As an outsider to America, it's none of my business, except as regards your foreign and energy policies, which affect me and mine.
But fools rush in...
America has always had a very healthy suspicion of government. But in recent years that has grown, in certain quarters, into a complete contempt for your own government. And, looking in on the recent shennanigans, fair enough.
BUT, it is a truth universally acknowledged that the first duty and responsibility of any government is to protect its own citizens; in Syria, not so much, but there is a civil war on. In many other jurisdictions, that responsibility has even been extended as far as the provision of universal healthcare, but lets not even go there.
My point is that the US government is, theoretically, looking out for your interests. And in the age of globalisation, who else is? The US is just a nation state: numerous nation states have found, to their cost and regret, that the international financial markets and multinational corporations wield power to humble mere nations. Have the markets any obligation or duty to look after your best interests?
It used once to be a truism that as Wall Street prospered, so did Main Street, or some such. But that involves Mr Burns off of the Simpsons, or the Koch Bros, splashing out on a load of yachts and such; and pension funds doing well; and it all trickles down. But these days the really big players aren't Mr Burns so much as Sheikh KhalifaBin Zatad al Nayam, who buys his yachts elsewhere...
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/luxury/travel/5742/the-worlds-biggest-superyacht.htmlOther "big swinging dicks" on the modern Wall Street including inter alia, the Chinese government, who've spent 20 years reinvesting all the profits from actually making the stuff in stores to buy stocks.
It"s globalisation; and it's not all bad.
A year or so ago, I read what I thought a really good column in the HuffPo, or somewhere, describing how some Americans, who win by globalisation; well-educated, smart, computer savvy and predominately liberal, find themselves huddled behind locked doors, scared of what is happening out on the streets; straining to hear the baying mob of redneck losers howling outside.
"We DEMAND..."
Oh right, this is good, there's so much obvious need out there, what is it that they demand?
"We DEMAND that YOU pay LESS taxes!"
°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°
Over here, of course, we've got it all sorted out. Just look at Lords Monckton and Lawson, and then there the bit when Her Majesty's Silver Rod in Black Boots by appointment to the Royal Footstool has to... er, what was it that I was saying? Any chance of a green card?