Perspective on the US from an expat working in China

[Cicero]

Originally Posted by Riddil

And Cicero, actually I'm not against the influx of Mexicans into the US at all. I am against the ILLEGAL influx of Mexicans. However, I think we should set up a simple registration system to make it just as easy for just as many Mexicans to come into the country. Get them tax payer numbers, and get them paying taxes. The beef I have with the current system is they come in, get paid under the table, and send all that money home. If you're working in the US, you should be paying taxes in the US.

Anyhow, I digress, my real point with immigration is that it's silly how easy we make it for uneducated illegals, and so difficult for educated professionals. I don't only mean Easterners, either. I say open up the gates and let Europeans, Africans, South Americans, whatever, let 'em come on in. We should lock out the poor Mexicans to match the difficult process for everyone else. We should clean them both up, and make it easy for people to move into the US.

And yes, "whatever it takes to stay at the top", INCLUDING bringing in foreigners to take top jobs. How many stories are there from the end of the 1800's, and beginning of the 1900's about some immigrant coming from Europe and building a massively successful company? The quality work they do makes American companies more competitive, and the companies they create give jobs to more Americans, and the income they earn is injected into the US.

Who cares if they talk with an accent? Their kids won't.

The illegals:They do pay taxes, because they have homes. Illegal, but they do pay. They also pay sales taxes at grocery stores etc. etc. Everyone pays. There is no way around any of that. Not that I am taking up for that. I live in an area full of illegal nationals and I don't like what is being done here. I think we do need to stop them from pouring into the United States in droves. This is already a great deal of stress on our allocation of federal and state funding that is supposed to go to naturalized citizens. I agree, get the ones here registered! Good Idea. But this has to stop. We need to limit the influx of immigrants and work with who we have here already. We are Americans and can self-sustain. I believe in the power of the American people to be steadfast, work hard, and pull themselves up by their own boot-straps.

I think your idea about immigration is specious. Like a common school-boy who can tediously string words together and not actually understand what he is saying nor the implications. Charming. (As the teachers clap from the side-lines) How is your immigration idea going to promote self-responsibility and progressive education? You are talking about the inevitability of common Americans becoming a slave race to corporate, immigrant, political leaders that do not have a respect for our way of life, our Constitution, our Bill of Rights, and thereby negating the essence of who we are. We are a people that have made great strides, and many advances since our founding fathers came here not too long ago. We have made countless contributions to the world, the best one I can think of, but receding currently, is freedom, and basic human rights. Your idea of getting to the top by any means makes you, sir, a (edited) bully-boy that blah blah blah...... You have lost all respect for what it means to be a common American laboring away at his blue-collar job to feed his family for a decent, still unlivable,wage. My husband is one of these people. He works 6 days a week and sweats to help get us by. He is skilled in his area. His company is making responsible advances. He is on the cutting-edge of systems that might help other countries to self-sustain as well.
Maybe you are describing Americans that are a projection of yourself.
Greedy for advances, over-production, be on top no matter what, and all of it will become waste, when there are good, hard-working Americans out there that fight for our way of life, and how to maintain what we have now and are concerned about our future.

Yes, foreigners have made many advances. But there are many great contributions made by Americans that you try and negate by spelling that out. I call bait and switch. We aren't going to see eye to eye on this. So what? I have seen personal evolutions that were american-made. And only possible in America.

Anyway, you are becoming a Riddil wrapped around a nightmare, and I see the direction you are heading. I find what you are saying to be (unintentionally as it may be) insulting. Which is why I sound like an asshole. I'm really not an asshole but I think you are trying to take advantage of the current american chaos, like everyone else in the world might like to, to have it run by a foreign, tyrannical elite class. You are talking about a foreign, legalized, occupation of the United States.

So. I guess I will go stick my head in the sand. I am bound to get butt-raped for this. But you know what? I call bull-shit. I Love the verbiage and good luck on your journey. I guess I'll stand in this thread alone and say my peace as stupid, lazy, American, but I am not so easily convinced. (oh and we are stubborn too)


I wish my over-qualified, underpaid, genius, fellow-americans would get to run a top job. That's what I wish. I know a lot of really smart hard-working Americans stuck in a meat-grinder. And you would like to turn the handle.

Well, thank you for helping me to the realization of how much I actually do believe in this country myself. It just gets lodged in the back of my brain because of my petty complaints.

[Razzmatazz13]

I'd just like to hop in here and say that this thread is TERRIBLY interesting...do continue.

*sits on floor indian-style with head on hands, in starry eyed amazement*

[ZenGum]

Originally Posted by Razzmatazz13

I'd just like to hop in here and say that this thread is TERRIBLY interesting...do continue.

*sits on floor indian-style with head on hands, in starry eyed amazement*

I think you're looking for this smiley :

Cicero, I hope that was cathartic for you. I wasn't really following the immigration sub-thread in this thread, but I might go and read up on it.

[Razzmatazz13]

Good smiley, but not quite what I was going for...not in the mood for popcorn you see...

[Cicero]

Yes, I feel better. Thank you.

[classicman]

You are not completely alone Cicero.

[TheMercenary]

There is no way you can compare the opressive government of China to the Democracy of the US. The list of things the government does to opress free speech, movement, the things they did to Tibet, good God to think that in some way the US or any western style democracy is worse than the things China has done to its people is pure and utter bull shit.

[TheMercenary]

Yea, great country that China, polluting the whole place in an effort to get ahead of everyone else economically. Damm the torpedos full steam ahead. They build 3 or 4 coal fired plants per month to our last ONE in 20 years. Have a look:
http://www.cellar.org/showpost.php?p=413008&postcount=1

[TheMercenary]

THE DOWNSIDE OF THE BOOM
China's Poison for the Planet
By Andreas Lorenz and Wieland Wagner

Can the environment withstand China's growing economic might? As one of the planet's worst polluters, Beijing's ecological sins are creating problems on a global scale. Many countries are now feeling the consequences.

The cloud of dirt was hard to make out from the ground, but at an altitude of 10,000 meters (32,808 feet), the scientists could see the gigantic mass of ozone, dust and soot with the naked eye. In a specially outfitted aircraft taking off from Munich airport, they surveyed a brownish mixture stretching from Germany all the way to the Mediterranean Sea.

These kinds of clouds float above Europe for most of the year and they've traveled far to get there. By analyzing the makeup of particles in the cloud, European scientists were able to identify its origin. "There was a whole bunch from China in there," says Andreas Stohl, a 38-year-old from the Norwegian Institute for Air Research.

Some 12,000 kilometers (7,500 miles) to the west, Steven Cliff is slowly winding his way up Mount Tamalpais near San Francisco in his RV. The 36-year-old researcher has installed a complex instrument to measure the air from Asia that reaches the West Coast of the United States over the Pacific Ocean.

Days like this are ideal for taking these measurements. San Francisco is shrouded in cool fog, but up on the top of the mountain there's warm sunshine. Indeed, these are ideal conditions for surveying air currents untainted by local influences. But Cliff is alarmed by his instrument's readings -- soot particles have colored the device's filter "blacker than we've ever seen it," he says.

Back in a lab at the University of California at Davis, Cliff and his colleagues analyze the origins of the air pollution with the help of x-rays. According to their "chemical signature," most have come from coal-fired Chinese power plants, Chinese smelters and chemical factories, as well as from the tailpipes of countless Chinese diesel-powered cars and trucks.

More:
http://www.spiegel.de/international/...461828,00.html

[Cicero]

On the bright side: take a look at the mobile Chinese death squad's, organ harversting, new van. Apparently they show up, conduct a trial, then bring people inside to kill by way of lethal injection. (Phasing out those inhumane firing squads)

http://www.edmunds.com/insideline/do...cleId=115788#3



Saves on trial fees, extradition fees, inmate housing fees, and supports healthier organs to sell. Go mobile!!

[Sundae]

Using this thread to bash China doesn't answer any of the points a US national who intends to return to the US raises.

I'd probably be the same if a Brit abroad criticised my country, but in the still, silent, thinking part of me I would consider the criticisms carefully. They come from someone who has lived in both cultures - they have at least some validity.

[Cicero]

See post 31.

btw-Thanks Classic!

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by Sundae Girl

Using this thread to bash China doesn't answer any of the points a US national who intends to return to the US raises.

I'd probably be the same if a Brit abroad criticised my country, but in the still, silent, thinking part of me I would consider the criticisms carefully. They come from someone who has lived in both cultures - they have at least some validity.

Ummmmm... fuck that. You cannot hold China's society and the Chinese government up to a standard which compares itself to the shortcomings of the US. That is a total straw man argument. I did not compare the shortcomings of the US to the advancements of China, the original poster did. I do take it with some keen observation but don't for one minute hold up the failures of US society as an example of how China can do it better. I can produce REEMS of links an original source info that shows how poorly China performs on the world stage. The statistics are staggering. Pollution is but one very easy example. Choose your subject, Tibet? Health Care? The environment? Oppression of free speech? Oppression of internet traffic? God the list is huge. For every example of horrific treament of the US by any peoples, to include it's own, I can show you 20 times the scale of that which the Chinese governement has produced. I respect totally the views of an expat living abroad, just don't use it to bash us, the facts may turn around and bite you.

[classicman]

Eh hem - This thread has nothing to do with China. There is another for that. This was about an external perspective of the U.S. or so I thought.

[Cicero]

Originally Posted by classicman

This was about an external perspective of the U.S. or so I thought.

From, and in contrast and comparison to, China.



Now there are two threads for that. Thank god. Couldn't do that in just one.