my stream of consciousness and garbled message does a little to inform people who are not policy wonk nerds about the state of the gun debate in the US and gives a little perspective. Hopefully this will show that we in the States are not a bunch of crazy savages ready to exchange lead salvos at the slightest provocation! I have to get back to my studies now but I'd like to see what you all think about this and what your positions are in regards to our policies when I get back.