USA#1INEVERYTHING!!!

these god damn euros think they're soooooooo cool with their skinny jeans and pacifist attitudes

america rocks and if we werent so busy putting a hurting on the terrorists we'd probably invade your crappy countries on general principle

liberate not invade

oops sorry

i should change that before i offend some of these euro pantywaists

Originally Posted by Rayn

he also has the benefit of living in a country that doesn't feel like it has to pay for nearly all other countries of the world with aid.

This. How many other countries came running to Haiti? Not many. Yet they make it seem like it's the job of the USA to fix Haiti. Same thing with Africa. The USA is the police of the entire world. None of those countries give back to us. We saved Kuwait, over threw a dictator in Iraq who set oil fields on fire. We put out the fires, do we get free oil from it? No.

So I completely agree we should care more about ourselves instead of trying to save screwed up nations. All the help we give won't change things in the long run. Kuwait, Iraq, Haiti, Africa, still **** holes after everything we did.

Originally Posted by NoGodForMe

Kuwait, Iraq, Haiti, Africa, still **** holes after everything we did.

ngfm on fire this morning.

Kuwait is a pro-Western oil-producing country in the resource-rich Middle East that allows a U.S. military presence within it.

Iraq disagreed with Kuwait's lower price of oil.

Originally Posted by h4rdluck

Well that is nice. but those countries are so tiny they can't really support much of a population. I mean honestly no America isn't THE BEST place to live. But when you think about quality of life, combined with opportunity, and education (Yea maybe other countries do out do us on QOL and Education...but certainly no one is even close to opportunity) And then factor in how many godamn people live here and you realize that overall....American really IS one of the best places to live.

You are talking about small little countries that don't have much to offer anyone else in the world and focus specifically on their own citizens. Yea that may be the best place in the world for an individual to live, but in reality denmark only has a population of 5.5million and sweeden 9.5million.

I mean **** France only has a population of 60 million. We are still supporting 310million people in our country.

That is my gauge of "best country to live in" Look at the population statistics for countries. United states is the only one in the top 10 (besides japan and I am not sure that is considered one of the best places to live either) that I would even REMOTELY want to live in.

It is a lot easier to provide for your people when there aren't as many to please.

Basically you need to find a country with 1/4 our population before you start finding countries I would actually consider someplace I would move.

While its pretty lame for American's to be like "America is the best place to live" and "America has the Most opportunity" I can't necessarily disagree...I'm not a big fan of shouting it out to the world. But there is still truth to the statement.

This is some of the oddest reasoning about which country is "best" I've ever seen. Considering how easy it is to travel around Europe, I think it makes more sense to compare the EU to the US than any specific country. Besides in the end you live in a single city (assuming you want a lot of population). So in Sweden you could live in Stockholm. In Denmark you could live in Copenhagen.

Really "the best" country is a total opinion. I'd personally like to stay in the US because of the friends I have here, but even I would like to end up in San Diego again over everywhere else. So I guess I could say that San Diego is best and I don't give a **** about most of the rest of the US. I would rather live in Stockholm than 95% of this country (simply because I know it better). It really comes down to where you're culturally rooted and how much that affects you.

lol i used to troll mitch a decent amount, but i've grown to like the guy

cheers, mitchdubai


kremsamerica

Originally Posted by Rayn

i don't think america is the best place to live
seems to me i have to work like hell and so does my female counterpart to have the best possible quality of life.
i might get 3 weeks vacation during a year and work long hours.

my friend who lives in europe has 2 months vacation. makes more than me. has free health care, and was able to afford a house before I could. his taxes are about equivalent and he can visit a number of other countries without crossing an ocean. he also has the benefit of living in a country that doesn't feel like it has to pay for nearly all other countries of the world with aid.

dunno, I don't really like working my life away. seems like I do and he doesn't. I'm not sure what I'm getting to make up for that?

This would be my major argument why living in US was not so great.
that and the cost of education etc.

In finland we have free education through high school, university costs me 90e a year (30e if I don't take the medical benefits) that is roughly 120 dollars a year. Which means free lectures, free activities & events... no tuition needed. And while I am studying goverment gives me money, pays 80% of my rent and I get 292e monthly (which is 400 dollars). This money is something I do not have to pay back ever, the requirement for me having this benefit is that I complete my studies in time. If this money is not enough the government loans me 1000 dollars a month, without intrest as long as I am studying.

Now i bet you might argue the quality of education will be lower this way, but feel free to google educational statistics. Finland is one of best educated countries in the world. By any measure.

Then there is the universal healthcare. And again you might argue the quality of treatment would suffer, but then again we have private sector for those who are willing to spend more money on their treatment, and the quality is also very very good. (we have soccer players from all over the europe coming to finland to get their surgeries done etc.)

And if you ever fall unemployed the government will support you.
and once your career is over, again the government pays your pension.

Granted our taxes are higher than anywhere in US.

US indeed has great opportunities for those that work really really hard.
But IMO quality of life is about having a good balance between free time & work.
In alot of places you don't have to work so much to have enough money to enjoy your freetime.

americans do work too hard

or at least spend too much time at work

i dont know about you dudes but i work to live not live to work

Originally Posted by Denver

This would be my major argument why living in US was not so great.
that and the cost of education etc.

In finland we have free education through high school, university costs me 90e a year (30e if I don't take the medical benefits) that is roughly 120 dollars a year. Which means free lectures, free activities & events... no tuition needed. And while I am studying goverment gives me money, pays 80% of my rent and I get 292e monthly (which is 400 dollars). This money is something I do not have to pay back ever, the requirement for me having this benefit is that I complete my studies in time. If this money is not enough the government loans me 1000 dollars a month, without intrest as long as I am studying.

Now i bet you might argue the quality of education will be lower this way, but feel free to google educational statistics. Finland is one of best educated countries in the world. By any measure.

Then there is the universal healthcare. And again you might argue the quality of treatment would suffer, but then again we have private sector for those who are willing to spend more money on their treatment, and the quality is also very very good. (we have soccer players from all over the europe coming to finland to get their surgeries done etc.)

And if you ever fall unemployed the government will support you.
and once your career is over, again the government pays your pension.

Granted our taxes are higher than anywhere in US.

US indeed has great opportunities for those that work really really hard.
But IMO quality of life is about having a good balance between free time & work.
In alot of places you don't have to work so much to have enough money to enjoy your freetime.

It's not free if someone is paying for it.

yes yes nothing is free.

that is however not the point here.
the point is if I want to have university level education, I can proceed to have it and not work my ass off at mcdonalds at the same time to raise the money for it.

Its sure as hell better than working to survive.

That fact of the matter is many of us are stuck in America. We don't have a choice. As far as education being cheaper... Well I can't get the degree I'm obtaining elsewhere except in Canada / United Kingdom / New Zealand / and Australia. And then their degrees are 5-6 years compared to our 4 years (But they also let people in at a younger age with less education) And the education is same price since i'm not a citizen.

I could never pick up, move to another country, gain citizenship, and then attend these colleges without sacrificing anything less than probably 5-6 years.

You just can't pick up and move. If you could I'll bet many of you would.

And complaining about not being able to visit different countries? I dunno that is just a matter of how you born. and geographics. I hate this attitude that people think they could just pickup and leave and move to a new country.

As far as not wanting to help out the rest of the world. No ****. You think I wanna spend money on haiti? But to ignore globalization, and to only hold your own countries self interest in mind is obsolete, and Europe and the EU don't realize this. I'm not sure when they will. We get **** when we don't "Help Out Enough". Just the fact that we catch **** from Europe for "Not helping out" when they honestly don't contribute **** ever shows you hold selfish and conservative the EU really is.

This isn't 1600's where everyone out to grab as much for themselves as possible. Those days are long gone. Selfish attitudes only exist to keep smaller countries isolated and allow them to take care of their own problems, but the problems surrounding them get larger.

If there really was more a global mindset more of the burden would be lifted off of America. But this ain't gunna happen any time soon. I doubt europeans would be able to live their luxurous life style either if they had to carry more of the global burden.

So yea it sucks dick that we work so hard and "have so little". I think it really sucks when people work 60-80 hours a week to keep their **** but then also maybe they should learn to live more below their means too. I don't plan on buying an expensive car and an expensive house that taxes my own resources beyond their means.

If you are buying a house that you can't save up more than 6 months worth of mortgage on you should have bought said house. Same goes for anything. How many people actually do this though? Most of our problems in America are brought on by ourselves.

And as far as education goes. I don't feel sorry for people who spend 120k on an undergrad degree in a subject that is guaranteed to NEVER land them a job that could hope to pay that loan off. You don't go out of state to a private college to get a retarded ****ing degree. I'm spending 120k on a medical degree after only spending 20k on an undergrad degree. Yea the loan is gunna be a mortgage in and of itself, but I went into a field that is literally starving for workers and will more than allow me to pay back my loans and lead a semi-relaxed lifestyle.

i learned a lot about time management and budgeting while working 30+ hours a week and taking a full time course load while making dick for money

of course if i could trade it for a govt stipend and $100 tuition i would in a heart beat

So we think alike.

No reason to argue then!

Originally Posted by Denver

yes yes nothing is free.

that is however not the point here.
the point is if I want to have university level education, I can proceed to have it and not work my ass off at mcdonalds at the same time to raise the money for it.

Point is someone is working their ass off at mcdonalds so you can pretend your education is free.

Originally Posted by Glare

i learned a lot about time management and budgeting while working 30+ hours a week and taking a full time course load while making dick for money

of course if i could trade it for a govt stipend and $100 tuition i would in a heart beat

Yeah but Americans are Taxed Enough Already.

Originally Posted by Vanster

Yeah but Americans are Taxed Enough Already.

Right, and it's going up even more when the Bush tax cuts expire. The government can not continue to print money. Needs to shrink, instead it's getting larger with more wasteful programs. I mean, you hear about programs that were started years ago that were supposed to be temporary, and now they have 100k+ employees. Why? Homeland defense is one of them.

Homeland defense is all that stands between us and Canada.