Comparing the United States to the rest of the Industrialized World...

[Yollam]

Comparing the United States to the rest of the Industrialized World, how would you describe the US in terms of its political climate, its citizens' attitudes on military action, its equality between rich and poor/breadth of its middle class, and its commitment to public infrastructure and helping the less fortunate?

In other words, where is America's "center" in comparison to other nations?

[Ravenseye]

1. I say slightly right

I think we're heading dangerously in the direction of very right, but we aren't there yet.

[Yollam]

2. Even when Clinton was president...

My friends from Europe and Japan were SHOCKED that the United States had no national health care or real gun control, that so much of our economy was based on war, that people were subject to random body fluid tests as a condition of employment, that taxes on the ultra wealthy were so unbelievably low, that we tolerate such desperate poverty next to such lavish wealth . It occurred to me then that I was a citizen of a right-wing nation.

At this point we've pretty much gone around the bend as far as I'm concerned. We actually have DEMOCRATS now that talk about anti-poor, anti-working people, RW schemes like "flat" taxes, vouchers, privatization, outsourcing and gambling the Social Security trust fund on the stock market as though they were not TOTALLY INSANE AND TOTALLY EVIL. Unthinkable in a sane country.

[Ravenseye]

3. Oh we're definatley to the right, just not that far

There is alot of right wing talk right now and we're definately moving to the right but we can see a quick reversal.

The lack of universal health care is a big one. Hopefully we'll turn that around soon though.

Drug tests are often directly related to health care costs, rather than puritanical reasons, though those do exist they also exist in other more 'liberal' countries. I don't see full legalization of marijuana in say Great Britain or Japan. They treat it differently, but the attitude remains in the government.

Yet in other regards our country is still liberal and we can't let it forget that. It has problems but Social Security, medicare and medicade, Chip, farm subsidies, etc, etc. We have plenty of social libertarian policies. They're just not done any lip service by the current parties because it doesn't win elections.

Sure we're more right wing than them, but not by as much as people are led to believe imho. Americans are far more liberal than they or others believe them to be.

[Yollam]

4. I couldn't care less about drug legalization.

Drug laws are very strict here in Japan, but I am not subjected to insulting tests that invade my privacy and treat me like a criminal from day one of my employment here. Police don't even have the power to subject people to random body fluid tests, but corporations should be allowed to? Oh brother.

I follow the law RE drugs. They are illegal here, so I don't use them. I have kids, so even if they were legal, I still wouldn't use them. It's not how I want to be seen by them.

[Ravenseye]

5. One might argue drug laws are conservative

You complain about a government or business' right to drug test you, yet have no problem with a government legislating morality. Both are conservative and intrusive. Conservatism isn't limited to the economic side. Japan is in many ways very conservative on social and foreign matters. Simply because they have stricter gun laws, and national health care doesn't necessarily make them more liberal. That's just part of the picture.

Liberalism by definition is a philosophy of freedom. Progressivism is something else, leading to positive social change. Often those two things contradict each other, such as with gun or drug laws.

I do think though that a few things mask the differences between the U.S. Europe and other industrialized places. I just don't think the U.S. is as conservative as people make it out to be. We aren't living in Jerry Falwell's America just yet, and other places aren't as liberal as even they give themselves credit for.

Americans like thinking they're more conservative than Europeans and Europeans like thinking they're more liberal than Americans. Both are true, just not as much as either really thinks.

[Yollam]

7. You could also call them 'nanny state"

I don't favor drug laws, I just don't care much because I'm not into drugs.

I agree that Japan is conservative in some ways, especially disturbing is its sycophancy to the US at all times. I do think it is time Japan showed some independence from its big brother, while retaining friendly relations. Koizumi is a laughingstock here for his servile attitude to Bush, who is extremely unpopular here, as in the rest of the world.

But I agree with much of what you say, but I do think that many ideas that are treated as rational in the states would be considered nutty and far right in most of the world.

[Terran1212]

12. EXACTLY -- Americans are liberal -- their politicians aren't

See the disconnect?

[Jim Warren]

6. Far to the right of where it used to be

the old center has shifted so far, well, we're all republicans now.

This past winter I had occasion to speak with a colleague from Norway who opined that his country's most right-wing politician would align most closely with John Kerry.

As Mike Malloy is fond of saying, "Bill Clinton was the best republican president we've ever had."

[Art_from_Ark]

15. Actually, Jan Simonsen, a right-winger in the Norwegian Parliament,

nominated bu$h and Bliar for the Nobel Peace Prize

[KamaAina]

8. If we were any farther right, we'd be in the breakdown lane

I don't see any other countries invading and occupying countries halfway around the world. Do you?

Oh, right, I forgot Poland :evilgrin:

Then there's the people sleeping in doorways, the off-the-charts incarceration rate, the clamor to expand the death penalty, the crappy public transport... maybe we should have a poll comparing the U.S. to the rest of the Third World!

[StellaBlue]

9. Far to the right

I lived in the UK for four years, which is not exactly a hotbed of socialism. They are still FAR to the left of us. And the rest of Europe even farther, from what I could tell.

We're the exception. Just not how we like to think!

I think this is because we are simultaneously the richest and the least educated of the industrialized nations.

$0.02

[arcos]

10. The US is so far to the right, that it makes Chirac look like a socialist

nt

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

11. It would have to move far to the left to be considered merely reactionary.

[Greyhound]

13. As with most here, my opinion is we are an extremist RW State.

50+ years of brainwashing and social neglect has left an astonishingly ignorant and unsympathetic mob. I wouldn't be surprised at all to find that 95% or more of amerikans don't even understand what liberal is.

Like a pro-death penalty Christian, we just don't grasp the concept of America. :banghead:

[genie_weenie]

14. Come on people!

The US is right of whom? Who counts as Industrialized? Russia, China? Most European nations? So every other industrial nation got to this point in history with Popular Government supported Woodstock Festivals? With no crushing of dissent by Government and Big Business.

Sometimes I wonder what History books the DU reads. :shrug: