ADVERTISEMENT

I Hurt for America

markfromj

HR Legend
Sep 1, 2004
31,864
17,424
113
I love my country. I am overall proud of my country. I think it is full of mostly good people. I think our political and economic system, while far from perfect, is the best man has come up with so far. I think we bumble our way to more progress than regression.

I hurt for America right now. These mass shootings, especially of children, are draining. Our polarization is very strong right now. Our debt is scary. Our southern border is too porous. We have a gun problem, though that is not all we have to fix relative to shootings.

The people we call leaders (our elected officials) are mostly not leaders, yet we re-elect Congress at an 88% clip. (No, term limits just take power from the voters.)

Like it or not, the burden is on us, the millions, to insist upon better. We need to elect leaders.

But overall, right now, I just hurt for this country.
 
People say, "America is a great country". It's a wonderful sentiment, but it's based on pride vs. facts. I'm no longer convinced America is a great country - it's a "Me First" country. It's a country of huge political divide. It is a country without leaders - it is led by politicians. It's a country of "Compromise? F*ck No!"

If you haven't seen it, The Newsroom is a great show. This is the scene in the first episode when you get hooked. Jeff Daniels, an incredible talent, lays out a lot of my feelings.

It's a great scene - take a few minutes and watch it,

 
People say, "America is a great country". It's a wonderful sentiment, but it's based on pride vs. facts. I'm no longer convinced America is a great country - it's a "Me First" country. It's a country of huge political divide. It is a country without leaders - it is led by politicians. It's a country of "Compromise? F*ck No!"

If you haven't seen it, The Newsroom is a great show. This is the scene in the first episode when you get hooked. Jeff Daniels, an incredible talent, lays out a lot of my feelings.

It's a great scene - take a few minutes and watch it,

It's a shit hole. Full stop
 
It's a shit hole. Full stop

No Chis, it’s not. Quit being such a drama queen. Your emotional lunacy is part of why you’re such a joke.

That’s not to say it’s perfect. Or there aren’t other countries I’d love to live in. But for Christ’s sake. Get out a little. Travel the world. America is not a shit hole. I’ve been to shit holes. Like real shit holes, where people are bathing in a river of shit. I’d be begging to get to America from those places.

That’s a full stop that your full stop can’t even comprehend.
 
No Chis, it’s not. Quit being such a drama queen. Your emotional lunacy is part of why you’re such a joke.

That’s not to say it’s perfect. Or there aren’t other countries I’d love to live in. But for Christ’s sake. Get out a little. Travel the world. America is not a shit hole. I’ve been to shit holes. Like real shit holes, where people are bathing in a river of shit. I’d be begging to get to America from those places.

That’s a full stop that your full stop can’t even comprehend.
Lol. Ok Champ I was in shit holes too made as such by us. Children massacred daily for profit defines shit hole. Great post though.
 
  • Like
Reactions: ericram
No Chis, it’s not. Quit being such a drama queen. Your emotional lunacy is part of why you’re such a joke.

That’s not to say it’s perfect. Or there aren’t other countries I’d love to live in. But for Christ’s sake. Get out a little. Travel the world. America is not a shit hole. I’ve been to shit holes. Like real shit holes, where people are bathing in a river of shit. I’d be begging to get to America from those places.

That’s a full stop that your full stop can’t even comprehend.
I too have visited some VERY poor regions and saw things there that still make me tear up years later. I almost started a human stampede once in a very poor area as I began to give money, as in coins, to the kids that were near by. In seconds there were more there and the guys leading our group immediately noticed the influx and then realized what I was doing and pretty sternly told me to stop...pronto. Or the whole village would be there in minutes...things were that desperate.

So...I left the money, hidden inside things, under things, etc, etc, all over and let the people find it later, once we were not there. That way they still got the resource, but they couldn't associate with us and therefore it was "safe".

EVERY person in that village was poorer than probably EVERY person in the USA, or at least a giant percentage of Americans. A balanced person can acknowledge that we have serious issues, or even problems, here in the USA and ALSO recognize that we are FAR, FAR away from a real shithole.

Wild, drama fueled statements do nothing to actually help improve anything.
 
I too have visited some VERY poor regions and saw things there that still make me tear up years later. I almost started a human stampede once in a very poor area as I began to give money, as in coins, to the kids that were near by. In seconds there were more there and the guys leading our group immediately noticed the influx and then realized what I was doing and pretty sternly told me to stop...pronto. Or the whole village would be there in minutes...things were that desperate.

So...I left the money, hidden inside things, under things, etc, etc, all over and let the people find it later, once we were not there. That way they still got the resource, but they couldn't associate with us and therefore it was "safe".

EVERY person in that village was poorer than probably EVERY person in the USA, or at least a giant percentage of Americans. A balanced person can acknowledge that we have serious issues, or even problems, here in the USA and ALSO recognize that we are FAR, FAR away from a real shithole.

Wild, drama fueled statements do nothing to actually help improve anything.
 
People say, "America is a great country". It's a wonderful sentiment, but it's based on pride vs. facts. I'm no longer convinced America is a great country - it's a "Me First" country. It's a country of huge political divide. It is a country without leaders - it is led by politicians. It's a country of "Compromise? F*ck No!"

If you haven't seen it, The Newsroom is a great show. This is the scene in the first episode when you get hooked. Jeff Daniels, an incredible talent, lays out a lot of my feelings.

It's a great scene - take a few minutes and watch it,


Seen that scene several times.

It just seems to me that to say America isn’t the greatest country on Earth, you need to name the one that is.

Otherwise, it just seems like emotive self-loathing.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Nole-4-Life
Seen that scene several times.

It just seems to me that to say America isn’t the greatest country on Earth, you need to name the one that is.

Otherwise, it just seems like emotive self-loathing.
Depends on who you ask? White Male has it pretty good here.
 
  • Like
Reactions: fsu1jreed
No Chis, it’s not. Quit being such a drama queen. Your emotional lunacy is part of why you’re such a joke.

That’s not to say it’s perfect. Or there aren’t other countries I’d love to live in. But for Christ’s sake. Get out a little. Travel the world. America is not a shit hole. I’ve been to shit holes. Like real shit holes, where people are bathing in a river of shit. I’d be begging to get to America from those places.

That’s a full stop that your full stop can’t even comprehend.
It's a shithole. It's like watching Ohio State football turn into the Cyclones.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Tom Paris
The last 2 Presidential elections have demonstrated
that America desperately lacks intelligent leadership.
Neither Trump or Biden have the capacity for any
dynamic leadership to guide our nation to greatness.

The political atmosphere in the U.S.A. is toxic. Neither
party puts the best interest of our citizens first. We
have a stalemate in the U.S. Senate with both parties
having 50 Senators. Where there is no vision for the
future, the people have lost hope.
 
No Chis, it’s not. Quit being such a drama queen. Your emotional lunacy is part of why you’re such a joke.

That’s not to say it’s perfect. Or there aren’t other countries I’d love to live in. But for Christ’s sake. Get out a little. Travel the world. America is not a shit hole. I’ve been to shit holes. Like real shit holes, where people are bathing in a river of shit. I’d be begging to get to America from those places.

That’s a full stop that your full stop can’t even comprehend.
He could always move.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Dvs9021
It's a shithole. It's like watching Ohio State football turn into the Cyclones.

We’ll have to agree to disagree, I’m not going to belittle your point of view. But my perspective - where I’ve been in numerous nations at the height of their worst crisis in the last few decades - does not equate.

All the best. I love America, even with all its horrible, nasty, exposed warts.
 
I too have visited some VERY poor regions and saw things there that still make me tear up years later. I almost started a human stampede once in a very poor area as I began to give money, as in coins, to the kids that were near by. In seconds there were more there and the guys leading our group immediately noticed the influx and then realized what I was doing and pretty sternly told me to stop...pronto. Or the whole village would be there in minutes...things were that desperate.

So...I left the money, hidden inside things, under things, etc, etc, all over and let the people find it later, once we were not there. That way they still got the resource, but they couldn't associate with us and therefore it was "safe".

EVERY person in that village was poorer than probably EVERY person in the USA, or at least a giant percentage of Americans. A balanced person can acknowledge that we have serious issues, or even problems, here in the USA and ALSO recognize that we are FAR, FAR away from a real shithole.

Wild, drama fueled statements do nothing to actually help improve anything.

Because I’m such a bleeding heart that I can’t give money or valuables to kids that I know had their eyes burned out by their handlers and all I’m doing is perpetuating the problem…I hear you. Been in this situation multiple times.

America is not a shithole no matter how Chis or his ilk want to portray it. Again, again, again….not perfect. But JFC and if you don’t realize how much worse it could be you live a blessed and charmed life.
 
We’ll have to agree to disagree, I’m not going to belittle your point of view. But my perspective - where I’ve been in numerous nations at the height of their worst crisis in the last few decades - does not equate.

All the best. I love America, even with all its horrible, nasty, exposed warts.
Problem is that those warts have turned into cancerous tumors.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Chishawk1425
Because I’m such a bleeding heart that I can’t give money or valuables to kids that I know had their eyes burned out by their handlers and all I’m doing is perpetuating the problem…I hear you. Been in this situation multiple times.

America is not a shithole no matter how Chis or his ilk want to portray it. Again, again, again….not perfect. But JFC and if you don’t realize how much worse it could be you live a blessed and charmed life.
I agree with you but it is being fundamentally destroyed by the right wing with attacks on human rights, women's rights, voting rights, refusal to address climate issues and the now basic protections of our school children with basic gun legislation because their handlers have paid them off. THAT is the shit hole reference.
 
Because I’m such a bleeding heart that I can’t give money or valuables to kids that I know had their eyes burned out by their handlers and all I’m doing is perpetuating the problem…I hear you. Been in this situation multiple times.

America is not a shithole no matter how Chis or his ilk want to portray it. Again, again, again….not perfect. But JFC and if you don’t realize how much worse it could be you live a blessed and charmed life.
Our last president led a coup to overthrow the election he lost and he is leading the polls for the GOP. At this point I think it's impossible to claim our problems are minor. We barely have a democracy anymore.
 
The draining aspect to this is that we're going on about 7 or 8 years of it getting worse. Sure, there's a bump here or there of improvement but if I hold a pencil against the graph, it's been pointing down to the right for almost a decade.

There's no end in sight. I could walk you through every piece of policy and political action from both sides that put that 18 year old in that school with a gun in his hand. There's blood on both sides of the aisle.
 
Problem is that those warts have turned into cancerous tumors.

OK?

Look, I’m probably (no definitely) more your side than the derps on this board. But hyperbole stating that America is the scourge of the earth is just….well…stupid. Sorry. We’re not as amazing as we think we are but we’re also not the devil incarnate.
 
  • Like
Reactions: EasyHawk
I agree with you but it is being fundamentally destroyed by the right wing with attacks on human rights, women's rights, voting rights, refusal to address climate issues and the now basic protections of our school children with basic gun legislation because their handlers have paid them off. THAT is the shit hole reference.
🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣
 
I agree with you but it is being fundamentally destroyed by the right wing with attacks on human rights, women's rights, voting rights, refusal to address climate issues and the now basic protections of our school children with basic gun legislation because their handlers have paid them off. THAT is the shit hole reference.

Ok. If you call those people shit-phucks I can get behind it. Although I’m not sure my version of them is the same, I’ll allow it. The entirety of America is not a shit hole.
 
OK?

Look, I’m probably (no definitely) more your side than the derps on this board. But hyperbole stating that America is the scourge of the earth is just….well…stupid. Sorry. We’re not as amazing as we think we are but we’re also not the devil incarnate.
Ted Cruz is the devil incarnate.
 
ADVERTISEMENT