Bouncing Hedgehog

Posts Tagged ‘America’

My other half who is American – I’m English – and I have often talked about the different beliefs and cultures I have come across during my travels as well as some of the widely held and cherished beliefs Americans hold. I’ve been meaning to blog about that for some time, but she has gone and beaten me to it. Go and read it here – especially if you view life in America as the best thing since sliced bread.

Having lived in the US for quite a few years now I am still somewhat bemused at the constant usage of the phrase “All New.” All new? As opposed to what? Partly new? Mostly new? Just a little bit new? New is a perfectly good word in its own right and has a very clear meaning and/or connotation. So when and why did someone think that it need “all” in front of it to get the point across?

I recently received my yearly “give us money” missive from our local fire department. Nothing too unusual there. I am sure that most Americans get similar letters too. This year though, there is an added twist. This year it’s not the usual “we need your help” type letter – it’s a “give us money or else” demand.

“Or else what?” I hear you ask. Well may you ask. My local fire department has now adopted the practice (totally illegal in many states but not West Virginia apparently – of billing anyone who uses their services who hasn’t coughed up the “voluntary” donation.

What a fine shining example of capitalism. Making money out of other people’s misery. And don’t think for one second that if you have insurance and the fire department bills you that they will cover the cost – insurance companies are fighting that one and refusing to pay up. So… if you haven’t met their demands donated to them but you do have insurance it’s probably cheaper to let your house burn.

And what happens if your neighbor calls them out because your house is on fire? Who gets the bill then? Inquiring minds (well.. mine anyway) want to know.

It’s time this iniquitous practice was stamped out nationwide.

Those of you who know me will know that I am a movie fan. I picked up a dvd a while back – The Tripper -  and finally got around to watching it. I liked the movie. It was a fun little comic horror effort that appealed to my somewhat warped sense of humor.  The movie had quite a strong political theme in some ways and definitely had a bone to pick with some of the “sacred cows” of American history. But what really got my attention though were the credits believe it or not. Usually the credits roll to music but not this time. They rolled to a speech. And it floored me. I am not used to American politicians telling it like it is rather than what they want you to think it is. It took a while to find the speech. It was given by Robert F. Kennedy Jr and although I had to find a transcript to see the complete speech (it was longer than the credits rolled for) it was well worth the effort. It deserves to be read, understood and listened to by all.

The speech…

I have been an environmental advocate for twenty years, and I’ve been disciplined during that period about being nonpartisan in my approach to this issue. The worst thing that can happen to the environment is if it becomes the province of a single political party. Most of the environmental leaders in our country agree with me. Five years ago, if you asked the leaders of the major environmental groups in America, What’s the gravest threat to the global environment?, they would have given you a range of answers: overpopulation, habitat destruction, global warming. Today, they will all tell you one thing: it’s George W. Bush. This is the worst environmental president that we have ever had. You simply cannot speak honestly about the environment in any context today without speaking critically about this president. If you go to the Natural Resources Defense Council’s web site you will see over 400 major environmental rollbacks that have been promoted by this administration over the last three and half years. It is a concerted, deliberate attempt to eviscerate thirty years of environmental law. It is a stealth attack, one that’s been hidden from the public. Read the rest of this entry »

I am always interested in reading through the comments that accompany many articles published by newspapers online. It’s always a good indicator of just how fucked up society in the US is. But, immune as I am to some of the crass points of view that get put forward, even I did a double take when I saw that someone was calling for a civil war in the US.

WTF? I thought to myself. He must be out of his tiny little less than average IQ mind. Apparently he wasn’t alone. Many posters were agreeing with him. The mind (well, mine at least) boggles that anyone in this day and age thinks that a civil war is the answer to America’s problems. I would hazard a guess that most, if not all, of these gung ho wankers have never actively been involved in any war let alone a civil war.

Ask anyone, anywhere in the world, who has been involved in a civil war whether they thought it was great idea that cured their county’s problems and I very much doubt you will get an affirmative answer.

Stupid doesn’t even begin to cover this one. This really is a case of danger in the gene pool.

Just what the hell is this country coming to?

I saw a commercial on TV recently,  T-Mobile if I remember correctly, that asked the question “What do you want from your wireless company?” The answer apparently was “cheaper bills than Verizon” or some such. Well, I guess cheaper where wireless plans are concerned is not a bad answer – although “cheap” and “wireless company” in the same sentence is a contradiction in terms.

So I thought long and hard about the question for oh…. at least 1 second and came up with a much better answer:

COVERAGE.

Around two years ago gas prices in the US took a big hike – well over $4 a gallon for me. They literally doubled and as a result my grocery bill also doubled. I bitched at the time but put up with it purely and simply because I understood that delivery prices to the supermarkets would also have doubled. Most supermarket suppliers here have no choice but to ship by road no matter where they are shipping from. The rail infrastructure sucks so road is it.

However, gas prices now are significantly less than that high that was reached. As a result the prices I pay at the grocery store should also have dropped accordingly. After all, as they said at the time, it was the price of gas causing the problem, not them. But they haven’t. Not at all. I am still paying the same price in a lot of cases and MORE in many others.

Grocery prices in the US are much higher than elsewhere in the world anyway. Many years ago that wasn’t the case. Back in 1973 when I first lived in the US grocery prices were significantly cheaper than the UK – where I hail from. When I came over here in 2003 that position was reversed. The UK was way cheaper. What happened America?

Anyway, back to the present. Gas prices have gone down – my grocery bill has headed in the other direction. Not even for a few weeks was the drop in gas reflected in supermarket prices. So just who is responsible for me feeling ripped off? Trucking companies not dropping their “unavoidable” rise in delivery costs? Or the supermarkets who liked the higher prices which once gas prices dropped meant higher profits?

Like many people back in December we got hit by a snowstorm which (at least in Clendenin, West Virginia) practically sent us back to the stone age. Just before midnight on Friday December 18 the cable went out. No biggie – the TV schedule sucked anyway. Within the hour the power and the phone followed suit. And that’s where the real fun began.

Fortunately for us we have a log fire and a reasonable supply of logs which meant that we weren’t totally without heat. It wasn’t great – we could get the den up to about 62F – but it was certainly better than the rest of the house which very quickly dropped to 40F. We always have food and water on hand for emergencies and thanks to a camping gas stove we could at least cook after a fashion.

We also have a small radio (also for emergencies) and so we tuned in to try and find out what was happening. There’s half a dozen local stations so we didn’t think that would be too hard. Boy, were we ever wrong. What we needed to know were details of the power outages (and what steps were being taken to repair the downed lines) and whether our area had even been reported as out and of course what Verizon were up to as regards downed phone lines. With the phone out we couldn’t report the power out. Cellphone coverage where we live (a whole 25 miles from the state capital) is non-existent. Read the rest of this entry »

Those of you that know me well know that I love auctions. And I have certainly had some good deals and yesterday was no exception. Being English and living in the US I can’t begin to even get across to my American friends just how much I miss the quality of British TV (one of the main reasons I joined Netflix who have a really good selection) and consequently I am always on the lookout for British TV dvds.

The complete set of Inspector Morse mysteries was up for grabs at my local auctioneers (www.mountaineerauctions.com) yesterday. Now this is a 35 disc boxed set issued in the US by PBS. It wasn’t individually listed on their web site so I hadn’t done any research beforehand but I reasoned a set with that many discs had to be at least $150 and so I was prepared to bid accordingly.

To cut a long story short I got the set (in perfect condition by the way) for a paltry $45! I took a quick look online today and it goes for $430.

60 hours of quality viewing and I don’t have to put up with a gung-ho swat team. Marvellous!

I was channel hopping the other night (as I often do in the vague hope of finding something watchable – particularly as the TV guide is far from reliable) when I paused briefly at the History channel.

It was a program that seemed to be about wild animals in general being kept in captivity in the US and chimpanzees seemed to be the featured species.

I am not going into the rights and wrongs of keeping wild animals (or the stupidity of the people who do so) as that is not what this blog is about. There have been some absolutely horrific attacks by “pets” in general and chimpanzees in particular in this regard and I think they speak quite eloquently by themselves. Read the rest of this entry »