What you don’t get, Steve, is that most of us here in Ameria think that’s reason enough to have them deported to, I dunno, the point in the Australian Outback geographically furthest from any fresh water, let’s say... and shot summarily if they protest even in the slightest. (EDIT: Note that I’m picking that example…

The Democrats didn’t so much reject their racist past as most of the Southern racists within the party fled to form the GOP as it became the party overwhelmingly funded by wealthy industrialists (at the time, anyway).

Woodchuck’s great number and variety of flavors is both its strength and its weakness. They’re kind of like Beatles or Rolling Stones music.

“Umami” makes perfect sense for 1963.  I can imagine it took at least 8 years for Japanese loanwords to become acceptable in America...  I’m surprised it wasn’t longer.

Marketing for a company that big is too smart to poke the Evangelicals.  Most of them like a good burger as much as the next person, so why antagonize them?  Heck, most of the ones I’ve met keep chowing down right through Lent...

# of films dated 2000 or newer: one

Keep in mind that statement about handgun effective ranges only holds true for untrained shooters. It’s more like “to the end of the block” for someone who’s had training, or even has favorable conditions (several seconds to aim while you run in a straight line).

What do we expect after 50 years of Republican corporate welfare, bailouts, lax regulations and isolationist trade policy? Local manufacturing that makes cheaper and cheaper junk for higher and higher prices. It’s not just cars by any stretch of the imagination.

It’s funny how you only ever seem to hear about voting machine “malfunctions” that favor Republican candidates. I have yet to hear one where votes get switched to a Democratic or 3rd party choice.

Ever since I attended a catered event with “signature dogs” from various American ballparks and had a bleu-cheese-and-bacon dog, I’ve suspended my disbelief about what might be tasty on top of a hot dog. I gotta endorse experimentation, because if you’d asked me beforehand if I thought that would be remotely good, I’d…

The hand holding it also obviously belongs to someone with enough remaining net worth to wear a shirt, which is something else no American can be after buying concessions at a sporting event.  Or pretty much any place in the U.S. that has “concessions” as opposed to a simple snack bar.  I often feel like they want you…

How amazingly ignorant of you to dismiss as drivel the opinion of anyone not old enough to be respected in your eyes.

This is what I’m talking about when I’ve complained about people projecting, twisting my words, and reading between the lines. Just because I asserted that something is rude doesn’t mean I’m demanding everyone begin policing the world for the slightest rudeness by strangers.  I should have realized that Americans at…

At best it’s unpopular to point out, in the crowd of commenters here.  That doesn’t make it incorrect or vicious in any way.  Note how few people are bothering to really read and understand what I’ve said, and are simply projecting racism or fear thereof onto me and giving in to their need to hurl abuse at someone…

Or, alternatively, it happens to be the only obviously multi-lingual part of the world I’ve personally travelled to, and therefore can say what I’ve seen firsthand.

No, if you LIVE in that part of Burma (is there still a Burma?  Isn’t it... yeah, it’s Myanmar now.  I thought so.), and you deliberately hold your public conversations in a non-native language, you’re being rude.  A tourist outside a tourist area is still a tourist, though this is one big part of why locals tend to…

I’m interested. What region is that, and what languages do you hear? Are we talking about somewhere other than a massively cosmopolitan port metropolis like NYC, LA, or Miami which are constantly full of foreign travellers at all times? My state’s pretty red, too, with a strong history of certain, specific European…

You’re talking about multiple different things in that statement. One always has the right to be as rude or polite as they wish; that’s why ettiquette isn’t law (usually; I think the British have something to say about that in certain specific circumstances). And, while one reaps the consequences of one’s rudeness or…

Now that’s a well thought out analysis. I don’t know if it’s quite on the level of pervasive, low-grade homophobia, but I’ll grant what you said about a moral component.

There’s really nothing incompatible there with what I wrote. But if you’re a permanent resident speaking to another permanent resident, that “most comfortable” language should be the official or de facto official language of the polity you reside in, be it the U.S., or anywhere else.