Harry’s Place

incentivize me! yeah ! incentivize my muffin ! yeah! appettize my crumpet!yeah!

dude,like, this post is like SO cravenly ,asslickingly servile to america.

Thank you, Neil D
That does sound like an interesting book.

Yes, one of these days, we Americans will have to re-cross the Atlantic & liberate our fellow English Speakers from those Germanic Hanoverian Tyrants.

“Without your Revolution, you’d (Americans) all be drinking tea and eating crumpets”.
Ugh, now I know why we rebelled and fought for 8 long years for our Independence!

My second most memorable Fourth of July was in 1982 when Wimbledon happen to end on the Fourth. This was right after the Falklands War and Britain was justifilably feeling its first real surge of National Pride since 1945. So Wimbledon concluded that year with the entire stadium audience standing and proudly singing, “Rule Britainia” on American Independence Day!
(Remember particularly one mutton-checked old veteran with a chest full of medals)

Most memorable Independence Day, well I am sure all my fellow Zionists will remember which one that was!

I see no reason why our British brothers and sisters shouldn’t be proud on July 4th. There are some core values which obviously took hold. I think that’s something to be proud of.

The problem is not so much that you liberated yourselves from the British tyranny, but that you subjugated the rest of the world to yours.

A victim becoming a victimizer. That is your history in a nutshell.

Flanker, should you not be consoling your F**KED FARC Friends!

I only serve to insult trash like you David, that and pointing the obvious.

Flanker, go take your meds.

Bah what a silly cliche, anywho…

Happy Bday US, you celebrate it alone.

Couldn’t you just compose an unfunny version of ‘happy birthday to you’ and yell it down a megaphone so that no one can understand what you’re on about?

“Couldn’t you just compose an unfunny version of ‘happy birthday to you’ and yell it down a megaphone so that no one can understand what you’re on about?”

Don’t forget the wig.

More about Fareed Zakaria:

http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0533,fpress,66881,6.html

I think these copy and paste extracts can be a bit misleading. Neil D has perhaps extracted the daftest part. As if democracy and the market are intrinsically “American” - absurd. Also, it’s worth noting that there are numerous democracies that are less corrupt and sclerotic than the American version, dominated as it is by just two entrenched large parties feeding of corporate wealth, where you have to be very rich to stand a chance. Many candidates have campaigned to change this system - none have succeeded. There is a lot of razzmatazz in American democracy - the orchestrated rallies, the flag waving and mass produced placards - but you have to look deeper to discover how corrupted, ossified and inflexible it really is. There are elements that are progressive and marvelous, but I would suggest that it is a constant battle to keep those alive.

reverting to their roots by selling sausages

Yes, let’s never forget that some of their ancestors were German.

I expect you’d have mentioned that one of ‘em is Greek, too, but that might remind us of one of the places where those “American ideas and ideals” actually came from.

(I mean, I wouldn’t mind cutting their heads off, but hating on the great leeches because they’re descended from Germans is just pathetic. Do you know how many Americans are descended from Germans?)

Also, it’s worth noting that there are numerous democracies that are less corrupt and sclerotic than the American version

Name them. And keep it numerous.

Chuck - any democracy with more than two main parties, a form of proportional representation, an independent commission for redistricting, a constitution, and a place where you can actually stand for election without needing to be rich or having to spend much of your time sucking up to rich people (that happens everywhere, but the degree to which it is a necessity in the US is quite pronounced). There is much that is attractive about the US system of government and politics - unfortunately there is much that is wrong too.

Gregg: “Do you know how many Americans are descended from Germans?”
A whole beer garden full of Americans!

In my native Middle West there were so many German-speakers that in many cities, including my home town of Dayton, Ohio, there were public schools in which all the classes were taught in German.Yes that was first practice of bi-lingual education. This lasted from the beginnings of large-scale German immigration in the mid-19th Century to the entry of America into the Great War in 1917 which caused a whole sale banning of everything German in a crazyed outbreak of homefront super-patriotism.

a whole sale banning of everything German in a crazyed outbreak of homefront super-patriotism

Surely, super-Anglophilism.

I really do feel bad about fellow leftists in the US, after the predictable shift to the right by Obama in the general election. So they are forced to put faith on an individual that has hinted he is but a trojan horse. Faith is for the religious not the left.

A real democracy would not allow for two (and only two) identical candidates, it smells like a dictatorship, but sadly it cannot be proven.

PS I only really care about one issue though: empire policies.

A real democracy would not allow for two (and only two) identical candidates, it smells like a dictatorship, but sadly it cannot be proven.

Now I know why HP keeps you around, Flanker. Comic relief.

Chuck - any democracy with more than two main parties…blah, blah, blah

Wriggle, wriggle, little worm. Names, please.

Sadly, the legend I heard from another kid at school, about German being only one vote away from becoming America’s official language instead of English, is just a legend.

“Now I know why HP keeps you around, Flanker. Comic relief.”

BS, then why the frequent bannings?

I annoy them, they ban, that simple, that sweet.

Following on David All: As was posted here by me previously elsewhere, Joel Garreau, in his “Nine Nations of North America” (a cultural geographic breakdown) points out that in the MidWest there were the English–and the Germans; the Scots–and the Germans; the Irish–and the Germans; the Swedes–and the Germans, and so forth, pointing out their vast numbers in that region. During WWI anti-German feeling rose to such hights that The Germania Life Insurance Company renamed itself the Guardian Life;the fabled Roosevelt Hotel in my New Orleans was originally the Grunwald, but went into decline largely due to anti-German feeling and was named after T.R. by new owners in the 30’s in order to shake old feelings. Likewise the old Hibernia Bank in N.O. (now Capital One)was originally the Germania, and present-day Gen. Pershing Ave once Berlin St. One can find name changes such as this in towns and cities all over America.

Finally, it was originally debated as to whether or not the Congressional Record should be printed in German as well as English to reflect the great numbers of German-born and speaking immigrants.

so basically in a reversal of the usual pattern there’s a bunch of yanks telling us they’d be speaking German now if it wasn’t for us.

After Britain, Germany is the country that has had the most influence on American culture and society. They were the first non-English-speaking group to come to America in significant numbers, starting in the late 17th Century. By the time of the Revolution, German-Americans were a good part of Pennslyvania, then the state with the largest population, also Maryland as well. There were German-Speaking Pennsylvania regiments in the Continential Army. Also the head drill master for the Americans was a former Prussian officer, Baron von Steuben. This group of Germans were almost entirely Protestant.

The large German immigration that started in the 1840s was different from what gone before in that while Protestants made up a plurality, there were also, for the first time, large numbers of German Catholics and significant numbers of German Jews among the immigrants. The first large number of Jewish Americans were German Jewish immigrants. The German immigrants settled primarily in the Free States and German Protestants, though not Catholics, were strongly anti-slavery and supporters of the Republican Party. During the Civil War, there were many German-American Regiments in the Union Army. Carl Schruz and a number of other refugees from the failed Revolution of 1848 played promenient parts both in the Union Army and in post-war American politics.

One thing to be noted. German Protestants and Catholics have never mixed much in this country, even today. In Urban areas, they live in separate neighborhoods. In rural areas, they live in separate towns and districts. The leagcy of the Thirty Years War, its devastation and its religious hatred, still echoes among German Americans more then 300 years latter.

Following on what Virgil Xenophon talked about:
The anti-German feeling of the Great War was so much that many German Americans anglicized their names, i.e. Schmdit became Smith, Braun - Brown, Muller - Miller. One American fighter pilot decided to anglicize his name to Rickenbaker.
Yes, Eddie Rickenbaker dropped “the Hun out of his name” as one patriotic newspaper put it, on his way to becoming America’s leading fighter ace of the Great War.

Ugh, it is almost midnight here on the US East Coast. I am signing off now until Monday. Have a Happy Fourth, everyone!

America has given the world much. They should have kept Bob Dylan whose awful drone has afrighted many of God’s innocent creatures like me.

Anyway, today is also my cat’s birthday. He’s six.

“Faith is for the religious not the left.”

Huh? I thought Commies like you, Flanker, were religious.

Otherwise why would you perform horatio on your statue of Uncle Joe every night before you turned in?

Or is it Mao, or Comrades Kim or Bob?

Anyway, today is also my cat’s birthday. He’s six.

Happy birthday to your parasitic little fur ball. :D

With hindsight, it was not really a great victory for Freedom. If you think about when slavery was banned in the UK and in the US. Lots of people lived in slavery - who would not have done if the US had stayed part of the British empire for another 100 years.

Boogski,
He’s a lovely beast and I’m buying him a nice bit of fish for later. He likes trout. I once had to rescue him from the kitchen bin because he’d got trapped (only a tail and a plaintive whine were left coming out) going after the packaging of some trout.

If you feel that strongly, you could always join the Facebook group called ‘Petition to revoke the independence of America’.

http://lettersfromatory.wordpress.com

The myth that Hebrew nearly became the official language has also been debunked.

I spent a few days a while back in Helen Georgia. This was a defunct logging town until 1969, when the townsfolk decided to transform the dreary concrete blocks of the high street into the kitchest gingerbread Bavarian alpine village. They have Octoberfests and the like. I met some girls there who were shortly leaving for London, England, sent by their ministry. It was called the Ministry of Blood and Fire.

http://www.helengeorgia.com/aboutus.asp?id06=100&par06=0

Off topic:

Apparently some group wants to ban google street view in the UK: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7488524.stm

Whoever they are, they come across as pompous asses (arguably par for the course with the privacy fetishists).

So using a photo with peoples’ faces in it for commercial purposes is not allowed. How about every crowd shot that ends up in a newspaper?

Carry on.

Wait ’til he gets to be about 14 and starts shitting and pissing all over the linens in your closet, Nick. :D

Give me tea and crumpets any day. And the Queen too, Gawd bless her; great tourist revenue from all those Americans.

Anyway, today is also my cat’s birthday. He’s six.

Happy birthday to your little god. I hope he has a good day filled with fish, play and lots of hugs and fuss. As any day in the life of a cat should be.

Adult cats are worthless parasites. They should be tossed into wood chippers and spread around as fertilizer.

Dogs earn their keep.

Dogs earn their keep.

Only the ones that end up in Korean stir-fries.

“Dogs earn their keep.”

My cocker spaniel faithfully brought in the newspaper for 13 years, rain or shine. Show me a cat that would do that.

Show me a cat that would do that

Cats do not regard humans as their masters and would not demean themselves by being so subservient. Cats on the other hand clean themselves, don’t smell and don’t shit on the pavement. They catch and kill vermin and their fur is much nicer to stroke. Cats win!

Cats do not regard humans as their masters

Neither does the flu virus. Both are worthless, disgusting parasites though. All domestic cats must die!

“A victim becoming a victimizer. That is your history in a nutshell”

Guess you’re just angry, Flanker, that the Yanks played such a significant role in defeating Nazism and fascism in WW2. Cos’ had the Nazis won, you’d have been a real big noise in their party machine and taken seriously by the “mainstream”.

Dream on, Flanker, even your Islamo-fascist friends in the Middle East probably laugh at you behind your back.

“Do you know how many Americans are descended from Germans?”

More than any other, according to the last census (Irish descent came in second). Where I was raised in the Ohio River valley, it’s nearly all German Catholics. The Lutherans ended up going north.

Neither does the flu virus. Both are worthless, disgusting parasites though. All domestic cats must die!

“For the cat is cryptic, and close to strange things which men cannot see. He is the soul of antique Aegyptus, and bearer of tales from forgotten cities in Meroe and Ophir. He is the kin of the jungle’s lords, and heir to the secrets of hoary and sinister Africa. The Sphinx is his cousin, and he speaks her language; but he is more ancient than the Sphinx, and remembers that which she hath forgotten.”

Compared to that, dogs are just pathetic.

Hey, HPL - that’s my man!

I know I’ve been “out of town” for a while, have the American colonies really gone independent?

Neil - to see America as the current carrier of a baton originally English is insightful. It is unremarkable to note that the founders codified what was best in the British consitutional arrangement, while disacarding most of what was worst. Despite the corruption suffered at the hands of FDR and the Warren court, the consituition remains probably the best expression of the principles that emerged from the Magna Carta.

However, you go further, and implicitly suggest that as a society, America has picked up the baton dropped by the English in the aftermath of catastrophe on the fields of Flanders. At least as far as that America which exists west of the Missisipi, I believe that in many ways you are right - though there are factors of class and religiousity for which such an attractively simple hypothesis cannot account.