I am an avid consumer of news - I generally read (UK) newspapers, the BBC, Sky and CNN websites and satellite news services every day.
I have been to the US and Canada a few times and worked with US ex-pats at college and in jobs.
In general almost all of the Americans I have met have been decent people - but some astonish me with their insularity.
American people tat I have met seem totally oblivious to world events and seem to genuinely believe that global policy is about "Good vs Evil" in some way.
I think that Europeans, Africans, and Asians seem to have a much more pragmatic understanding of global realpolitik - maybe it's because we come from smaller countries, or have a direct recollection of wars. I don't know for certain.
Too me, one analogy tat seems nearly correct is tat the US is like a huge nursery or junior high. You are safe there, but you look out the windows and don't want to know about it.
What's really odd is that the US is populated by the decedents of the most adventurous people that Europe could supply (as well as the involuntary settlers descended from slaves etc).
The American SYSTEM seems totally incomprehensible to us - you worry about civil liberties and gun control as a purely academic issue, but seem to ignore the fact that if some of the big cities in your nation are so dangerous that the police won't go there at night time, it might be because you can get handguns in Wal*Mart
I have always thought of the US as the smallest and most insular country I have been to - but spread out to enormous volume with loads of empty countryside.
The USA is like a Polynesian island chain - you have to travel for days to get from one part to another, but for some odd reason people try to present it as a unified whole.
The on ting it seems safe to say about the US is that in almost all respects it is far from united.
And nobody likes that Bush bloke - they think he's a bit stupid and very dangerous (sorry).
Nobody expects a Greek to have the same way of viewing the world as a Scot or a Norwegian, but everyone talks about "Americans" as if they were the same thing.
My most shocking experience in the US was driving through mile after mile of horrific poverty, half an hour away from sparkling beautiful finance districts in big rich cities.
The US is without contest the richest place on earth and has room and money for immense developments to allow everyone to live productive and worthwhile lives, but nobody does it.
Anywhere else in the world that sort of wealth has led to an enlightened welfare state, but in the US things have slipped so far the other way that travellers from the EU are now advised (by our governments) to take out additional health insurance and insist tat we are not taken to public hospitals if we are involved in an accident.
There are 3rd world countries tat don't get that rating from the Foreign office.
