Ok first sorry my English sucks at political talk so try to understand... To those who don't know (to avoid any confusion) I'm a left-liberal straight Eastern-European atheist. For the record if anyone thinks non-Americans should keep their opinions to themselves then screw you 
this bullshit affects me so I have a moral right to communicate my opinions as loudly as I can!
Somehow I can catch a very strong drift that this guy is a republican.
"For the most part, right and left differ in their visions of America and that is why they differ on policies." DOH ... isn't that a point of democracy to have multitude of opinions (so that ideally the best ones may emerge and prevail)?
"The left wants Europe's quasi-pacifism..." - I don't understand what he means by that. "kind of war-opposing"? So the left wants peace. Boo...
"..., cradle-to-grave socialism..." - what does socialism have to do with a person's age. If by socialism he means universal-healthcare, working class and the rich helping the old, the sick etc then absolutely I think that's great.
"..., egalitarianism..." - means equality among all people - yes absolutely.
"...and secularism in America." - (hope he didn't mean racism) - yes absolutely state and religion should be kept 100% separate. Personally I think that people living in la-la land should not have anything to do with leading a major country but that's just me. As a compromise I think that they should at least not mix religion with politics because a) it's unnecessary b) it's dangerous.
"The right wants none of those values to dominate America." - first thing that came to mind: what a bunch of assholes. Second thing that came to mind: what a weird way to say those things. As if he's trying to use bad sounding words to characterize the "left" and then he uses the word "dominate" to cast another dark shadow on those (imo perfectly sound) values.
"The left feels that if people want to be religious, they should do so at home and in their houses of prayer, but never try to inject their religious values into society." - Too vague and generalizing. Will mean one thing to a religious person and something completely different to a non-religious person.
"The right wants America to continue to be what it has always been -- a Judeo-Christian society with a largely secular government (that is not indifferent to religion)." - IMO that's just incorrect. The USA government is one of the most religious western governments in the world. Again IMO.
"These opposing visions explain, for example, their opposite views concerning nondenominational prayer in school." - IMO a very bad bad thing that American kids are not thought about atheism and different religions alike. Even worse that they are force fed one particular religion. School is a place that first and foremost should teach to think. Force feeding one religion is not something that encourages rational thought and reason. - This needs a chapter of it's own but I'll stop here.
"The left prefers to identify as citizens of the world. The left fears nationalism in general (this has been true for the European left since World War I), and since the 1960s, the American left has come to fear American nationalism in particular. On the other side, the right identifies first as citizens of America." - generalized bullshit - no comment
[/i]"The left therefore regards the notion of American exceptionalism as chauvinism; the United Nations and world opinion are regarded as better arbiters of what is good than is America. The right has a low opinion of the U.N.'s moral compass and of world opinion, both of which it sees as having a much poorer record of stopping genocide and other evils than America has."[/i] - Now he just tries to convey he's own personal opinion as something greater.
"The left is ambivalent about and often hostile to overt displays of American patriotism. That is why, for example, one is far more likely to find American flags displayed in Orange County, Calif., on national holidays than in liberal neighborhoods in West Los Angeles, Manhattan or San Francisco." - tries to support a bullshit claim with another bullshit claim.
"The left subscribes to the French Revolution, whose guiding principles were "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity." The right subscribes to the American formula, "Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness." The French/European notion of equality is not mentioned. The right rejects the French Revolution and does not hold Western Europe as a model. The left does. That alone makes right and left irreconcilable." - ok ... I have no idea about that.
"The left envisions an egalitarian society. The right does not." - already covered earlier.
"The left values equality above other values because it yearns for an America in which all people have similar amounts of material possessions." - is he referring to communism? Really? Socialism doesn't mean equal amount of possessions. At least in modern sense. It means helping those who need help.
"This is what propels the left to advocate laws that would force employers to pay women the same wages they pay men not only for the same job but for "comparable" jobs (as if that is objectively ascertainable)." - humm ... is he serious? - no comment
"The right values equality in opportunity and strongly believes that all people are created equal, but the right values liberty, a man-woman based family and other values above equality." - equality isn't about opposing "man-woman based family" and certainly not about opposing liberty so this sentence makes no sense. Moreover equality is about liberty.
"The left wants a world -- and therefore an America -- devoid of nuclear weapons. The right wants America to have the best nuclear weapons. The right trusts American might more than universal disarmament." - I strongly support global disarmament of nuclear weapons. And if terrorist's nuclear weapons are what you're afraid of then having your own doesn't really help you any.
"The left wants to redefine marriage to include same-sex couples for the first time in history. The right wants gays to have equal rights, but to keep marriage defined as man-woman. This, too, constitutes an irreconcilable divide." - Why add the "first time in history", it's been done elsewhere. World didn't end because of it.
"For these and other reasons, calls for a unity among Americans that transcends left and right are either naive or disingenuous. America will be united only when one of them prevails over the other. The left knows this. Most on the right do not." - I think that unity can be found when the the Government of USA (tm) starts doing some actual work, and starts to think about it's people. All parties need to be heard, all opinions need to be considered and the best compromises need to be found that don't just cater to the rich and the powerful but actually improve the life of ordinary US citizens.
What I think the USA really needs: (not in the order of importance) universal healthcare, serious tax reform (for example I need to log in and press 1 button on the internet to file my "income declaration" and it's done! Can go on with what's more important to me: living.), stop wasting money on fueling pointless civil wars in obscure far-away countries (nice ideals but really not what world needs right now), start respecting civil rights and privacy and stop persecuting ordinary people in the name of the (holy) war against terrorism, science based education and of course the list goes on forever...
posted 10-21-2008 18:22
). There is no one group that are "real" Americans, other than perhaps the Native Americans, the original inhabitants of the Continent.