America as a nation is well known for its crazy lawsuits, tasteless vulgarity*, lack of history and a corrupt military/economic/media/justice/political system that throws up such wonders as the Schivao case, a President being put on trial because of his sexual antics, Bhopal, 'Friendly' fire, another President who used the word 'Crusade' while trying to gain the support of Muslims, 40 years of paranoia during the Cold War and a blundering, blunt stick of a military that is more famous for its defeats (Pearl Harbour, Vietnam, Bin Ladin and in time, Iraq) than it is for its victories. Then there are the American people, overweight, ignorant, vacuous, conformist consumers of all the crap they are sold on TV. When they go abroad, they complain that there are not enough McDonaldses, or that the people don't speak good enough English, or that things just aren't big enough out here.
They have no real sense of history, so they pay money to go to Disney world where they get someone else's idea of what having a history and a culture might actually be like, but everything is fake and unreal and without substance.
Americans thrive on this fakery, and believe in things that people in other parts of the world would laugh at out of hand. Where else in the world might you meet people who have been abducted by, and now offer (for a small fee) to establish communications with aliens, or psychic pet therapists, or TV evangelicalists, or Scientologists or Moonies or the Branch Davidians or the Baptists who claim that God
'hates fags' or the KKK or Californians. Then there's Hollywood, the cult of celebrity (which unfortunately is catching on Worldwide), Schwarzenegger holding a position of governmental office, the Jackson trial, the OJ trial(s). Michael Jackson. Star Trek conventions, learning Klingon, inventing new races to gloss over the difficult issues with the ones already there. It's just crazy.
E Pluribus Unum my arse, more like Persevero Emo Vestri Somnium.
At the same time, there are lots of good things about America. For example many of the people there were originally British.
*also, they are widely known for not understanding irony, or humour that otherwise employs words that say one thing while actually conveying something else - hence the requirement for me to add this note at this time to state that at this point my tongue is lodged firmly in my cheek. I actually love America, Americans and all (well OK, some) things American.