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America By The Numbers

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katrina

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This was an essay written by a student at University of Miami and is blasting around Europe today. It is NO JOKE.



America By The Numbers



by Michael Ventura



02/03/05 - No concept lies more firmly embedded in our national character than the notion that the USA is "No. 1," "the greatest." Our broadcast media are, in essence, continuous advertisements for the brand name "America Is No. 1." Any office seeker saying otherwise would be committing political suicide. In fact, anyone saying otherwise will be labeled "un-American." We're an "empire," ain't we? Sure we are. An empire without a manufacturing base. An empire that must borrow $2 billion a day from its competitors in order to function. Yet the delusion is ineradicable. We're No. 1. Well...this is the country you really live in:



* The United States is 49th in the world in literacy (the New York Times, Dec. 12, 2004).



* The United States ranked 28th out of 40 countries in mathematical literacy (NYT, Dec. 12, 2004).



* Twenty percent of Americans think the sun orbits the earth. Seventeen percent believe the earth revolves around the sun once a day (The Week, Jan. 7, 2005).



* "The International Adult Literacy Survey...found that Americans with less than nine years of education 'score worse than virtually all of the other countries'" (Jeremy Rifkin's superbly documented book The European Dream: How Europe's Vision of the Future Is Quietly Eclipsing the American Dream, p.78).



* Our workers are so ignorant and lack so many basic skills that American businesses spend $30 billion a year on remedial training (NYT, Dec.

12, 2004). No wonder they relocate elsewhere!



* "The European Union leads the U.S. in...the number of science and engineering graduates; public research and development (R&D) expenditures; and new capital raised" (The European Dream, p.70).



* "Europe surpassed the United States in the mid-1990s as the largest producer of scientific literature" (The European Dream, p.70).



* Nevertheless, Congress cut funds to the National Science Foundation. The agency will issue 1,000 fewer research grants this year (NYT, Dec. 21, 2004).



* Foreign applications to U.S. grad schools declined 28 percent last year. Foreign student enrollment on all levels fell for the first time in three decades, but increased greatly in Europe and China. Last year Chinese grad-school graduates in the U.S. dropped 56 percent, Indians 51 percent, South Koreans 28 percent (NYT, Dec. 21, 2004). We're not the place to be anymore.



* The World Health Organization "ranked the countries of the world in terms of overall health performance, and the U.S. [was]...37th." In the fairness of health care, we're 54th. "The irony is that the United States spends more per capita for health care than any other nation in the world"

(The European Dream, pp.79-80). Pay more, get lots, lots less.



* "The U.S. and South Africa are the only two developed countries in the world that do not provide health care for all their citizens" (The European Dream, p.80). Excuse me, but since when is South Africa a "developed" country? Anyway, that's the company we're keeping.



* Lack of health insurance coverage causes 18,000 unnecessary American deaths a year. (That's six times the number of people killed on 9/11.) (NYT, Jan. 12, 2005.)



* "U.S. childhood poverty now ranks 22nd, or second to last, among the developed nations. Only Mexico scores lower" (The European Dream, p.81). Been to Mexico lately? Does it look "developed" to you? Yet it's the only "developed" country to score lower in childhood poverty.



* Twelve million American families--more than 10 percent of all U.S. households--"continue to struggle, and not always successfully, to feed themselves." Families that "had members who actually went hungry at some point last year" numbered 3.9 million (NYT, Nov. 22, 2004).



* The United States is 41st in the world in infant mortality. Cuba scores higher (NYT, Jan. 12, 2005).



* Women are 70 percent more likely to die in childbirth in America than in Europe (NYT, Jan. 12, 2005).



* The leading cause of death of pregnant women in this country is murder (CNN, Dec. 14, 2004).



* "Of the 20 most developed countries in the world, the U.S. was dead last in the growth rate of total compensation to its workforce in the 1980s.... In the 1990s, the U.S. average compensation growth rate grew only slightly, at an annual rate of about 0.1 percent" (The European Dream, p.39). Yet Americans work longer hours per year than any other industrialized country, and get less vacation time.



* "Sixty-one of the 140 biggest companies on the Global Fortune 500 rankings are European, while only 50 are U.S. companies" (The European Dream, p.66). "In a recent survey of the world's 50 best companies, conducted by Global Finance, all but one were European" (The European Dream, p.69).



* "Fourteen of the 20 largest commercial banks in the world today are European.... In the chemical industry, the European company BASF is the world's leader, and three of the top six players are European. In engineering and construction, three of the top five companies are European.... The two others are Japanese. Not a single American engineering and construction company is included among the world's top nine competitors. In food and consumer products, Nestlé and Unilever, two European giants, rank first and second, respectively, in the world. In the food and drugstore retail trade, two European companies...are first and second, and European companies make up five of the top ten. Only four U.S. companies are on the list" (The European Dream, p.68).



* The United States has lost 1.3 million jobs to China in the last decade (CNN, Jan. 12, 2005).



* U.S. employers eliminated 1 million jobs in 2004 (The Week, Jan. 14, 2005).



* Three million six hundred thousand Americans ran out of unemployment insurance last year; 1.8 million--one in five--unemployed workers are jobless for more than six months (NYT, Jan. 9, 2005).



* Japan, China, Taiwan, and South Korea hold 40 percent of our government debt. (That's why we talk nice to them.) "By helping keep mortgage rates from rising, China has come to play an enormous and little-noticed role in sustaining the American housing boom" (NYT, Dec. 4, 2004). Read that twice. We owe our housing boom to China, because they want us to keep buying all that stuff they manufacture.



* Sometime in the next 10 years Brazil will probably pass the U.S. as the world's largest agricultural producer. Brazil is now the world's largest exporter of chickens, orange juice, sugar, coffee, and tobacco. Last year, Brazil passed the U.S. as the world's largest beef producer. (Hear that, you poor deluded cowboys?) As a result, while we bear record trade deficits, Brazil boasts a $30 billion trade surplus (NYT, Dec. 12, 2004).



* As of last June, the U.S. imported more food than it exported (NYT, Dec. 12, 2004).



* Bush: 62,027,582 votes. Kerry: 59,026,003 votes. Number of eligible voters who didn't show up: 79,279,000 (NYT, Dec. 26, 2004). That's more than a third. Way more. If more than a third of Iraqis don't show for their election, no country in the world will think that election legitimate.



* One-third of all U.S. children are born out of wedlock. One-half of all U.S. children will live in a one-parent house (CNN, Dec. 10, 2004).



* "Americans are now spending more money on gambling than on movies, videos, DVDs, music, and books combined" (The European Dream, p.28).



* "Nearly one out of four Americans [believe] that using violence to get what they want is acceptable" (The European Dream, p.32).



* Forty-three percent of Americans think torture is sometimes justified, according to a PEW Poll (Associated Press, Aug. 19, 2004).



* "Nearly 900,000 children were abused or neglected in 2002, the last year for which such data are available" (USA Today, Dec. 21, 2004).



* "The International Association of Chiefs of Police said that cuts by the [Bush] administration in federal aid to local police agencies have left the nation more vulnerable than ever" (USA Today, Nov. 17, 2004).



No. 1? In most important categories we're not even in the Top 10 anymore. Not even close.



The USA is "No. 1" in nothing but weaponry, consumer spending, debt, and delusion.



Reprinted from the Austin Chronicle.

www.citypages.com/databank/26/1264/article12985.asp
 
This whole article seems overcome with liberal hogwash by looking at the places they got their facts from:

New York Times
The European Dream
Jeremy Rifkin

Ask yourself what country you would most like to live in.
 
I think your right Bull Burger. I like to put this stuff up for Steve and Cal to sink there teeth into. The only thing I can possibily agree with is the fact that alot of the stuff the stores are peddling says made in Thiawan and China. And I try NOT to buy them. People will believe anything and very seldom search for the truth. Or the news is onesided...
 
one missed fact by the numbers.......

95% of Europe is NOT speaking Germany because of America.


all the America bashing is getting old, the only thing you can count on is Europe to be there when THEY need US!
 
actually i think canada was fighting in europe be fore the usa was. Usa didnt go there untill pearl harbour happened.By that time canadian soldiers pretty much had it tamed down. :shock:
 
* The United States is 41st in the world in infant mortality. Cuba scores higher (NYT, Jan. 12, 2005).

"Infant mortality rate (per 1,000 live births) The probability of dying between birth and exactly one year of age, expressed per 1,000 live Births."

"First, there may have been a change in how infant mortality is measured. The question is, how does one decide what is a live birth followed by infant death (which counts as infant mortality) versus the miscarriage of a fetus followed by fetal death (which does not count). The hypothesis is that neonatologists may now perceive very small fetuses/infants as potentially viable, and are counting them as infants rather than fetuses."

"the changes in obstetrical practice may have affected the rates. There has been an increase in the number of caesarian deliveries of premature infants, suggesting that doctors were attempting to rescue fetuses who were thought to be in danger; and naturally some of these attempted rescues failed."

"International differences in infant mortality rates must be interpreted with caution, as there are significant international variations in clinical practices and the methods used to register live births."

with that taken into account, one must ask why the data does not reflect the almost heroic attempts by doctors in this country to save children that in most other countries would be considered stillborn or a late term miscarriage, and not counted. because the author was biased and wanted to only show that his biased data could show the worst in our great country.

But; this quote says it best;

"
In other words, advances in medicine are giving these babies a chance to be born, when they would likely have been considered late miscarriages in the past. We're actually able to give these babies a chance at life. I don't think that's a problem that needs a new government program, it's a miracle of science and will only get better.
 
All of those out and out lies should have earned him an A with his professor, facts be damned! Does anyone actually imagine this misguided youth will be moving to any of these other countries that he obviously deems superior?
 
In his latest book "The European Dream", Jeremy Rifkin looks at Europe's future with very rosy glasses. Contrary to the general feeling of pessimism reigning on the old continent, Rifkin (who has acted as an advisor to Commission President Prodi) sees the European vision of the future "quietly eclipsing the Americam Dream".

Rifkin's vision of the 'European Dream' stands in stark contrast to the gloomy perceptions of Europe's political and business leaders, who fear that the EU is losing its competitive advantages because of the challenges of globalisation, the ageing population and the lack of a culture of risk-taking plus a failure to push through deep structural reforms.
Positions:

Like a professional evangelist, Jeremy Rifkin mesmerised a full house with a 55-minute narrative of the demise of the American Dream and the rise of the European Dream. Using selective statistics and comparing Germany to California and France to Texas, Rifkin tried to prove that the Europeans do much better than they think.

Maybe the Heavily Quoted Author "socialist" Jeremy Rifkin thought he was writting a fiction novel?

Like this statistic he "forgot" to include:
US unemployment July 2005 5.25
EU unemployment 8.9

Canada 7.0
http://www.cbc.ca/story/business/national/2005/03/11/jobs-050311.html
 
Les said:
actually i think canada was fighting in europe be fore the usa was. Usa didnt go there untill pearl harbour happened.By that time canadian soldiers pretty much had it tamed down. :shock:


USA was in the European front long before Pearl Harbor happened.


If Canada had it "tamed down", how did we lose so many men over there?
 
Bull Burger said:
Les said:
actually i think canada was fighting in europe be fore the usa was. Usa didnt go there untill pearl harbour happened.By that time canadian soldiers pretty much had it tamed down. :shock:


USA was in the European front long before Pearl Harbor happened.


If Canada had it "tamed down", how did we lose so many men over there?

Sept. 5th 1939 USA declared neutrality.
Sept. 10th 1939 Canada declared war on Germany and officially entered WWII

Dec. 1941, immediately after Pearl Harbor the US declared war on Japan and then Germany declared war on the US. No American troops were in Europe before that.

Canada and England and the other allies didn't have it tamed down and we were getting slaughtered waiting for the US to join us. We greatly appreciated your help but I don't know why you would think the US was there at the beginning. I know that the Hollywood has made countless movies showing the US as the sole savior of Europe but that is not very factual.
 
Bill said:
Bull Burger said:
Les said:
actually i think canada was fighting in europe be fore the usa was. Usa didnt go there untill pearl harbour happened.By that time canadian soldiers pretty much had it tamed down. :shock:


USA was in the European front long before Pearl Harbor happened.


If Canada had it "tamed down", how did we lose so many men over there?

Sept. 5th 1939 USA declared neutrality.
Sept. 10th 1939 Canada declared war on Germany and officially entered WWII

Dec. 1941, immediately after Pearl Harbor the US declared war on Japan and then Germany declared war on the US. No American troops were in Europe before that.

Canada and England and the other allies didn't have it tamed down and we were getting slaughtered waiting for the US to join us. We greatly appreciated your help but I don't know why you would think the US was there at the beginning. I know that the Hollywood has made countless movies showing the US as the sole savior of Europe but that is not very factual.

Bill & Les,

Thanks for the great history lesson! You are both right. I apologize for my ignorance of the facts. It's been too many years since history class.

BB
 
Bull Burger said:
Bill said:
Bull Burger said:
USA was in the European front long before Pearl Harbor happened.


If Canada had it "tamed down", how did we lose so many men over there?

Sept. 5th 1939 USA declared neutrality.
Sept. 10th 1939 Canada declared war on Germany and officially entered WWII

Dec. 1941, immediately after Pearl Harbor the US declared war on Japan and then Germany declared war on the US. No American troops were in Europe before that.

Canada and England and the other allies didn't have it tamed down and we were getting slaughtered waiting for the US to join us. We greatly appreciated your help but I don't know why you would think the US was there at the beginning. I know that the Hollywood has made countless movies showing the US as the sole savior of Europe but that is not very factual.

Bill & Les,

Thanks for the great history lesson! You are both right. I apologize for my ignorance of the facts. It's been too many years since history class.

BB

No apology necessary BB, I enjoy your posts. It is surprising how many Americans and Canadians don't know the facts of WWII and I suspect Hollywood's portrayal of it is a large reason.
 
Isn't it interesting how bad things are in the United States and we still have to spend billions of $ guarding our borders from illegal immigration!
 

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