EPTHow do foreigners view US politics? - Page 6
| Forum Index > General Forum |
|
Amestir
Netherlands2126 Posts
| ||
|
misaTO
Argentina204 Posts
Also where i live, obama is portrayed as a nice guy opposed to evil neo-liberal palin. I do not consider Master Nigro a good president, and i am absolutely convinced Neo-cons are not Evil. Just totally wrong. | ||
|
Plutonium
United States2217 Posts
Rather, it's a conglomeration of disaffected, older white people driven by fear. Their only uniting ideology is that they're extraordinarily scared and angry that a man who doesn't look like they do is in the oval office. It's brought together the jingoistic racists (Birthers), the evangelicals (Obama is a secret muslim), the paranoid conspiracy theorists (Obama gonna take our guns), the hypocrite libertarians (People should do able whatever they want as long as it fits my social agenda) and the elderly who are scared of everything that could or could not conceivably threaten them, especially if they're younger than 30, darker than Larry Byrd, or it could even remotely affect their medicare of social security. | ||
|
Vile Animus
United States34 Posts
On November 04 2010 07:25 Jameser wrote: ... who the hell forms a political movement and calls it 'the teabaggers' like seriously nobody in the entire organization knew about the term? ... and then there's of course the 'intelligent design' crowd, to this crowd I also count christine o'donnell who, FOR CEREAL, spent her 20's campaigning against masturbation For the record, the Tea Partiers don't call themselves teabaggers- the media have used the term extensively though (pretending it isn't a slur) so I can see where there might be confusion. The group is a close copy of the liberal protest groups that were around during Bush. Marginal groups like these can't control their message as well as major parties can- both sides end up with nutjobs like the Lyndon LaRouche people or some other extremist minority viewpoints that end up getting associated with their rallies. They don't properly vet candidates for political office and you get revelations about them that make them not look like serious candidates (O'donnel, Angle) Europeans, foreigners, etc -- Consider how news in your country gets portrayed around the world in other countries- its boiled down and distorted into something that gives, at best, a weak understanding of what happened. Thats what you're getting from your media regarding news in the US. | ||
|
Roggay
Switzerland6320 Posts
On November 04 2010 07:20 LOLtex wrote: I also think that Europe, with each country being largely homogeneous in race and culture compared to the U.S., means that much of what works for you guys does not work for us. I think this is often overlooked. Here we have cities and giant metropolises (metropolii? lulz) that are more populated and larger than some of your countries. Not to mention we have millions of immigrants bleeding in from Mexico, usually illegally, who are not educated and some who have no interest in even learning the English language. These are unique problems of ours that can't really be fixed via what you call "normal" means, which is one reason the republican party exists: to promote state-solved problems, not federally solved problems. We have far more immigrants in Switzerland (percentagewise. In fact Switzerland would have a decreasing population if no immigrants could come) and we still manage it fine (or without too much problems). In my primary school (when I was little) we were 20 kids and 16 nationalities were represented (I'm myself actually half Swiss half Italian, and it is very very common to hear all kinds of languages). Well, the U.S. is much larger so it is surely far more difficult to manage. | ||
|
domovoi
United States1478 Posts
On November 04 2010 07:44 enzym wrote: except that the tea party folks are basically republicans, are funded by billionaires just like republicans and helped to oppose the democrats, who tried to fix the supposedly biggest problem with your spending (health care) which they failed to do (no public option) because they didnt have enough power (republicans working for corporations and blocking everything). oh, republicans also caused this whole mess. its not that we dont know about their mantra or that we hate the tea party so much. its just the complete lack of consistency or misinformation present in your electorate. :/ on top of that there's a pretty big difference between running on fiscal conservatism and actually working towards it. i guess the main problem are the two party system couples with the huge amount of corruption, which neither people nor the media seem to be adressing at all. Hey, I didn't say the Tea Party platform made any sense. But if it weren't for the fact that the Tea Party is associated with Republicans, many, many Europeans would agree with their rhetoric regarding austerity. | ||
|
misaTO
Argentina204 Posts
| ||
|
domovoi
United States1478 Posts
On November 04 2010 07:48 Roggay wrote: We have far more immigrants in Switzerland (percentagewise. In fact Switzerland would have a decreasing population if no immigrants could come) and we still manage it fine (or without too much problems). In my primary school (when I was little) we were 20 kids and 16 nationalities were represented (I'm myself actually half Swiss half Italian, and it is very very common to hear all kinds of languages). Well, the U.S. is much larger so it is surely far more difficult to manage. Let me just say that in the US, nobody cares about the immigrants who come from Europe. | ||
|
misaTO
Argentina204 Posts
| ||
|
Tufas
Austria2259 Posts
On November 04 2010 07:42 domovoi wrote: From my point of view, the European dialog on Muslim immigrants is a lot worse than the American one. And I 100% agree there. And I really try my best to stop this, like me, my persona. I am in various groups that actually try to inform people about what is really going in with the immigration like why they are doing it, what they bring with them, what they can give us ... how we can help so that they also feel at home here. if we say we dont want them here, how are they supposed to immigrate. I consider myself very left, like european trotsky communist left. But you are right. | ||
|
Yukidasu
Australia125 Posts
On the other hand, my experience of Americans has been very positive. Probably because meeting in person is in an environment which is real to most people, unlike the abstract world of politics where you're taking other people's word for just about everything and probably learn not to really care really fast. Same everywhere really, just the landmines are in different places. | ||
|
misaTO
Argentina204 Posts
| ||
|
Skrammen
Norway195 Posts
Up here in norwegen, we dont really have elections at all, we only have re-elections. The Labour Party has been in charge at the parliament since the dawn of time basically, and theres rarely any action going on. | ||
|
DoubleReed
United States4130 Posts
On November 04 2010 07:42 domovoi wrote: From my point of view, the European dialog on Muslim immigrants is a lot worse than the American one. We have far fewer Muslim immigrants than Europe. Our immigrants are usually from Mexico and the Caribbean. Also as Religious Freedom is one of the fundamental principles of America, we have a pretty strong guard against that kind of discrimination even if there is a lot of bigotry going on. Something like France's ban on headscarves or whatever would never fly here. | ||
|
Plutonium
United States2217 Posts
This leads to funny non-sequitors, like a common tea-partier statement that the government should "Keep its hands off my Medicare" For those who don't know, Medicare is the socialized medicine program run by the Federal government that's been in existence since 1965, providing medical insurance for all citizens above the age of 65. It's not only extraordinarily popular among all segments of society, it's magnitudes less wasteful than any private insurance coverage in terms of dollars spent on health-care vs. administrative overhead. | ||
|
misaTO
Argentina204 Posts
| ||
|
Jameser
Sweden951 Posts
On November 04 2010 07:48 Vile Animus wrote: For the record, the Tea Partiers don't call themselves teabaggers- the media have used the term extensively though (pretending it isn't a slur) so I can see where there might be confusion. The group is a close copy of the liberal protest groups that were around during Bush. Marginal groups like these can't control their message as well as major parties can- both sides end up with nutjobs like the Lyndon LaRouche people or some other extremist minority viewpoints that end up getting associated with their rallies. They don't properly vet candidates for political office and you get revelations about them that make them not look like serious candidates (O'donnel, Angle) Europeans, foreigners, etc -- Consider how news in your country gets portrayed around the world in other countries- its boiled down and distorted into something that gives, at best, a weak understanding of what happened. Thats what you're getting from your media regarding news in the US. I didn't mean to say that christine o'donnell represents the republican party in any way, but there is record of both current and past republican senates who say intelligent design is just as valid as evolution, which is 10x worse than campaigning against masturbation, and more common by literally a factor of ~~75000000 source:+ Show Spoiler + (http://www.gallup.com/poll/114544/darwin-birthday-believe-evolution.aspx) and glenn beck has quite a following, and I daresay 99% of his audience votes either republican or not at all, either way they still follow him after glenn said he believes obama has a 'deep seated hatred for white culture' | ||
|
HeadhunteR
Argentina1258 Posts
Republicans always declare war, and Democrats always have to be in a war. Republicans inject fear into the people and Democrats use the fear installed in the people to run their office. Republicans are Uber rasist Christian and they will always be outraged when someone presents another view of an issue, Democrats are more mildly Christian and then want more dialogue but they are considered to be inept to run office. Either way Republicans and Democrats are just 2 steps away from each other most Democrats vote for very Republican laws and Both in conjunction have done hideous things to the world. Americas Politics is pretty easy to understand the thing is that regular people believe that what is said in papers and in the news doesnt have a bias when it most certainly does. In Argentina regular people are much more Politically aware and they don't trust their politicians but because of poverty the vote can be "bought" by making rallys and holidays for the working middle class syndicate associated worker. Here we know that politics is bullshit we just accept that the president will never comply with what they say so we vote for whom we hate the less. | ||
|
andrewlt
United States7702 Posts
On November 04 2010 07:48 Roggay wrote: We have far more immigrants in Switzerland (percentagewise. In fact Switzerland would have a decreasing population if no immigrants could come) and we still manage it fine (or without too much problems). In my primary school (when I was little) we were 20 kids and 16 nationalities were represented (I'm myself actually half Swiss half Italian, and it is very very common to hear all kinds of languages). Well, the U.S. is much larger so it is surely far more difficult to manage. As an ethnic Chinese who immigrated from the Philippines to the US, I'm going to tell you this. 20 kids representing 16 different Western European nationalities is a lot less diverse than 1 white American and 1 Japanese guy. The difference between a French and a German is like the difference between a Californian and a Texan. When the US talks about immigrants, it is not immigrants from Canada or Western Europe that dominate the discussion. It is about immigrants that are sufficiently different culturally. | ||
|
LittLeD
Sweden7973 Posts
On November 04 2010 06:27 Frozenzen wrote: I'm probably getting a very biased view of the American political climate, seeing as how I hang around with quite left wing people, and have rather heavy leftish opinions overall. What few American forums and such I frequent are also rather pro democrat. But it seems completely insane, and dominated by complete and utter maniacs without any connection to reality at all. The right wing propaganda I see is hilarious if a joke, and sad if real. People have such ridiculous opinions like calling Obama a socialist, and making abortion/gay rights into bad things at the same time as they rage about their liberty being curtailed. So hypocrisy and complete stupidity seems to be the reigning ideal that I'm exposed to. But I'm fairly sure I just get to see the extreme cases. Said it. Things that should stay absolutely out of politics and have none of it whatsoever: Religion. Well that is all for now, fix the rest later. | ||
| ||
