So .... who is really running America???

[@SandWitc

God, I wish the US would be more like Sweden, or Switzerland, or a dozen more countries. My explanation for why not is that no one seemingly (besides me) is drawing on a "too big to succeed" model, and our misleaders are trying to make us even bigger, driving us in the wrong direction.

But here is an interesting comparison: chop the US into smaller pieces and many, many of those smaller pieces compare wonderfully with Sweden, Switzerland, etc. Likewise, inflate Sweden, etc., to 350 million and it likewise would probably be too big to succeed.

There are a half dozen "too big to succeed" countries in the world. Can't we learn from their failures?

Amazingly, we already have a floorplan for dividing America into 50 smaller pieces, we call them states. And we can break those states into smaller pieces, called counties, and cities.

United we stand is good, but by being too united may spell failure.

@Heartlander

Please educate me about my own country and about your country as well, Heartlander! Please tell me 'how' or in what way the USA is better than Sweden?

@Heartlander It’s not that complicated. Baron is my family’s name.

And I live in a place run by Democrats, and it’s quite nice. Don’t believe everything you hear on Faux News.

@SW-User I’ve never, never in my life, heard a friend, relative or any US resident claim they are fed up with the US and are moving to Sweeden. But a pretty common “fed up” is heard from Americans moving from Democrat created hell holes to America’s nice places. I believe there may even be a stampede of Californians migrating to Texas.

Sweden’s population is about the same as Houston metro, but spread over many, many more square miles. So maybe better compared to the northern US heartlands.

I’ve only been to Scandinavian countries a few times. All 40+ years ago. Usually for less tha a hour, but at times long enough to enjoy a cup of coffee and chat with a few locals.

@Heartlander Many places “run” by Democrats don’t have enough Republicans to run.

@Heartlander


🤣 Of course you haven't ever heard of a US resident who's fed up with life in America and is moving to Sweden, Heartlander! That's because nobody on earth, including Americans, can just pull up stakes and suddenly show up in Sweden unannounced and decide they'll be living in Sweden for a change of pace in their life!

The Swedish government doesn't allow people to immigrate to Sweden like US immigration policy allows open immigration by simply applying for immigration status in the USA, to then be granted Landed Immigrant status assuming one is able to prove they can memorize who the past 45 Presidents were in the correct order.

That kind of immigration action doesn't happen here in Sweden which is why there are no Landed American immigrants seen (or heard) walking around Sweden! The only real way of gaining Landed Immigrant status in Sweden is through marriage to someone who was born in Sweden. When that occurs, that person is also granted access to Sweden's world class healthcare system which leaves no one behind, nor requires one to sell their house to pay for their 7 day hospital visit.

Yet, apart from that tidbit of trivia I provided explaining why no Americans are living at-large in Sweden, somehow you know that life in America is way better than the standard of living found here in Sweden, despite the fact that you haven't been here for over 40 years and when you were last here, you only stopped long enough for coffee!

So, I suppose if I imagined real hard, I could speculate that an American, especially an American, could deduce a lot about Sweden from what they'd once experienced in a Swedish coffee shop or more accurately stated, what they may have noticed in a picture-post card of Sweden which they ended up buying as a souvenir in a gift shop!

It all makes sense to me now!

I will give you first prize for your answer... 🥇 ...mainly for humoring me by stating the funniest thing I've ever heard anyone say on this website since I first joined SW! 😂

@SW-User Ohhh nooo …. You keep that award my special friend, you posted what would have been my own next post to this discussion.

Go through the 10 or 15 countries that traditionally rank ahead of the US on quality of life issues and what all tend to have in common is immigration control. On a huge scale, it’s like our Uvalde school massacre. Someone propped the back door open and allowed the entry of a murderer. Biden propped America’s back door open and uninvited were let in to help themselves, to US benefits, or murder or rape, or bring in poisonous drugs.

Go through all the quality of life issues and compare. Education? Healthcare? All undermined in the US by polititians at the national level with seemingly alliance to someone other than the people.

Our great communities are great in spite of what’s wrong in Washington. Once we whip Washington into shape we’ll move up that quality of life list, across the board. Some we can just copy from some of those other great countries. I especially like educational and mandatory community service requirement, also compulsory military training like in Switzerland. Our daughter went to a private school that included community service. Many private schools do likewise in the US.

@Heartlander

Is that why Trump built that beautiful wall on your southern border with Mexico before Biden was elected President?

Is that why Trump only started that 'beautiful wall' project near the end of his one-time Presidency as election time quickly approached, so Joe wouldn't have to deal with Donald's failed immigration policy?

I'm curious to know how undocumented immigrants who illegally enter the USA can help themselves to US benefits once they've arrive there on foot, especially if American authorities aren't suppose to know they're there?

@SW-User I’ve never really favored a wall, for a lot of reasons. Except as an immediate counter step when Obama and Biden propped open the border as an invitation for an invasion.

Much like immigration control helps account for Sweden’s quality of life, the US failure to manage its border undermines the US quality of life.

The US doesn’t know who is here because census data doesn’t include citizenship status, a bitter fought over issue between D and R. Meanwhile, Medicaid benefits are based on need, not citizenship. Democrats are invested in keeping illegals hidden, in hope of giving them a path to citizenship.

@Heartlander

..and the reason the Dems want to do that is because 'real' so-called Americans refuse to do the kind of labor on farms and construction projects that people from other countries are grateful to do to create a living for themselves.

If 'real' Americans would lower themselves to picking fruit, harvesting vegetables and doing a host of other labor-intensive initiatives which Americans typically love to enjoy as the benefactors of those fruits of nature, but only as long as someone else does all the work to get it from field to table, then the Dems wouldn't have to concern themselves with finding suitable candidates to do all that work that 'real' Americans are way too proud to do themselves.

@SW-User


:) I think you may have been reading too many Democrat propaganda periodicals.

For years I have been pretty well connected with both the Mexican-American community and migrating field workers. Migrating field workers are like roofers who follow tornados, or circus workers. It's a seasonal work force that moves to where it's needed when needed. There is no "dirty work" attribute to it. And it's not what Americans won't do. Family farms are mostly owner-operator in the US and with mechanization, single families manage thousand acre farms alone. The need for migrant workers depends on the time window for harvesting. Even my egg-farmer cousin managed 15,000 chickens single handedly, including processing the poop produced by those chickens.

A dozen or two years ago I attended the local unveiling ceremony of he Cesar Chavez postage stamp. The guest speaker was non other than the president of the UFW union. The audience and event was no different than what I would expect from Teamsters meeting or a GM stockholders meeting.

@Heartlander
Do you ever see White Americans out picking fruit or harvesting vegetables in a field?

@SW-User Absolutely. Including family members who owned sugar plantations. Including some rich family members. You should study US history a bit deeper. To keep to the subject of Mexican immigrants, Mexican Americans were heavily discriminated against by the Democrat controlled governments for years and years. In my area Democrats treated Mexican Americans even worse than Blacks. As late as the 1940/50s, when there were racially segregated schools, there were schools for what Democrats called "whites", and schools for "colored". So where did the Mexican American kids go to school? Nowhere. They didn't count. Although they were invited to come to the US to build our railroads they were counted as nobodies. They were considered neither white nor black.

Now guess who wrote the op-ed that got a local school renamed in honor of the first Mexican American to break through the Democrat's iron grip on segregation?

@Heartlander
You should take a look outside your windows once in a while Heartlander. In your day, there were plenty of Whites picking fruit and harvesting vegetables in the field, but that was over 50 years ago. White Americans don't pick fruit nor harvest field crops anymore, which is why the USA cannot find farm labor anymore either.

When Trump began evicting undocumented migrants by the busload, he successfully evicted the only eager farm labor supply the US had that could be relied upon.

@SW-User Again, you should study US history a bit deeper. Within the past 5 of 6 years I participated in community food policy meetings and meetings with migrant farm workers.

Migrating agriculture workers, though mobile, are an organized community, not working from desperation but working for the same reasons why we all work. If there is desperation, it’s about automation and mechanization reducing the need for workers.

If I can share my own current experience with hiring home landscaping, the going rate is $80 to $100 per hour, regardless of the color or race of the worker.

@Heartlander
Again, you should look out your window once in a while, Heartlander. If you've been meeting with migrant farm workers, you have not been meeting with WHITE farm workers who were born and raised in the USA. WHITE Americans do not work in the fields anymore, which is why you met with migrant farm workers!

@SW-User I think you are stuck on Democrat talking points. Migrant ag workers and illegal immigrants are not one and the same. Also the word “white” itself isn’t well defined and mostly used by racist. 90% of ag workers in SE Texas are Hispanics, but Hispanics also make up 90% of the general population. Also 60% of the population is “white”. Duhhhh … a lot of people there are both Hispanic and White; and some of them work as doctors and some of them work in agriculture.

Social orders change as you move north. Just north of Austin is different than the Valley. Further North into the heartlands are old Mexican communities that go back 100 plus years to the building of Americas railroads, and historically suffered years of discrimination at the hands of mostly Democrat governments, and they created alternative neighborhoods, much like separate but equal like with Black Americans.

It was never about jobs that white people wont do, but about jobs that white people couldn’t do without help, and for help went to the most affordable workers with great work ethics. So follow the formula: Mexican Americans were discriminated against by mostly Democrat government, which denied them education and work opportunities. Farmers needed extra help and hired the best workers at the lowest price which were the Mexicans.