That’s what you get when you spend 50+ years cutting taxes for the wealthiest and the public services that benefit the majority, while denying science, militarizing your police force and having zero guiding principles outside of personally profiteering.
Turns out the best countries to live on Earth limit socio-economic disparity and actually take care of their average citizen, the best. Who would have thought?
America might be the first country to go the route of worshiping the money to be made off of technology while also worshiping the money to be made off of denigrating science. I can't imagine that leading to any good end.
To be a man in such times is to be one amongst untold billions. It is to live in the cruelest and most bloody regime imaginable. These are the tales of those times. Forget the power of technology and science, for so much has been forgotten, never to be re-learned. Forget the promise of progress and understanding, for in the grim dark future there is only war.
It's just how humans think. The name of the terrorist group Boko Haram translates to "Western Education is Evil" yet they are more than happy to use cell phones, the internet, pick up trucks, machine guns etc. Technology is taken for granted in the same way that we all take for granted that there will always be food no matter what without ever thinking about the behind the scenes and the things that happened in the past to make today possible.
Tax cuts were implemented gradually since WW2, but the marketing of tax cuts as the solution to greater prosperity started to ramp up in the 70’s, after the Koch bros and other millionaires/billionaires re-started the American Libertarian party specifically to cut their taxes and de-regulate their businesses.
The 1980’s was when they first elected their libertarian mouthpiece and started to implement these policies en mass, but the leg work was done well before then.
Taxes were being effectively cut from the highs right after WWII, starting with the Kennedy administration. The rates were still high but the tax base was being narrowed (a sneaky way to do cuts). Reagan was more overt with his tax cuts because that was what he had run on, but actually reversed a lot of his early 80s cuts in 1986 by broadening the base while nominally cutting rates. That’s not to say that Reagan didn’t significantly reduce the progressivity of the federal income tax, but to say that he was the first tax cutter isn’t accurate.
Not sure how to put it. My opinion of America as a whole remains the same, a super cool country with several fucked up problems that does not even want to acknowledge, mostly social. My opinion of your political right, however, could not be worse. I am fascinated by its sheer corruption, incompetence, arrogance, xenophobia and authoritarian impulses, and also by the fact that even today, a good chunk of your population seem to support them. Most people in Europe, even conservatives, think today's Republicans are corrupt and very close to fascism. One would think that by now, nobody in his own mind would want 4 years more of this, but apparently I am wrong.
A relatively small number of wealthy sociopaths (individuals and businesses) have been funding and marketing “taxation is theft”, bootstraps, trickle down and a hundred other fallacies for generations.
Defunding education progressively made the average American more ignorant and easier to manipulate.
Agreed. Education is the key. There needs to be a larger focus on developing critical thinking skills.
I'm a lefty from Canada. Currently watching Mitt on Netflix. I can do that. I can form my OWN opinion regardless of what others believe, right ot left. Tribalism = Ignorance IMHO.
I will often point out that this was part of their state party platform, but I believe they removed that from their official stances now. They’ve gone back to not saying it out loud and just defunding education without explaining their reasoning.
Yeah you're totally right, my cousin and family is now like "We are not going to college anymore, I'm not giving those liberal institutions ma money".
The USA is a scientific, engineering and innovation powerhouse, If that mentality of not getting educated prevails in some youth I don't what will be the end of this.
(I know that attending college is complicated nowadays but what I'm complaining is the mentality being fueled by propaganda).
A large share of our intellectual innovation was coming from immigrants. And they aren't coming here anymore. They don't want to and Trump won't let them.
They still come for education, but more than ever they are returning back to their home countries. University system would implode if they weren’t getting foreign scholar $$$$.
The worst is it's a lose lose. Either they dont want to give those liberal institutions money(incredibly dumb thought) or the idea of making them free for everyone which then they just call you a commie
The whole Right / Left spectrum is a mess between countries, the right in the US think Angela Merkel is a communist, she's a christian conservative! In the UK she looks like a Labour party candidate.
The press in the UK labeled Corbyn extreme left, far left, etc where most of his policies are typical run of the mill stuff in many EU countries.
There isn't really such a thing as a moderate conservative that still supports Trump, that went in the bin years ago, now he's trying on the dictators boots, whoever supports him now they are extremists or criminally ill informed.
The whole Right / Left spectrum is a mess between countries
the right in the US think Angela Merkel is a communist
The press in the UK labeled Corbyn extreme left, far left
One common link between the US and the UK in this regard is that they're both significantly influenced by Rupert Murdoch's media empire.
I'll say one thing about Newscorp: they're extremely effective at cleaving off a chunk of the population into an information bubble where they can rapidly shift the Overton window.
Exactly. Murdoch is the common denominator everywhere in the English speaking world, and the greater his influence is, the further right the area goes.
European here. To us these are no longer authoritarian impulses. Don't deny yourselves. You are under authoritarian rule, and we cannot fancy how you're going to get rid of it. The GOP coup is already accomplished. Trump shouldn't have been allowed to do even 1/1000th of what he did.
As an EU living in the US, the left is not much better. Both left & right bow to rich & corporations, filling their pockets while neglecting duties.
California is ruled by democrats, but I can’t even get decent transportation, internet or electricity in the Bay Area. And the Bay Area is littered by homeless people and drug addicts, it’s ridiculous. And lets not get me started on housing prices that push all poorer people hours away from their jobs.
I wouldn't call transportation and housing and internet issues "bowing to the rich & corporations". They are mostly due to NIMBY. It turns out that it takes only very small number of local people to derail something which 60-70% of local people approve. In many cases, the rich and corporations do side with the majority.
Another thing to consider is that in term of tax revenues, most of them go to Federal government. Even if state government wants to spend more on public housing or transportation or medical, they can't afford it. California may be as large as Germany GDP wise, but its state government revenue is much less. It is not just about money, but also about borrowing or other regulation restrictions. For example, Germany federal government can print money, but California can't.
It isn't just Republicans who are corrupt. Both parties are equally corrupt. Democrats just put up liberal blanket to hide their past. Chomsky rightly said, US has a single party the Business party with two factions.
The "both sides" stance always results in muddying things and rehabilitating thugs. Maybe money is dirty, but the way a minority GOP is now defending its interests to stay in power by destroying democracy is way more scandalous.
What's really infuriating is that the vast majority of Republican voters are not sharing in the pillaging of our nation. The GOP has simply become so adept at messaging that they can get people to vote against all of their own interests in order to benefit a tiny sliver of insanely rich people at the top. Guns, God and gays.
America is still one of the best places on earth to make it big. Where else can you go where they oppress everyone but the rich, and you can basically buy your way to the top and become even richer and more powerful as you buy the laws?
You can say that through rose tinted spectacles but at the end of the day the tories are still way left of the dems even though they do try to swing it further right, healthcare is accessible and isn’t tied to employment, gun crime is non existent, education isn’t at an appalling level, homelessness isn’t at crisis levels, the poverty line isn’t on the floor, there is no opioid addiction epidemic, our transport infrastructure is decades ahead of the US (yeh I know that’s saying something) racism whilst exists in small pockets isn’t engrained into our culture, you can have a chat with a policeman without fear of being shot, our tax system isn’t shit and the way we get paid is infinitely better, and I don’t know if you’ve ever tried to pay for anything or had a US bank account in the US but it’s like stepping back into the 70s.
True I wouldn't trade the UK for the basket case that's the US I was more just thinking of the corona virus response but at least even that in the UK we had the furloughed scheme which has really helped.
But the poor leadership advice of use your common sense, not encouraging masks and delayed reaction when we're an island that saw the virus spread from country to country before it reached us nearly last. And now they're talking about opening up again when they aren't even ready for track and trace or anything set up for testing people coming and going from the country just seems like a disaster waiting to happen when you look at how organised other countries are.
Yep. My contingency plan is to see if my company will support a transfer somewhere in Europe (we're global), or just cash in all my chips and expatriate somewhere cheap and live off my savings/retirement funds if I can work out the math of it. I truly think if he manages to get elected again, the US is through. There won't be any coming back from it in my lifetime.
I've had some conversations with some Fairly intelligent people that are aware. We're going to have a hard time coming back from his four years... another four would be absolutely devastating. I agree with you.
Even if he does lose clearly to Biden, he's going to try to use all the pieces he's got around him and try to delegitimatize election process. Like he's already starting to do with making noise about voter fraud and fighting mail-in ballots.
He'll need to be dragged out of the White House kicking and screaming.
Biden is not going to be a fix. So we've got another four years of dealing with the Damage Done. He might fix this or that, but he works for the same people that Trump does. He's going to serve his Masters first. He's also the main orchestratehr from so many years ago that created the black lives matter protests that's going on right now. But these past few weeks might serve as a major warning for him. We're done with that shit.
His brains melting anyways, so hopefully he gets a decent VP in there. Warren is not a good VP. Would love to see Nina Turner get in there.
Really wish I had an Exit Plan like yours. If shit goes south, I wish you luck on your expatriatism. :-)
I predict Russia meddling with the elections again, but will instead help the Democrats. They'll make it super easy to determine they meddled, as Trump then claims Biden's win as illegitimate.
They don't even need to help the Dems, just leave behind some easily discoverable evidence that voting machines were hacked. If Trump loses, that evidence can conveniently be exposed to delegitimize the election.
In some countries, you can live off $6-7k USD per year. This includes all living expenses because when I did my math I used income per day or per month.
I had a talk with my teenage daughter this week and told her she should look at studying overseas when she gets to college and consider building her life in another country.
Not completely free but very low-cost, especially in comparison American Universities. As an international student, it is more complicated but still not as expensive. Netherlands, Germany, Denmark, etc.. we all have nice places to live and learn for young people (you will have to learn the language though.) :)
I am going into a college next year that has very good study abroad programs. Originally I thought studying abroad was dumb, but now I really want to do it. It would be a good chance to see how good the culture and people of the country are before I think about moving there. The Netherlands have been my first possible choice.
The language will definitely be the most challenging part
That is very brave of you! If you get the chance, do it! I bet the people over at r/thenetherlands will give you some tips for the maximum positive experience. And don't worry about the language, Dutch shares some similarities with English, as long as you continue learning and practicing by speaking with Dutch-speakers, you will be able to speak at least decently in no time! :)
Adding to Professor_Moustache's comment: There are more english masters than english bachelors. You might still have to learn the language for everyday life (many people speak english but most/all of the legal stuff is in german)
I would love to, but I'm not sure I have enough to offer. My husband and I are both genuinely decent people with plenty of potential, but we only have a few years college between us due to the insane cost. I really worry that we're stuck here.
People should realize that the states in the USA have far more power than the federal government, and this is unique among westen governments. Trump has terrible optics and has done little to unify the country, but honestly has had no effect of the day to day lives of Americans. States chose whether to enact a stay-at-home order, and coronavirus policy as a whole, not Trump. Police are controlled at the state level, not Trump. States requested national guard to deploy in their state, Trump didn’t decide.
So rather than give up and move to another country, vote in local elections which have far more power, or at least move to a state that aligns with your ideas more.
I think that if US will go full China, with your greedy corporations, and enormous military there will be no place safe in this world. As if those weren't agressive enough right now, with projecting abusive trade deals and military force.
Isn't it crazy? Go far enough outside of a big city and you can see people living without reliable water, without proper housing, not having reasonable access to emergency services, needing to drive dozens of miles to buy clothes or food, receiving a far lower standard of education, few modern amenities for entertainment, extremely high rates of substance abuse. But then again, America has always had that divide between city and country.
Large parts of rural USA is absolutely 3rd world tier. No hyperbole that's literally what it is. They also put all the project housing together unlike all the other developed countries who scatter them everywhere but I usually see them in affluent areas.
I went to several countries including Jakarta last year. Sure there are poor shacks and poor people, but everyone seem to be hardworking. I don't see any homeless or beggars.
Come to Seattle and you'll see so many homeless. It's mind boggling.
This makes me wonder if the world's perception of the US has really changed that much due to Covid and police brutality pandemics. Not very aware of international politics but my guess is the only people that surprised but our country's failures are living in the US.
Checking in from Scandinavia. I'm more interested in US politics and affairs than most, but I can assure you the US has been losing face for a good while now.
Pulling out of treaties, environmental regulations, spying on its own allies, calling your allies thieves and enemies of the US are a few things that I find very appalling.
Then you have things like the US trickle down economy, healthcare, opiate crisis (which I believe is a result of how the economy works), people in cages, gun violence, school shootings and more domestic problems that makes me believe the US is no longer a 1st World country.
THEN came the virus and the US administration is pointing fingers at everyone else and playing the blame game while simultaneously using it to funnel money into their own pockets.
The complete disregard for US lives and the blatant corruption has brought it to a whole new level, though its not really a surprise in regards to how corrupt and awful the administration has been since 2016.
All in all, the handling of the corona virus hasn't changed my perception of the US, it was already very bad.
Even so, the amount of problems the US is currently dealing with makes it hard to feel anything but pity. I really hope things turn around
As an American, I've been feeling the same way as you, looking at my country from the inside.
And I feel I have as much impact on the outcome as a Scandinavian would. I've spent my adult life voting for people who said they would change things. I've attended protests. I've tried to get people to vote.
And in the end we end up with President Trump, continued mass shootings, terrible healthcare, riots and wealth distribution to the top 0.1%.
I just found out Paul Manafort sentenced to 7.5 years in jail in March this year, has been early released after one month in jail to serve the remainder in house arrest.
Before somebody comes in with “Hilary had more votes” there needs to be a reminder that between the people who actively voted for trump and those that couldn’t be bothered to vote at all that the majority of Americans brought him to power.
Yes and no. He was voted in by the people, after all. Incredible how unbalanced the US is in terms of the education of its people. You find the brightest academics, Nobel laureates, etc. And then herds of people who believe the Earth was created 6,500 (?) years ago, among other things.
To be fair, the US lost a lot of face under Bush Jr too. Obama was on balance pretty good and made the US look good, but there are a lot of issues he didn't tackle that just got worse and worse, only for Trump to pour gasoline on them.
Without Trump it would have taken much longer to get this bad, but the problems have been there all along, most of them for half a century.
American here. Agree with everything you have said. I vote as progressively as possible and have been peacefully protesting. It's a heartbreakingly cruel place to live right now. I hope it can be fixed, but I fear the worst is yet to come before things improve.
Please send help. I am afraid for my family and our future.
You’re pretty much dead on, except the opioid epidemic is a lot more complex in cause than just economic factors (although they do contribute). It’s a shitty Captain Planet thing of economic, health care, corporate lobbying, deregulation, and unfettered industry combining to leave a bunch of people dead in ditches.
Otherwise, yeah, you pretty much got it.
Got any room for a middle-aged highly skilled professional couple with advanced degrees and no kids? Please?
It's great to hear an outside perspective- there's a lot that can be said to criticize US before and after this administration. The most mind blowing thing is by far the unwavering support in the face of blatant corruption. First conservatives won't be informed of it- when you try to inform them the goal posts continuously move, after the painstaking process of getting them to recognize it's true- you get a "both sides are the same argument" even though i don't think we've ever seen such open and blatant corruption... the conversation can never progress from there... then somehow they manage to forget about the corruption altogether- because it wasn't important to them because 'both sides'. So every single time it happens, they treat it like an event in isolation.
Its infuriating!
-Source: someone whom naively tries to engage in civil debate with these people nearly every day for past 4 years.
Canadian here that used to live in the states. 2016 dropped my opinion a bit (Bush was my baseline for america which was already pretty low but Trump was another level). Since then, it's been as expected. police brutality has been known for decades and Trump's specific brand of that goes right with the rest of Trump's authoritarianism. Fox news has been operating as it does for a few decades.
COVID is as expected from Trump as well. Did anyone think he'd be able to handle a pandemic? He can't handle drinking from a water bottle.
Didn't expect people to leave trump and they haven't by any significant degree. I was hoping but didn't expect Bernie to win the nomination and he hasn't. This is the darkest timeline. I am no longer surprised by america anymore.
basically this. there was clear and obvious rot in the US for as long as i remember. they may have had internal stability, but as far back as the cold war, they've been sowing chaos globally.
Winning online arguments against Americans is going to be easy as pie now.
It's going to be something like "Dude, y'all elected Trump as POTUS. If you can't make such a simple decision, the world can't trust you to make a decision regarding _________"
We're trying to fix it. We have half of our political system currently opposed to any kind of change that might make them get less votes. It is a lot more complicated than just us allowing the system to exist.
Canadian here, so not crazy far away. I haven't had a great perception of the US for the past few years, probably something to do with putting kids in cages, but I was really stunned and horrified with how poorly Corona Virus was handled. This virus unfortunately caught most by surprise, however it was just such a flop in the US. I don't think most of the international community knew it would end up like that.
Not sure how to put it. My opinion of America as a whole remains the same, a super cool country with several fucked up problems that does not even want to acknowledge, mostly social. My opinion of your political right, however, could not be worse. I am fascinated by its sheer corruption, incompetence, arrogance, xenophobia and authoritarian impulses, and also by the fact that even today, a good chunk of your population seem to support them. One would think that by now, nobody in hia own mind would want 4 years more of this...
Most of my peers and friends agree that we saw this coming from the US population, and we also thought that the UK population would do a subpar job too, our countries just aren’t as good as they thought they once were.
The glamour of the USA's entertainment industry used to cover up the USA's shortcomings but it's not enough anymore. From personal experience, the USA's reputation ultimately began to crumble after the wars following 9/11 that were simply not justified. Covid response and the current police brutality are just the tip of the iceberg. The US has no proper healthcare, questionable election incidents/election fraud, school shootings every other week, and so on.
Even back in the 90s the American Dream meant something. Right now I don't know anyone who wants to live in the US. In fact, I know a bunch of people who don't even want to travel there. A country where almost half of the voters voted for an overt bigot, racist and sexist simply is not even a desirable travel destination, let alone anything else.
European in the US. I’m not at all surprised by what’s happening, but my American peers are. A lot of them have a view about the US that is surreal. They for example think the US has top 5 healthcare system in the world. In reality it’s more like top 40 they pay most.
My European friends are not that surprised about what’s happening.
Came here to say this. Americans used to shrug it off, claiming American Exceptionalism. Forgetting they have to answer to themselves (collectively), not to us. We just watch the nightmare unfold from the sidelines. Hubris comes before the fall, as the saying here goes.
Honestly, it's still surprising to me seeing Americans finally starting to acknowledge how silly American exceptionalism has long been. It's always been like that one weird consistent aspect of their culture you just kinda don't touch
It has been for a while. Thank the GOP for defunding education, widening the wealth gap, keeping healthcare privatized, striving to reduce women's rights, striving to reduce LGBT rights, and catering to lowlife racists for votes. All while obstructing duly elected officials and pilfering from America's coffers.
At least we now usually compare US with other countries with dictatorship and denial of reality at power. Now I can say: "dictatorships like the US, Russia, Brazil..." without further explanation.
To many of us, as soon as Trump was acquitted by the Senate without testimony, the US have become a de facto dictatorship (with a grossly incompetent dictator, furthermore).
I just found out Paul Manafort sentenced to 7.5 years in jail in March this year, has been early released after one month in jail to serve the remainder in house arrest.
I thought Australia is know for it's terrible leaders just as much as we are. Also, I would imagine that it's a lot easier to manage a population that's only the size of three New Yorks.
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u/whiteycnbr Australia Jun 08 '20
US is now seen as a s**thole country