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There has NEVER been any comprehension on the part of Germans, for the rather free-wheeling scope of freedom that Americans seemed to take for granted, at least until recently, from the days when the Republic as being established, and as the territories were being forged into States. Otto von Bismarck was supposed to have remarked, that God watches out for "fools, drunks, children and Americans." Implying that Americans are not good rational sensible people like Germans, who seem to be partial to marching in rows and adhering to a strict hierarchy in their social and business dealings.

Germany never had any cowboys, and do not seem to understand the concept of "cowboy justice".

If you ever say the word cowboy to a German....they immedately want to smile and say 'Old Chatterhand'...the dream character from Karl Mays 1890s western series...made into 8 movies during the 1960s and is the icon of the Germans version of the American west. There are several amusing things about this whole thing. Karl May never ventured out of Germany and yet wrote numerous books on the American west. In Mays books, the white man is usually the bad guy and the Indian is a legendary moral individual, who never kills unless provoked. Germans tend to view the book and the legend as fact and always want to use that as their moral discussion about the 'poor Americans'.

They have the same problem with todays fictional movies...which might show an American in a negative light and then base their whole rightous conversation on how bad the Americans are. I used to just sit there in disbelief and try to be nice and civil...and wondering how if they realized that this was a fictional movie. I no longer and wonder...I immedately challenge them on their economy, their taxes, their racism involving black Africans in Germany and even white Russians, and more importantly....I challenge them on their future. With a declining birthrate and no great future ...will there be a Germany in 50 years? They start to laugh but I always point out that the Muslim population in Hamburg is rapidly outdistancing the pure Germans...and the same is true in the Frankfurt area. Bavaria will eventually leave the union and become its own independent state when the Muslim influence on the German government becomes too much.