<p>@Japanese nukes. You call thousands of civilians dieing “minimum casualties”? Really?</p>
<p>@Vietnam. What business does the US have interfering with the spread of communism. What if I made a super powerful communist state and then decided it was my sworn duty to go around stopping the spread of capitalism? EITHER WAY, the US caused for more deaths and “oppression” from fighting communism then communism would have done anyway.</p>
<p>@Iraq. It takes a certain kind of person to govern those countries. By tossing out one dictator another one will rise shortly. To my knowledge the US installs most of the dictators in these countries anyway and then takes them out (read: kills) when they no longer fulfill the purpose they were put in power for.</p>
<p>@Korea. I’ll give you this one. You can dislike him all you want.</p>
<p>@ japanese nukes, yes thousands of civilians died but who knows how many more would have died if japan continued its assaults on the world?</p>
<p>@… whatever, nevermind we both know both sides of the argument already and on half this stuff I have just been playing the devil’s advocate. I’m just saying america is not as good as some people think but it is also not as bad</p>
<p>Haha i’ve been playing devil’s advocate as well! I agree the US isn’t that bad, but it isn’t that good! It’s just like any other country. And that is exactly why American exceptionalism is so silly.</p>
<p>dang we were on the same page all along huh? lol. I could have sworn you were an America-bashing-grass-is-always-greener-somewhere-else kind of guy, and i bet you thought i was some blind-supporter-of-anything-redwhiteandblue. But nope</p>
<p>Though those schools are ran and occupied(professors, ta’s, researches) by a vast majority of products who are products of the K-12 system in America. I would have to assume it very unlikely that a failing K-12 system would produce and maintain the top universities in the world.</p>
<p>Today, I drove home from my lovely Catholic high school to my lovely McMansion on eight acres on the fringes of a suburb in my bright red 1995 V6 Ford Pickup getting 16 miles per gallon stopping at the McDonalds on the way and picking up two double cheeseburger’s, a large fry, two apple pies, and a medium chocolate shake. After going to the shooting range for an hour or so getting ready for hunting season I went up to my high school around five o’clock where we tossed around the pigskin for an hour and a half while grilling up some hot dogs and burgers. Then I witnessed my high school football team get killed by some team from the north metro - who cares though cause I had a lovely hot chocolate and two boxes of popcorn. I then hitched a ride home and propped myself up in front of my 60 inch plasma tv where I watched my tiVo recording of my Twins getting robbed by the umpires at Yankee Stadium. Tommorow I will ride on into town and work for 8 hours at the grocery store before heading home and lounging on the couch from three till bedtime watching college football.</p>
<p>Where else in the world could you do this? I love America!</p>
<p>The line between failing and best in the world is very broad, and there’s also a time lapse between now and when the people running those universities were in grade school. I don’t know how the US K-12 system ranked in the middle of the last century, but I can tell you that most studies now show that the US is mediocre compared to other industrialized countries, especially in Math and Science. As the title of the thread says though, they’re more likely to believe it’s the best.</p>
<p>“Sorry, the poor and immigrants and the ethnically diverse in other countries scored higher than ours.”</p>
<p>Which study showed that blacks in Japan did better than those in America? How about any in Western Europe. What industrialized country had a significant number of blacks other than America? How about Latinos?</p>
<p>Edit: I didn’t realize this was that thread… Nevermind, I don’t care. This thread is dumb.</p>
<p>just a side-note, if they made my high school any harder/longer, kids would ~actually~ kill themselves. it’s <em>almost</em> that bad/competitive now. so, that’s the worst idea since…i don’t know what :|</p>