united-states

How is the United States at once the most conservative and commercial AND the most revolutionary society on Earth?

I'm saying the American way is to overcome, to conquer, to come out on top. And we do it by spending and eating and screwing our women harder than anyone else. That's all I'm saying.

One of the real reasons that Russia__ President Vladimir Putin is so intent on remaining loyal to Syria__ Dictator Bashar Al-Assad, is that in January 2017, Russia and Syria signed a lease to extend Russia's control of its naval facility in the port of Tartus, Syria for 49 years. As with the United States Naval Base in Guantanamo, Cuba, the Russians have sovereign rights over the territory, considered a Material-Technical Support Point and not technically a naval base. The piers are large enough to accommodate four medium-sized vessels but not any of their larger ships of the line, including cruisers or their aircraft carrier. The facility which gives Russia a warm water port, consists of office space, two storage buildings, barracks and a parking garage for about six vehicles. Under the terms of this lease agreement, the Russians also operate Khmeimim Air Base located south-east of the city of Latakia, Syria. The present lease for these military facilities has an extension clause for an additional 25 years.

Not to dampen any parade, but if one asks if there is a single thing about Mr. Obama's Senate record, or state legislature record, or current program, that could possibly justify his claim to the presidency one gets ... what? Not much. Similarly lightweight unqualified 'white' candidates have overcome this objection, to be sure, but what kind of standard is that?

He pondered that a little while and then he asked, do Black people have to pay for their doctors, too? Because that's what TV programs had said. I smiled a little at this and told him it's not only Black people who have to pay for doctors and medical care; all people in America have to. Ah, he said. And suppose you don't have the money to pay? Well, I said, if you don't have the money to pay, sometimes you died. And there was no mistaking my gesture, even though he had to wait for the translator to translate it. We left him looking absolutely nonplussed, standing in the middle of the square with his mouth open and his hand under his chin staring after me, as in utter amazement that human beings could die from lack of medical care. It's things like that that keep me dreaming about Russia long after I've returned.

The industrial part of Detroit is really the most interesting side, otherwise it__ like the rest of the United States, ugly and stupid.

We trace the hand of the Almighty in framing the constitution of our land, and believe that the Lord raised up men purposely for the accomplishment of this object, raised them up and inspired them to frame the Constitution of the United States

There is no such thing as notoriety in the United States these days, let alone infamy. Celebrity is all.

I have a map of the United States... Actual size. It says, 'Scale: 1 mile = 1 mile.' I spent last summer folding it. I hardly ever unroll it. People ask me where I live, and I say, 'E6.

In the spring of 1990 I flew to Aspen, Colorado, to cover a summit meeting between Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and President George Herbert Walker Bush. This fairly routine political event took on sudden significance when, on the evening before the talks were scheduled to begin, Saddam Hussein announced that the independent state of Kuwait had, by virtue of a massive deployment of military force, become a part of Iraq. We were not to know that this act__nd the name Saddam Hussein__ould dominate international politics for the next decade and more, but it was still possible to witness something extraordinary: the sight of Mrs. Thatcher publicly inserting quantities of lead into George Bush__ pencil. The spattering quill of a Ralph Steadman would be necessary to do justice to such a macabre yet impressive scene.

Everybody is comparing the oil spill to Hurricane Katrina, but the real parallel could be the Iranian hostage crisis. In the late 1970s, the hostage crisis became a symbol of America's inability to take decisive action in the face of pervasive problems. In the same way, the uncontrolled oil plume could become the objective correlative of the country's inability to govern itself.

The mission of the United States is one of benevolent assimilation.

Originality and initiative are what I ask for my country.

If you put your politicians up for sale, as the US does (alone in this among industrialized democracies), then someone will buy them--and it won__ be you; you can__ afford them.

Our leaders know we__e turning into a giant ghetto and they are taking every last hubcap they can get their hands on before the rest of us wake up and realize what__ happened.

June 17, 1972. Nine o'clock Saturday morning. Early for the telephone. Woodward fumbled for the receiver and snapped awake. The city editor of the Washington Post was on the line. Five men had been arrested earlier that morning in a burglary attempt at Democratic headquarters, carrying photographic equipment and electronic gear. Could he come in?

Of course he had a female following. Was there anything college girls found sexier than being told what to think?

In the United States, people don't revolt in order to obtain freedom, but continue denying it to others.