I was told by a middle manager at a company I was formerly employed with that I didn’t understand America, that he knew more than I did because he lived in California and worked in kitchens in LA during grad school. “How could I, a rich white kid, know anything about the real America?” Well the truth is I’m a lower middle class white male who grew up on a farm in the Midwest and whose parents work in a hospital and a factory, respectively. What is often painted to me is an America of fat, lazy people that get money from the government for nothing and only have to work six, maybe 9, months a year.

The truth is, all the exposure in the world won’t affect those that refuse to open their eyes. I too used to have the idealized view that democracy, modernity, education, exchange, economic aide all of these things paved the way toward a more peaceable world or at least a more cooperative one. Alas, as I’ve aged, though I still find value in all of the aforementioned, I have realized that we are and will always be groups of self interest, too large to not compete, to not fight, to not war, to not maintain large militaries, too large to ever understand because too many of us simply don’t care enough or find value in the endeavor. For those of us that do, well, hopefully we become the leaders, the visionaries, the organizers, the educators of our countries, states, cities and communities.

Re: Fallows

Other than sporting events, the most heavily covered Olympic story in the US was: the protest zones. Not due to “anti-China” bashing or anything like that, but just because it was an interesting and controversial topic - a necessity for something to be “news”. And, because the other hottest topic before the Olympics - the the pollution effect - fortunately turned out to be a non-story.

Many US media outlets posted regular daily reports from the protest zones. E.G. “Five people applied to protest today, all were rejected, and three were arrested and sent to jail.” It turned into a public relations debacle, and reinforced the perceptions that show up in US TV and films. But, none of the reporters were able to explain why the situation (and others like it) were so badly managed. Fallows was the only one I’ve come across that has taken a credible stab at it. Although, I don’t know if his information and analysis was sound or not.

That’s really interesting - yes, its sad how many of them are swear words. And the actors were so helpless with the tones…Still, hearing Simon refer to his sister as “mei mei” makes me forgive the other shortcomings (including the very odd fact that the ship’s computer speaks Cantonese - they should have stuck with you as translator).

If you do get a chance to watch the show, I promise the English lines are better than the Chinese ones.;)