john9blue wrote:Why are we so concerned with what some jealous Europeans think? I don't care much for the uninformed opinions of those who believe the most successful country in the world is populated by fat, lazy idiots...

Yeah, we are so jealous of how your ideals just ruined the world economy and caused thousands of people worldwide to lose their jobs. Not to mention those millions of poor slobs who are working like 20 jobs and still cannot make ends meet... I'd love to live in a country like that!

EDIT: Okay, before I start a riot, I want to point out that what I mean is, a lot of people here apparently feel like we Europeans think we're superior to Americans. This is not true and thinking that is being biased, which is what you criticize Europeans for in the first place. So don't be biased yourself. Some Americans claim to be living in the greatest country in the world. This is mainly because:
a) they have always lived there and it's their home and a lot of the time all they know (which if perfectly normal) -or- they emigrated to America to escape a life of poverty or prosecution abroad (so no wonder they like it so much and are prepared to give all for the American dream, eventhough for many it'll just never happen anyway)
b) it is, as far as I can tell, also somewhat part of your national culture to think of all things American as great or best in the world
And there's nothing wrong with that, but please know that people in other countries, like a lot of Europeans, might not agree with you for a multitude of different reasons. Because they prefer their own way of life like Americans prefer theirs, or because they simply do not see the same thing when looking at America as what an American would see, caused by, among other things, the American government's foreign policy in these last decades- best demonstration was the immense protests held around the world just before the (current) Iraq war and the fact that the US government simply said "screw you world leaders and international organisations and many US citizens, we're going along with it anyway because we are Team America - World Police and we feel like it"