really jarring coming back to the US after traveling to Asia for the last three weeks

[Anonymous]

You are free to leave.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You are free to leave.

Not OP, but do you have zero complaints about this country? Even when a certain person was POTUS? Did you leave the country?

[Anonymous]

And yet here you are.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You are free to leave.

Not OP, but do you have zero complaints about this country? Even when a certain person was POTUS? Did you leave the country?

NP here. I think the frustration is that many here are making simple comparisons when it’s not so simple. That and the fact that they completely ignore they are part of the problem. So you went to a resort for two weeks. You are still an American living in the US. Who exactly are you referring to when you trash Americans? If you live here and trash Americans but are not American, one can only wonder what keeps you here. Oh yeah, it’s $$$$$. The same thing most of you complain about. If you are American, it’s weird when you refer to “Americans” like you are somehow different than the rest of us because you visited Euro Disney.

That’s my beef. You fools are part of the system you are criticizing. Yes, we are not perfect. See how I included myself in that?

PS. I would love for our public toilets to be as clean as Japan but I understand why they aren’t.

[Anonymous]

I think people are making good points on both sides of this debate. As a 50-year old, I am somewhat depressed at where our country has been headed with respect to national infrastructure and government services, however. I blame on part the Reagan revolution which started or accelerated the war on federal government (which Trump really super-charged by affirmatively trying to destroy basically all federal agencies), plus our American sense of independence which really seems to be spinning out of control. The 20th century had a couple major shocks that pulled people together in a common interest — the Great Depression led to much infrastructure through the WPA and TVA, for instance, and WW2 led to the development of the interstate highway system and many bridge improvements so we could move military equipment across the country. We just don’t seem to hand together like that anymore. There’s no sense of shared sacrifice to create something communal. If your schools stink, people want tax credits to send their kids to private. People throw trash on the ground and if you ask them not to do that, you’re derided as a busybody. People are impressed by a presidential candidate that pays no taxes and it is what every rich person and corporation aspires to.
Then you also have things like citizens United that have basically destroyed our system of government. Our Congress is barely functional — it takes years to get one piece of functional legislation like ACA or Infrastructure and everything grinds to a halt in the meantime.
I’m a born of the 4th of July patriotic American who really does think this is the best country in the world but it is all rather depressing. It’s like we’re actively sabotaging ourselves as a country.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well that’s one narrow part of Asia. Visit Bangladesh and you’ll kiss the linoleum at JFK.

Have you been to Bangladesh or are you just generalizing?

Yes, I do business regularly in Bangladesh. Have you been?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You are free to leave.

Free to leave but not free to immigrate to Japan!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:America is merely a corporation only caring about generating more employees to generate more profits for the wealthy.

- said the Marxist weirdo.

If you are not a cog in the machine most likely living paycheck to paycheck, kids attending low ranked schools, eating processed foods, and will rarely be a home owner in many cities etc...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think people are making good points on both sides of this debate. As a 50-year old, I am somewhat depressed at where our country has been headed with respect to national infrastructure and government services, however. I blame on part the Reagan revolution which started or accelerated the war on federal government (which Trump really super-charged by affirmatively trying to destroy basically all federal agencies), plus our American sense of independence which really seems to be spinning out of control. The 20th century had a couple major shocks that pulled people together in a common interest — the Great Depression led to much infrastructure through the WPA and TVA, for instance, and WW2 led to the development of the interstate highway system and many bridge improvements so we could move military equipment across the country. We just don’t seem to hand together like that anymore. There’s no sense of shared sacrifice to create something communal. If your schools stink, people want tax credits to send their kids to private. People throw trash on the ground and if you ask them not to do that, you’re derided as a busybody. People are impressed by a presidential candidate that pays no taxes and it is what every rich person and corporation aspires to.
Then you also have things like citizens United that have basically destroyed our system of government. Our Congress is barely functional — it takes years to get one piece of functional legislation like ACA or Infrastructure and everything grinds to a halt in the meantime.
I’m a born of the 4th of July patriotic American who really does think this is the best country in the world but it is all rather depressing. It’s like we’re actively sabotaging ourselves as a country.

9/11 was the moment where we could have turned things around. We had the unity.

Instead, we pursued a bunch of land wars in Asia.

[Anonymous]

We did a road trip from Canada through Detroit to Oregon. I was shocked how bad the roads were in MIchigan, INdiana, etc - crazy potholes, like a country road. in Canada. And these were highways, not country trails. It's also noticeable when you go over the border to Washington State. IT's sad. It makes the US seem poor.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was just in Singapore for the first time and after hearing how incredibly clean and modern it is from many people I was really surprised by the amount of litter I saw all over as well as the strange dearth of garbage cans anywhere. I wasn’t nearly as impressed as I expected to be.

I wasn't impressed visiting the US, because they call themselves #1 for everything, yet all you need to do is drive through MLK Blvd. in Baltimore where it looks like a real life epsode of the Walking Dead with all of the homeless drug users everywhere. So many boarded up row homes in many US cities that make it look like Baghdad.

Singapore is incredibly clean compared to how much human dookie and pee is on the streets in many US cities from all of the homeless people everywhere. There's really no neighborhood in Singapore as filthy and disgusting as Skid Row in SF or Kensington in Philly, for example. I mean Kensington in Philly really makes you call into question whether the US is a first world country.

Well, the executions for drug use help Singapore maintain its streets unpopulated by the homeless. Ready for that?

Yes

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was just in Singapore for the first time and after hearing how incredibly clean and modern it is from many people I was really surprised by the amount of litter I saw all over as well as the strange dearth of garbage cans anywhere. I wasn’t nearly as impressed as I expected to be.

I wasn't impressed visiting the US, because they call themselves #1 for everything, yet all you need to do is drive through MLK Blvd. in Baltimore where it looks like a real life epsode of the Walking Dead with all of the homeless drug users everywhere. So many boarded up row homes in many US cities that make it look like Baghdad.

Singapore is incredibly clean compared to how much human dookie and pee is on the streets in many US cities from all of the homeless people everywhere. There's really no neighborhood in Singapore as filthy and disgusting as Skid Row in SF or Kensington in Philly, for example. I mean Kensington in Philly really makes you call into question whether the US is a first world country.

Well, the executions for drug use help Singapore maintain its streets unpopulated by the homeless. Ready for that?

Yes

When I was there I saw several people sleeping in parks - not the scale I see in the US but definitely some.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The terrible state of US infrastructure is widely known. Why are posters getting so offended by OP’s post? The average age of bridges in the US is 44 years but most were designed for a 50 year service life. Over 43,000 bridges are classified as structurally deficient and in poor condition. Why have they been neglected?

Well, 33 OECD countries collect more tax as a % of GDP than the US. Nobody wants to pay tax.

I’m not offended I just think it’s stupid. As you say, it’s widely known, but OP is treating it like breaking news.

You may not be offended but there are a bunch of really ridiculous responses which have nothing to do with infrastructure. It's like these posters' feelings are hurt because someone criticised American infrastructure, so they respond by denigrating any country with better infrastructure or implying there is some sort of trade-off between good infrastructure and diversity/freedom.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We did a road trip from Canada through Detroit to Oregon. I was shocked how bad the roads were in MIchigan, INdiana, etc - crazy potholes, like a country road. in Canada. And these were highways, not country trails. It's also noticeable when you go over the border to Washington State. IT's sad. It makes the US seem poor.

Interesting. I just drive the interstates between MD and IL, and they were more or less fine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well that’s one narrow part of Asia. Visit Bangladesh and you’ll kiss the linoleum at JFK.

Bangladesh is a third world country.

US, S.Korea and Japan are first world countries.

OMG.

You DID NOT just use the bigoted, racist, discriminatory, classist term “third world country.”

You really need to be banned from DCUM forever.

dp.. is this a joke. Oh, no, it's not. DC in HS just told me how now they want to ban the phrase.

btw, I'm Asian American.

This is so dumb. So we will just use different phrasing to describe OBVIOUS differences in countries? "less developed, more developed" Ooookaaay, because don't know what you really mean. /s