Posted on 08/18/2005 9:14:42 AM PDT by minus_273
Humphrey Hawksley asks whether that once universal idea of the American dream still exists.
It was a brilliant, hot day on the Seattle waterfront, with unspoilt views across the sound to outlying islands.
Just beyond a stretch of grass where people lay with books and lovers, came the melody of live unaccompanied singing from deep within the bustle of the nearby Pike Market.
It turned out to be four men outside a cafe singing a love song about Cupid, each with different voice ranges, and a deep, swaying crowd, clapping along.
The Starbucks logo of the cafe struck me as a little old-fashioned until someone mentioned that this was the first Starbucks ever opened anywhere in the world.
I had come to Seattle because of a recent survey by the Centre for Economic Performance in London, on how easy or difficult it was to get rich in different parts of the world - or if not rich, at least move out of poverty.
"If you are born into poverty in the US," said one of its authors, "you are actually more likely to remain in poverty than in other countries in Europe, the Nordic countries, even Canada, which you would think would not be that different."
Possibilities
The study, together with general anti-American sentiment which has become more prevalent since the Iraq war, raised for me a question about the American dream - the idea that the United States is a place where anything is possible.
American culture is about self-reliance and the individual fighting a way through
I had chosen Seattle not only because Starbucks was created there, but also because Microsoft and Amazon Books and Boeing airliners all come from this small city. Dreams, if you want, which began small but are now global brands.
"Great day, isn't it?" I turned to see the lined, and drawn face of a man I will call Dave.
"Are you getting what you want?"
We had met a couple of days earlier when he was having breakfast at a charity for the broke and homeless, and I had asked him if he believed in the American dream.
"The American dream," Dave said, eating a muffin and wiping his lips with a paper napkin.
"Well, it comes and goes. It will come again."
Winners and losers
In a low-ceilinged eating hall, maybe 100 men sat side by side along trestle tables.
Seattle - the home of American dreams and big brands They had queued up since five, registered in case there was any work, then ate while security guards watched over them in case there was trouble.
In Europe or just across the border in Canada, they would get social security, but this was America, where society is starkly divided into winners and losers.
Strangely, though, there seemed to be little resentment or blame of government. American culture is about self-reliance and the individual fighting a way through.
"The American dream," said one of the men, his eyes dartingly alive, his nose so skewed it must have been broken many times in different fights.
"I guess you are talking about a home, wife, children and all that."
"Do you have it?" I said.
"No. No. I don't. I had my opportunities, but I lost."
Control
Just up the road in a small print shop, a fit, thoughtful former air force officer, Bobby Ray Forbes, was slotting calendars into envelopes.
In America, I felt a sentiment that the more say the government has over you, the more you carry a sense of failure
His life collapsed when his marriage went wrong. He had ended up on the street, but recently had managed to get a job and keep it.
"Oh sure, I have had the house, picket fence, two cars," he said.
"But I put myself in a position where the government could take control. Right now I am happy just being back in control. You see, what a lot of people do not know is that the key is not getting the American dream. It is holding onto it."
In Europe, the government is entwined with a lot of what we do, yet in America, I felt a sentiment that the more say the government has over you, the more you carry a sense of failure.
Yet millions still yearn to come and take up the challenge.
A million a year settle to start the process of becoming American citizens. Half a million actually take the oath.
Flag waving
At the landscaped Seattle centre, using cards and newspapers to shield themselves from the sun, rows and rows of immigrants at a naturalisation ceremony listened to local officials speak about various aspects of the American dream.
They came from everywhere: Britain, France, Iran, Iraq - the name of every country read out, to cheers, as if we were at the Oscars and, of course, the waving of American flags.
"Why do you want to live here and not in Europe?" I asked a young woman from Ethiopia, who tipped back her Seattle Mariners baseball cap and looked at me as if I were completely mad.
"Europe," she said disdainfully.
"What do they ever hope for in Europe? Here they have a law that you can dream to be happy."
The writer assumes that to be wrapped in European socialism is to not be poor.
I've lived in Europe, and of course, in the USA. In Europe it's harder to get a job esecially the job you want, but once you get it it's harder to lose it. European gov'ts interfere with every aspect of your life. I'd rather be poor (and I have been from time to time) in the USA, than the average in Europe. The US provides so many opportunities - all it takes is a little perseverance and a willingness to chase them.
You missed the main point, genius. Yeah, he's a Euro-liberal with an agenda, but his point wasn't to question why we are happy with a system that allows us freedom, it was to ask why we're happy with a system that gives us less economic mobility than the rest of the civilized world. Yeah, we're free, but we're becoming more and more free to fail rather than to succeed. We think that we're the Land of Opportunity, but we've been falling behind in this regard over the last forty years, and yodelheads like you aren't smart enough to understand when someone is pointing this out. You automatically think that this socialist is making fun of our freedom.
What terrible writing. And what a maroon.
There's the difference- In America it is shameful to live on welfare(as it should be for most people) while in Europe it's the norm.
Although I often feel a sense of disgust with certain things... massive government encroachment of personal liberty, that began long before I was born. Large scale misunderstanding of the Constitution and the Federal Governments role in our lives, etc. Because those things lead to less free markets that are inhibited from being as free as they once were and could be again, from regulation.
Having said that I still step back and marvel at the fact that we're still holding things together after nearly 230 years of independence.
Dinesh D'Souza had a book a few years ago called "What's So Great About America" and in the book there's an interview with a young man from India (D'Souza himself is an immigrated American citizen, from India.. his parents came over when he was an infant, I believe). The gist of the interview is that America is the richest most prosperous nation in the world, the greatest nation in the history of the world. Even the poorest citizens in this country have weight problems. If I remember the quote correctly; "I want to live in a country where even poor people are fat".
Pretty much sums up how great this country is.. I think.
Welcome to FR. I'm sure your stay will be interesting. Just like "out there," you're free to fail here, too.
Yeah, what a "maroon". I hate "maroons", and really stupid macaroons, too.
Seattle? As a model of America? Well, maybe a lifetime ago. Seattle as a model of socialist nannyocracy, I can accept that. Why didn't he go to Dallas? Because he's clueless, that's why.
Welcome to FR, we try being a little more polite on this board than your friends at DU are.
Do you think you can be any more sarcastic and overbearing or did you just sign on today because DU is slow.
read my bio dufus, i am an immigrant myself. people like you who are born with the privilege of being American and then complain don't know how well you have it. you are like Paris Hilton complaining to some kid in Somalia how hungry she is.
"Yodelheads"? That sounds almost as sophisticated as "Doodyheads". Welcome to FR, but you will find that logic and reason go farther here than name-calling and ad-hominem attacks.
America: 90% winners, 10% losers.
Europe and Canada: 9% winners, 1% losers, 90% trapped in permanent lower middle class immobility.
But instead of hearing about how 90% of Americans do better than 90% of Europeans and Canadians will ever have a chance to, we only hear about America having ten times as many losers as the socialist countries. It's like looking through the wrong end of the telescope.
Your not blaming Bush for all of the problems???
Amusing!
It was at the bottom of where they skidded the logs down to the waterfront.
I think many in Seattle are proud to be the home of the original skid row.
Polite? Stop being so sensitive; you sound as thin-skinned as some PC'er. Here's some examples of FR politeness I found:
"If Cindy Sheehan and her ragtag band of America-hating moonbats don't like living here..."
"Yeah, he removed his lips from La Raza's a$$ long enough to declare a State of Emergency"
" Were we raised differently than the liberal nuts?"
"I hope the DUmmies read this"
" The loony left..."
Sorry, I thought I was just going with the general tone here. What's DU, by the way?
Read this: http://cep.lse.ac.uk/about/news/IntergenerationalMobility.pdf
Then you can base your made-up figures on actual numbers. Looks like us and the Brits are tied for last...
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