Otisburg??
Even if we make it through the next four years with our Democracy intact, one of the most lasting affects of the Trump administration will be an understanding by the rest of the world that any pact, treaty or agreement that they make with uthe United States, will be valid for at most 4 years, and could be rendered void with the start of the next administration.
Honestly, the name “Gulf of Mexico” seems more America-centric than “Gulf of America” since it assumes “America” is the default.
Just like how naming one smurf “Smurfette” just underscores that we are meant to assume all other smurfs are male, despite them all being named after their professions.
It’s also probably worth nothing that, if you travel within Central or South America, when they ask you where you’re from, it’s ‘correct’ to say “United States,” and not “America.”
Because – as is likely self-evident – Central and South America are also Americas.
So, one way to think about it is that our flag-humping President-elect seems to have fucked this one up, too.
Is Trump going to do this by Sharpie?
He probably thinks he can just call Rand McNally and it would be a done deal.
Or Mexico. “Estados Unidos” is what the USA is called there. Very important to remember when going through customs on the Mexico side (when you are looking at signage and stuff at least).
Yeah. I should have specifically mentioned that Mexico and Canada are also both “America.”
ETA: and, to be more precise …
As are all the countries that make up the continent below us, like Brazil, Venezuela, Chile and Peru. AMERICA is a pretty big place, among which the United States OF America are a part of North and South America.
Formally “Estados Unidos de America”, as opposed to “Estados Unidos Mexicanos” which is the formal name for Mexico (the United Mexican States).
If you count North and South America as one landmass I guess that’s true, but no part of the US is on the South American continent.
Sometimes I’m annoyed by the fact that I live in Washington State, which has a stupid name since Washington was already the name of the nation’s capital more than a century earlier. And now if I say I’m from Washington I have to specify that I mean the state because people will assume that I mean the city.
And Washington State is part of the United States of America, which is a mouthful to say, but it’s also called “America” and I’m “American” even though “America” is also the name of two different continents, one of which my country is part of.
I mean, basically I live in a state with no imagination within a country with no imagination.
Okay, serious question, how do things like gulfs, oceans, etc., get names (and who has authority to change them?) We don’t own the Gulf of Mexico, so I doubt we have naming rights.
There’s no central naming authority. It’s all convention.
So, even if Congress were to entertain this (current) insane notion, it would just mean that official federal documents have to refer to a certain region of seawater in a certain way.
Just like Elon Musk can call his social media platform whatever he wants and have his employees do so, but I will still just call it Twitter because there’s nobody stopping me from doing so.
That said, for certain regions with well defined and long standing and established boundaries (even if those boundaries may shift over the years) like say Virginia or France, there’s no reason for everybody to come up with their own names (unless they had an old one from waaaay back in the day). They just use the conventional ones because there’s no reason not to.
Exactement! As the a French would say.
Hey, don’t tell him! He might want to do that instead.
I heard it on “All Things Considered” about an hour ago. Here’s another link.
Hoo Boy! That’s a whole nuther thread…
Funny how he didn’t campaign by saying “I’m going to change the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America, I’m going to change the name of Mt. Denali back to McKinley, I’m going to buy Greenland and make the Danes pay for it, and I’m going to annex Canada.” I think his cheese has slid off his cracker.
I don’t much care for the nazis, but I would love to have been at one of their rallies where they surrounded the stadium with antiaircraft spotlights.
He’ll go down as the greatest con man in history, if for nothing else.
Large parts of the world consider America to be one continent.