Things I like about the USA

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

(Background: a poster claimed I was being ‘anti-American’ for criticising the actions of certain of his compatriots, wrt Iraq and “Creation Science”. I thought I would put together a (non-exhaustive) list of things I like about the country. Note that I have put ‘free speech’ pretty high up the list. This is after only four visits spanning about 12 weeks, and nearly all of that in Northern California)

The size and connectedness.

The vibrancy and diversity

The spirit of adventure, of ‘lets have a go’

The Revolution. The successful insurgency war after it.

The Constitution and the Bill of Rights.

The traditional respect for democracy.

Free speech. The right to burn the flag.

The Underground Railroad.

Martin Luther King and all he achieved.

Abolition of capital punishment.

Traditional American isolationism.

Mark Twain

Raymond Chandler

Nathanel West

Joseph Heller

John Steinbeck

Kurt Vonnegut

Robert Sheckley

Philip Dick

Isaac Asimov

Harry Harrison

JD Salinger

ee cummings

Steve Martin

Lenny Bruce

Taxi Driver

Fight Club

A lot, but not even slightly most, but still a lot, of films.

A lot, but not even slightly most, but still a lot, of TV.

Star Trek (original TV series only)

MASH

Jefferson Airplane

Michelle Shocked

Hersh, Donnelly et al. Belly and The Throwing Muses.

The Pixies

Tom Waits

Public Enemy

Sonic Youth

The Black Keys

Keith LeBlanc

Cheech Marin and Tommy Chong

Gilbert Shelton

Franklin D Roosevelt

Thomas Jefferson

Abraham Lincoln

Muhammad Ali, more for his refusal to fight in Vietnam than for his
considerable boxing prowess

Jesse Owens, for being there to beat white athletes in front of a racist.

The Interstate Freeway system

The Hoover Dam

The Marshall Plan

Gemini

Apollo

Skylab

Hubble Space Telescope

Polaris, Poseidon and Trident (with reservations about the morality of the
weapons they carry; to launch underwater and carry five thermonukes at a time 4,600 miles with high accuracy is an awesome achievement)

P-51 Mustang (late models only)

B-24 Liberator

F-86 Sabre

F-104 Starfighter (late models with upward-firing seat!)

SR-71

X-15

XB-70

F-16 Falcon

Boeing 707

Boeing 737

Boeing 747

Quality beers cheap in every corner shop

Big Sur Coast; the Pacific coast in general

Oakland Bay Bridge

Commonalities and differences in language. Both.

Quaint old dollar bills

Quaint old public phones

The Internet; joint credit that one but substantially the US

Libraries and the US Mail

Time capsule quality of places like Niles. Refusal to have any truck with
any unit of measurement developed after 1650.

2

And that’s just one coast!

(But Skylab? Are you high?)

You left out our wonderful cuisine. Yes, I’m serious.

3

I agree with most of that list. For those who equate dissent with “Unamericanism”, I would remind of the importance of discourse and free speech to healthy PARTICIPATIVE democracy.

Hawk

4

As much complaining as I do about some of our policies/administration, I should say something positive, as well.

I love the regionality of our country. Hearing the accent of someone in Wisconsin or Minnesota, then conversely hearing someone from the deep south. Cultural differences can be quite dramatic depending on where you go. The food people eat, the tone of their skin, the size of people heads??? er… being tied to the Pacific NW or East Coast, etc… kind of interesting to think about how things developed and why they are they way they are today.

5

You left out Harvey Fierstein! Just how long did you think your homophobic Americaphobic theatraphobic showtunaphobic anti-Semitism would last before being unmasked?

Scottish Things I like:
J.K. Rowling (technically English, I know, but she wrote most of HP&t[S/P]S in Scotland)

Dougray Scott

Alexander Graham Bell (I don’t blame him for the cell phone)

Bloody history

John Knox (not really, but the beard was cool)

The Bay City Rollers

kilts (whether tartan or traditional)

Dougray Scott in a kilt

Dougray Scott in formalwear

wool

Robert Burns

Robert Louis Stephenson

David Hume

Whiskey

Dougray Scott drinking whiskey until he loses his kilt

Highland dancing

bagpipes

Clan MacLeod

Angus cattle

Allan Cumming (and his new cologne line )
Lots more I’m sure.

6

This is a puzzling entry.

And you forgot NPR - National Public Radio. Give 'em a listen next time you come through.

7

Uh…

8

…and TWINS!

9

Yeah… about that “Abolition of captal Punishment” bit. Yeah, that hasn’t actually happened.

10

We did abolish it. Of course, we brought it back later, but we abolished it.

11

Gosh!

Three real-life Americans who don’t know their own history! And on SDMB as well!

Regallag_The_Axe, Bruce_Daddy and UncleBeer:

UncleBeer, you were right about NPR. I listen to them regularly on webcast.

:slight_smile:

12

Say what you want about the U.S. but we have the best bathrooms, not to mention the softest toilet paper, in the world.

13

You bet. As I have remarked before, I wrote my mother a letter with a ball-point pen on Scottish toilet paper and never tore it once.

So there too.

14

Damn!

I forgot to include Frank Zappa!

15

Was this the same pen that even now is resting on the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean? :stuck_out_tongue:

16

Baseball

Jazz

National Parks

Hawaii

Rock ‘n’ Roll

Will Rogers

Amusement parks

Hot dogs

Walt Whitman

The Roaring 20s

Alaska

San Francisco

The Grand Canyon

Lena Horne

The Chrysler Building

The Model T, Mustang and Corvette

Stephen Spielberg

Dorothy and Lillian Gish

James Stewart

Walt Disney

Leonard Bernstein

Susan B. Anthony

Eleanor Roosevelt

The Lower Manhattan skyline

George Gershwin

Cole Porter

Rogers and Hammerstein

Stephen Sondheim

Silicone Valley

The Brooklyn Bridge

The Wright Brothers

Oprah Winfrey

Lance Armstrong

Nat “King” Cole

Laurel and Hardy

Katherine Hepburn

Charles A. Lindbergh

Frank Lloyd Wright

The post-WW2 economy

The Rocky Mountains

Marilyn Monroe

The transcontinental railroads

National Geographic

Ken Burns

17

Not to quibble but, the U.S. Supreme Court established a moratorium on Cap. Pun. with Furman v. Georgia. The Death Penalty was only set aside until the states drew policy in line with the Supreme Courts view of due process. The states unfortunately did so and the moratorium was lifted with Gregg v. Georgia.

18

The Simpsons

19

I have seen Newark, Cincinatti, Atlanta etc airports only. It is frustrating. I would so like to see the East. NYC obviously then Chicago, Wash DC…

What would fellow Dopers recommend?

Skylab rocked. One wing down, it was a casualty from the day it launched. I loved it. But it was the end of any meaningful manned space programme on your part. The Mars Rovers and the unmanned stuff. That is double-plus-brilliant! But where are we going with manned?

Your cuisine rocks in that it is slightly cheaper than where I live. Plus: quality of produce, fresh fruit, fresh herbs. Minus: no decent Indians, my staple when travelling here. Big minus: cannot easily find decent wholemeal bread without sweetener.

Your advice is welcome.

20

Avoiding Newark and Cincinnati, for starters.

Two things. 1) You’re not looking in the right place if you can’t find good Indian. I’ve got two places a five minute walk from me that both received enthusiastic thumbs up from a couple of UK friends. Although, come to think of it, I can’t recall getting good Indian on the west coast. Which brings me to point 2), you should be eating stuff you can’t get back in Scotland. Like good Mexican food, especially when you’re on the west coast.

Hmmm…most bakeries and whole food stores should have the bread you’re looking for. At least I would think.