Neither is the nation called “America”. If we’re allowed to lop off the “United States of”, why aren’t we allowed to lop off the “North” or “South”? And one can perfectly well refer to “the Americas”, meaning North and South together.
Meanwhile, it’s perhaps a pet peeve of mine, but “the Americas” is not synonymous with “the Western Hemisphere”. Ireland, Portugal, Iceland, and several African countries all lie entirely in the western hemisphere, as well as large chunks of Great Britain, France, and Spain.
Not so. The zero line of longitude going through Britain is a 19th-century invention. “Western hemisphere” already meant (more or less) “New world” long before that.
The same reason that those in North Dakota and South Dakota would be angry if you said they were from Dakota. But if you said they were from the Dakotas it’d be ok.
I for one will begin to call the country formerly informally know as “Mexico” The United States of Mexico.
Actually, No, I won’t. I’m sticking with Mexico for the USM, America for the USA. You know what I mean when I say America, don’t try to pretend otherwise.
I will though, retract the above, if some other conglomerate of nations/states in “The Americas” comes up with a name that includes it. e.g. The Latin Association of America. Until then, USA=America is in commmon use.
As to the OP, I’d just say things were a bit different in the world in the 17th century and leave it at that.
Because then you’d be creating a collision where none existed previously.
And as long as nothing else on Earth is referred to that way, there is no confusion.
This is unhelpful pedantry. The line of 0 longitude does not define the western hemisphere in any sense other than a strictly technical one related to latitude/longitude calculations. The western hemisphere is usually defined according to cultural and historical divisions relating to the history of colonization and later political developments growing from that. Simply cutting the Earth in half is a useless tautology springing from a completely arbitrary invention.
Well, a fall has to be preceded by a rise, no? But yes, I said “rise” when I meant “fall”.
I agree that at first read the NY Times article seems to imply a causal link, but it’s not said explicitly, and it’s possible that the author didn’t imply a causal link.
Why not use the Dutch experience to help out in the aftermath of Katrina?
Their engineers could help us with the dikes and levees and the refugees could have one heck of a barbeque putting local politicians to a higher use than they have served so far.
I call us American and if I need to be specific I’ll use USA. Obviously this is a personnel peccadillo, I use to work for a USA & Canadian company and the Canadian were a little sensitive to American being co-opted by the people of the US. I guess this was an unfounded concern.