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The Americans (Start out 2005-with this Truth antidote to the "stingy" comments)
various sites via google ^ | 1974 | Gordon Sinclair, Byron MacGregor

Posted on 01/01/2005 12:07:00 PM PST by VOA

The Americans
written by Gordon Sinclair (spoken-word recording made by Byron MacGregor
with musical accompaniment by The Detoit Symphony Orchestra)

United States dollar took another pounding on German, French and British
exchanges this morning, hitting the lowest point ever known in West Germany.
It has declined there by 41% since 1971 and this Canadian thinks it is time
to speak up for the Americans as the most generous and possibly the
least-appreciated people in all the world.

As long as sixty years ago, when I first started to read newspapers,
I read of floods on the Yellow River and the Yangtse.
Well, Who rushed in with men and money to help?
The Americans did, that's who.


They have helped control floods on the Nile, the Amazon, the Ganges
and the Niger. Today, the rich bottom land of the Mississippi is under water
and no foreign land has sent a dollar to help. Germany, Japan and,
to a lesser extent, Britain and Italy, were lifted out of the debris of war
by the Americans who poured in billions of dollars and forgave other
billions in debts. None of those countries is today paying even the interest
on its remaining debts to the United States.

When the franc was in danger of collapsing in 1956, it was the Americans who
propped it up and their reward was to be insulted and swindled on the streets
of Paris
. And I was there. I saw that.


When distant cities are hit by earthquakes, it is the United States
that hurries into help... Managua Nicaragua is one of the most recent examples.
So far this spring, 59 American communities have been flattened by tornadoes.
Nobody has helped.

The Marshall Plan... the Truman Policy... all pumped billions upon
billions of dollars into discouraged countries. And now, newspapers in those
countries are writing about the decadent war-mongering Americans.

I'd like to see one of those countries that is gloating over the erosion
of the United States dollar build its own airplanes.

Come on... let's hear it! Does any other country in the world have a plane
to equal the Boeing Jumbo Jet, the Lockheed Tristar or the Douglas 10? If so,
why don't they fly them? Why do all international lines except Russia fly
American planes? Why does no other land on earth even consider putting a
man or a women on the moon?

You talk about Japanese technocracy and you get radios. You talk about
German technocracy and you get automobiles. You talk about American technocracy
and you find men on
the moon, not once, but several times ... and safely home again.
You talk about scandals and the Americans put theirs right in the store
window for everybody to look at. Even the draft dodgers are not pursued
and hounded. They are right here on our streets in Toronto, most of them...
unless they are breaking Canadian laws... are getting American dollars
from Ma and Pa at home to spend here.

When the Americans get out of this bind...
as they will...
who could blame them if they said 'the hell with the rest of the world'
.
Let someone else buy the bonds, let someone else build or repair foreign
dams or design foreign buildings that won't shake apart in earthquakes.

When the railways of France, Germany and India were breaking down through age,
it was the Americans who rebuilt them. When the Pennsylvania Railroad and
the New York Central went broke, nobody loaned them an old caboose. Both of
them are still broke. I can name to you 5,000 times when the Americans
raced to the help of other people in trouble.


Can you name to me even one time when someone else raced to the Americans
in trouble? I don't think there was outside help even during the San Francisco earthquake.

Our neighbours have faced it alone and I am one Canadian who is damned
tired of hearing them kicked around. They will come out of this thing with
their flag high. And when they do, they are entitled to thumb their
noses at the lands that are gloating over their present troubles.

I hope Canada is not one of these. But there are many smug, self-righteous
Canadians. And finally, the American Red Cross was told at its 48th Annual
meeting in New Orleans this morning that it was broke.

This year's disasters... with the year less than half-over... has taken it
all and nobody... but nobody... has helped.

ORIGINAL SCRIPT AND AUDIO
COURTESY STANDARD BROADCASTING CORPORATION LTD.


TOPICS: Your Opinion/Questions
KEYWORDS: foreignaid; gordonsinclair; stingy; sumatraquake; tsunami; unitednations
Just a counter-balance to the ragging we 'Muricans are enduring today...for being "stingy".
(emphasis formatting is all by "VOA")

And to just give a "blast from the past" for the younguns in the forum.
Not to mention a good note to start 2005!
I just gave the URL above as the Byron MacGregor recording of this
piece is still available for sale, with proceeds to the Red Cross.
("VOA" has no connection to that operation whatsoever)
1 posted on 01/01/2005 12:07:00 PM PST by VOA
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To: VOA

The United States of America has nothing to be defensive about. Not one thing. The demand that we trumpet our kindness and generosity is disgusting. Perception is NOT reality. (This is not a criticism of this post; just a general observation.)


2 posted on 01/01/2005 12:11:24 PM PST by Bahbah
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To: VOA

Stated a year after my birth, and still true today. If I wasn't the person I am, I really would say to hell with the rest of the world.


3 posted on 01/01/2005 12:22:02 PM PST by vpintheak (Liberal = The antithesis of Freedom and Patriotism)
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To: vpintheak
If I wasn't the person I am, I really would say to hell with the rest of the world.

I know what you mean.
But my feeling is that it can be intuited from the tone of the article
that there's no doubt that those 'Muricans are just suckers for
doing "the right thing" (or at least trying).
And we'll be back to help out old enemies when they are truly in trouble.
4 posted on 01/01/2005 12:25:08 PM PST by VOA
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To: VOA

darned if someone in Canada is say a few of the same things right now...

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1311545/posts


5 posted on 01/01/2005 12:28:30 PM PST by VOA
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To: VOA
Hear! Hear!....Good post VOA

FMCDH(BITS)

6 posted on 01/01/2005 12:41:34 PM PST by nothingnew (Kerry is gone...perhaps to Lake Woebegone)
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To: nothingnew

BUMP!


7 posted on 01/01/2005 1:31:15 PM PST by Publius6961 (The most abundant things in the universe are hydrogen and stupidity.)
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To: VOA

New Years Day bump...


8 posted on 01/01/2005 2:06:24 PM PST by VOA
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To: VOA
Wow. Been fussing about putting up my liberal socialist spouse's birthday present- a picture. This makes me late. I am now pledging a few green backs for the cause. (Free speech) the real kind. Plenty of other donations for the disaster from the old adopted home town- God love 'em. I mean that.

Yours is a well appreciated guesture re my post. All the best everyone, for 2005.

9 posted on 01/01/2005 7:46:50 PM PST by Peter Libra (Steady in the ranks)
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To: VOA

Sunday bump...


10 posted on 01/02/2005 12:18:42 PM PST by VOA
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