American hedonism closes its eyes to death, and has been
incapable of exorcising the destructive power of the moment
with a wisdom like that of the Epicureans of antiquity.

- Octavio Paz
Death is un-American, and an affront to every citizen's inalienable
right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

- Arnold Toynbee
the_band_huge
the_band_huge
"As long as such self-serving hypocrisy
motivates America's response, Ukraine will
only sink further into needless bloodshed,
and that blood will be on America's head."
JOIN THE DISCUSSION
the_band_huge
In America everybody is of the opinion that he has no social superiors,
since all men are equal, but he does not admit that he has no social inferiors,
for, from the time of Jefferson onward, the doctrine that all men are equal
applies only upwards, not downwards.

― Bertrand Russell
Global Coke
Global Coke
"What those 'racists' are reflexively and rightly reacting
to is the soulless chill as the fire goes out beneath the
melting pot. Those who think America can thrive as a
'cultural mosaic' are worse than fools; they're Canadians."

JOIN THE DISCUSSION
Global Coke
Two centuries ago, a former European colony decided to catch up with Europe.
It succeeded so well that the United States of America became a monster,
in which the taints, the sickness and the inhumanity of Europe
have grown to appalling dimensions.

― Frantz Fanon
What the United States does best is understand itself.
What it does worst is understand others.

- Carlos Fuentes
Poor Mexico, so far from God
and so close to the United States.

- Porfirio Diaz
the_band_huge
the_band_huge
"Indeed, everything about the American southland was magical
and exotic to the young Canadian musicians, from the sights
and smells to the drawling manner of speech to, especially, the
central role that music played in people’s everyday lives."

JOIN THE DISCUSSION
the_band_huge
America is a mistake, a giant mistake.
- Sigmund Freud
America is an adorable woman chewing tobacco.
- Auguste Bartholdi
chimerica
chimerica
"This is the tone of the China Century, a subtle
mix of Nazi/Soviet bravado and 'oriental'
cunning -- easily misunderstood, and
never
heard before, in a real enemy, by the West."

JOIN THE DISCUSSION
chimerica
Coke and 'America the Beautiful'
Coke and 'America the Beautiful'
"And for the others who argued for English-only
patriotism, I note that there are more than
57 million Americans (about 20% of the nation)
whose first-language is not English...."

JOIN THE DISCUSSION
Coke and 'America the Beautiful'
predator-firing-missile4
predator-firing-missile4
"This is the behavior, and the fate, of paranoid
old-world tyrants like Hitler or Saddam, not liberal new-world democracies like America pretends to be."

JOIN THE DISCUSSION
predator-firing-missile4
America is the only nation in history which
miraculously has gone directly from barbarism to
degeneration without the usual interval of civilization.

- Georges Clemenceau
I found there a country with thirty-two religions and only one sauce.
- Charles–Maurice Talleyrand
A people who are still, as it were, but in the gristle,
and not yet hardened into the bone of manhood.

- Edmund Burke
America is the only country ever founded on the printed word.
- Marshall McLuhan
"The removal of racist sports nicknames (and mascots) seems outrageously belated
-- why, exactly, has this civil rights cause
taken so long to gain momentum?"

JOIN THE DISCUSSION
The atom bomb is a paper tiger which the
United States reactionaries use to scare people.
It looks terrible, but in fact it isn't.

- Mao Tse-tung
They made us many promises, more than I can remember, but
they kept only one; they promised to take our land, and they did.

- Red Cloud
In America sex is an obsession,
in other parts of the world it is a fact.

- Marlene Dietrich
I would rather have a nod from an American,
than a snuff-box from an emperor.

- Lord Byron
One day the United States discovered it was an empire.
But it didn’t know what an empire was.
It thought that an empire was merely the biggest of all corporations.

- Roberto Calasso
Americans are so enamored of equality, they would rather
be equal in slavery than unequal in freedom.

- Alexis de Tocqueville
newtown
newtown
"No one, I thought, could watch those scenes, of young children slaughtered en masse, and so many parents grieving, without thinking that this, finally, would tip some kind of balance in the country."
JOIN THE DISCUSSION
newtown
If you are prepared to accept the consequences of your dreams
then you must still regard America today with the same naive
enthusiasm as the generations that discovered the New World.

- Jean Baudrillard
I am willing to love all mankind, except an American.
- Samuel Johnson
America, thou half brother of the world;
With something good and bad of every land.

- Philip Bailey
"What can be more powerful than disinformation in the Information Age?"
JOIN THE DISCUSSION
England and America are two countries separated by the same language.
- Sir Walter Besant
Christopher Columbus, as everyone knows, is honored by
posterity because he was the last to discover America.

- James Joyce
Now, from America, empty indifferent things
are pouring across, sham things, dummy life.

- Rainer Maria Rilke
If the United States is to recover fortitude and lucidity,
it must recover itself, and to recover itself it must
recover the "others"- the outcasts of the Western world.
- Octavio Paz
The youth of America is their oldest tradition.
It has been going on now for three hundred years.

- Oscar Wilde
"America really is, for most Americans, all things considered, a good place to be, and all they really want is for everyone to enjoy the same privilege and pleasure."
JOIN THE DISCUSSION
When good Americans die they go to Paris;
when bad Americans die they go to America.

- Oscar Wilde
jobs drug dealer
jobs drug dealer
They're nothing more than traffickers; and as the smart traffickers'll tell you, you don't use the merchandise. They are just inoculating their kids with a tech-drug serum, to immunize them against the very merchandise that put the **** bowling alley in their basement.
jobs drug dealer
America is therefore the land of the future, where, in the ages that
lie before us, the burden of the World's History shall reveal itself.

- Georg Friedrich Hegel
America is a large, friendly dog in a very small room.
Every time it wags its tail, it knocks over a chair.

- Arnold Toynbee
Americans always try to do the right thing after they've tried everything else.
- Winston Churchill
The thing that impresses me most about Americans
is the way parents obey their children.

- Edward, Duke of Windsor
Americans are apt to be unduly interested in discovering
what average opinion believes average opinion to be.

- John Maynard Keynes
Europe was created by history.
America was created by philosophy.

- Margaret Thatcher
America is God's crucible, the great Melting-Pot where all the races of
Europe are melting and reforming!... The real American has not yet arrived.
He is only in the crucible, I tell you - he will be the fusion of all races.

- Israel Zangwill
American dreams are strongest in the hearts of those
who have seen America only in their dreams.

- Pico Iyer
America: It's like Britain, only with buttons.
- Ringo Starr
The essential American soul is hard, isolate, stoic, and a killer.
It has never yet melted.

― D.H. Lawrence
I have two conflicting visions of America.
One is a kind of dream landscape and the other is a kind of black comedy.

― Bono
The American mirror, said the voice, the sad American mirror
of wealth and poverty and constant useless metamorphosis,
the mirror that sails and whose sails are pain.

― Roberto Bolaño

April 12, 2024

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Author Topic: The 100 Years War


NataliaK
Novice Their American
Posts: 8
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The 100 Years War
on: April 1, 2016, 19:33

In another article from USA Today, it seems as though Clinton has been receiving support from private corporations in return for promised funding. One of her most staunch critics are environmental activists, most notably Greenpeace, in which they are undoubtedly stating that Clinton has received more than $1 million dollars from these private corporations who work in the gas and oil industry that are vying to get her a seat in the White House. Greenpeace activist Eva Resnick-Day sarcastically thanked Clinton for supposedly ensuring the safety of the environment with the promise of tackling global warming and green house gases while also commenting whether she would be tackling such a feat with the help of fossil fuel money. At such a remark Clinton was enraged, unsuccessfully saying that this was not true and that whoever uttered it (supposedly Bernie Sanders) was a “liar.” Now this could all come as a surprise to whoever does not follow politics, but it has become a reality that these private corporations bid on the campaigners, gambling their profits with the promise of ten times the profit in return if they prove to be correct in their algorithms. This is of course illegal, as campaigns and campaigners are not allowed to accept any money from such corporations directly through them. However, it seems that these wealthy billionaires, who have been exploiting the Earth's natural resources and making immense profits, have been calling the shots since more than a hundred years ago. According to Frederick Jackson Turner, the land in America that was there before it was cultivated was to be destined to be used for resources. Cities and urban dwellings were bound to happen, and industrialization and the exploitation of nature was unavoidable. However, too much unrestraint would ultimately lead to manipulation, coercion and evil deeds. The effects of such events have echoed up to today, as it is clear that these corporations still have a hold on our society.



Brian-
Emmerson
Experienced Their American
Posts: 11
Avatar photo
Re: The 100 Years War
on: April 7, 2016, 20:55

I recently saw a video by comedian Sarah Silverman in which she voices her support for Bernie Sanders and why she will not vote for Hilary, citing similar reasons mentioned involving her reputation of taking money. In the video, she mentions how common it is for politicians to take money due to Citizens United and compares it to athletes taking steroids to level the playing field. She calls it "legalized corruption", then goes on to point out how Americans are skeptical about Bernie because of his leanings towards socialism.

It's troubling to see how much corporate influence goes into politics, but I would like to suggest an alternative perspective. I think that many Americans find anything associated with socialism as taboo due to social mores developed from the Cold War which have made Americans strongly support capitalism and strongly oppose socialism, and it still lingers today despite the benefits of socialist programs integrated into society (Silverman cites firefighters, saying it's an example of integrated socialism and that it is in fact pro-American and not anti-American). While it may take some citizens some time to come around to socialist ideas, America still runs on big support for capital, and I would like to suggest that maybe the reason it continues to hold so dearly to capitalistic ideas is because of public approval. If people feel comfortable with their system and that it's justified, it's easier to maintain. It reminds me of a Refused song, The Refused Party Program, in which the opening monologue states "The great spirits proclaim that capitalism is indeed organized crime, and we are all the victims." But if people are comfortable with what they perceive is not injustice, or accept it as necessary, then it can remain a part of the system flourishing as it does. The corporations would likely do their best to ensure that nothing rocks the boat too much.

Sarah Silverman video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1dh78x0Pr1s

The Refused Party Program: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SH_E_dFXDKA



icedcoffee
Novice Their American
Posts: 7
Avatar photo
Re: The 100 Years War
on: April 7, 2016, 23:57

Like Brian has mentioned, because of Citizens United, I understand it is actually legal in the U.S. for corporations to donate money for federal campaigns because it is protected under their First Amendment rights. As absurd as it sounds corporations are qualified as persons ("corporate personhood") and are extended some of the same rights a natural person would be granted. As a Canadian, the concept is hard to grasp but America's politics are completely different. In Canada, the ideology behind socialism is much more acceptable than it is in the United States. They gravitate heavily towards capitalism and are mostly fall right wing on the political spectrum.
The reason that probably caused a ruckus between Clinton and Sanders is not because of it was illegal (because it is not) but because it does not seem honest or ethical especially considering the companies/organizations involved. Global warming is a topic that is continuously brought up and as more signs begin to show of its impending damage, this would be a key issue to bring about and use to one's advantage when improving their own image or trying to diminish the image of your opponent. As a democrat, Hillary Clinton definitely does not want to have her reputation marked on that matter.

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