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In an attempt to be more positive (I've just had a crash course on The Secret, which sounds an awful lot like a self-help Barnum-ized version of the Golden Rule to me but I am trying to be positive and will not roll my eyes) and because there was a conversation about the state of the world and the US CiC that has left a bad, no-good, grumpy taste in my mouth, five things I love about the United States:
1) Movies - I don't know why Americans make the best movies but they do. And it probably has something to do with no. 2, below:
2) E pluribus unam a.k.a. "we will add your uniqueness to our own" - no other culture in the world so aggressively and enthusiastically borrows and embraces traits, qualities and characteristics of other cultures. Also 'plunders' but mostly in a good way.
3) New York City, which is almost a cheat because NYC arguably just happens to be in the United States as opposed to quintissentially American.
All cities have their own unique flavour - Montreal tastes of cigarette smoke and Maple Syrup. London tastes of rain and malt vinegar (and just a dash of curry). Paris is fresh bread and chestnuts along the Seine. Rome - incense and strong coffee. New York is exhaust and hot dogs on Times Square (while the street rumbles under your feet as a subway passes).
4)
1) Movies - I don't know why Americans make the best movies but they do. And it probably has something to do with no. 2, below:
2) E pluribus unam a.k.a. "we will add your uniqueness to our own" - no other culture in the world so aggressively and enthusiastically borrows and embraces traits, qualities and characteristics of other cultures. Also 'plunders' but mostly in a good way.
3) New York City, which is almost a cheat because NYC arguably just happens to be in the United States as opposed to quintissentially American.
All cities have their own unique flavour - Montreal tastes of cigarette smoke and Maple Syrup. London tastes of rain and malt vinegar (and just a dash of curry). Paris is fresh bread and chestnuts along the Seine. Rome - incense and strong coffee. New York is exhaust and hot dogs on Times Square (while the street rumbles under your feet as a subway passes).
4)
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. ...5) The Great Robber Barons and the tradition of philanthropy they instituted - see the Art Institute of Chicago, the Frick, the Cloisters, the Isabella Gardiner Gallery, the Getty and, in the case of Carnegie, and the Beaches Branch of the Toronto Public Library.
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