Marco, Rog, All
The contention that all the rest of the World seems to watch and discuss
all things US to a greater degree than Americans watch and discuss the
World is sadly to a large degree true. One inherent problems with this
exchange is that a majority of the information, going in either
direction, is by and large filtered through American media, primarily
television. And a majority of all television programming, even the news,
is based on an entertainment model. So to a large degree what the World
sees and discusses as "the real US", is mythology; a blend of
'situational comedy' , 'docu-drama cop show' portraits with a dash of
'Who Wants to be a Millionare' thrown in for good measure. This leads to
"other-worldly" views of both that
are overly broad misguided generalizations.
Marco
> I think that the USA is somewhat for Europe what NYC is for the USA. It's the
> center of quasi everything. I guess that in Nebraska they talk about NYC more
> than in NYC they talk about Nebraska.
3WD
This is one of those mythological stereotypes. If on Sept 10th we could
have somehow monitored all thoughts and communications of all Nebraskans
and all New Yorkers we would have found that the groups of each thinking
or talking about the other would have been so small as to be virturally
undetectable. And if we asked both a question like, "Where is the center
of everything in America?" A majority New Yorkers probably would have
answered"NYC", while the response from the Nebraskans would have been
much more varied with "NYC" no where near the majority. And if we were
to ask
Nebraskans, "Where is the center of your life?" New York wouldn't have
even been on the list!
But these myths are not without value, for while the terrorists have
declared "war on America" and espoused that they want to "kill
Americans" and "destroy America" they made a serious tactical mistake,
they attacked "American icons" in lieu of real "war" targets.
And while horrific for everyone except the terrorists, if they had
executed this strike as well as they did with clear military objectives
and 'real' war targets the deaths, destruction, damage, and TERROR to
the world would have been much, much, worse.
Whether America and its allies will make the same mistake in responding
is still an open question.
Marco
>Twins separated at birth.
> (by Fabrizio Rondolino)
> Its immense force is not in its military power, in its richness, or in its
> cultural hegemony, conquered by means of Hollywood, Rock 'n roll and Coca Cola.The invincible force of America resides in that it doesn't acknowledge the art
> of dialectics (that is an European creation, modern and leftist), and in that it
> ignores the dialectic's pretension [unsupported claim] of passing over the contradictions of the world as it is, in order to build with an higher synthesis the world as it should be. America let contradictions live and survive, refuses to control and bring them to a synthesis, and on this path is able to produce everything and the opposite of everything: Vietnam war and pacifism, Mc Donald's and biological farms, IBM and the hackers, globalization and the Seattle people. The Left could learn from America many things; but, for that, it should rethink itself radically.
3WD
At first reading this seemed so right, but the reasoning seemed wrong.
Surely Americans not only acknowledge the art of "dialectics", but
regularly use them.
dialectic n. 1. [often pl] the art or practise of examining opinions or
ideas logically, often by the method of questions and answer, so as to
determine their validity.
But the "dialectics" of which Mr Rondolino speaks are these:
dialectic n. 3[often pl] the method of logic used by Hegel and adapted
by Marx to observable social and economic processes: it is based on the
principle that an idea or event (thesis) generates its opposite
(antithesis), leading to a reconciliation of opposites (synthesis)
Which leads "the Left" to think that if they can control the events
(thesis) the (antithesis) can be predicted as can the (synthesis). What
was not realized is that the events are much more complexed,
simultaneously occurring as they do on many levels, so that even if one
could somehow control the events the consequences are beyond absolute
predication that is necessary to make the process work.
The pragmatism inherent in the American approach is based allowing or
initiating similar yet slightly different events running in parallel
and then letting the "market" in the broadest sense, select what is best.
3WD
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