THEEUROPEAN：美国并不伟大的11个理由(4)

对，还有更多：美国完全无法应对新冠病毒疫情，这个理由如何？美国是世界上监禁人口最多的国家，这一事实可不可以做理由？种族主义、污染和腐败这个理由？大规模枪击、国内恐怖主义和广泛的药物滥用如何？一个世纪以来，美国一直通过在世界各地建立军事基地和展开军事行动来实施新殖民主义政策，这一理由又如何呢？美国一直在消耗世界各国的自然资源，这一理由如何呢？美国已经发展成为一个分裂的国家，当人们持枪包围美国国会时，美国甚至似乎已处于内战的边缘，这一事实可做理由吗？我的意思是，通常你只会在美国称之为香蕉共和国（指南美国家）的国家看到这样的事件。美国政府官员对龙卷风、洪水和野火的反应如何？由于出现了几天恶劣天气，强大的德克萨斯州几乎毁于一旦，电力供应都中断了，这一事实可做理由吗？对同性恋的不宽容可做理由吗？歌颂枪支、暴力和物化女性的美式音乐文化可做理由吗？
那么，严重损害美国儿童发展机会的糟糕教育体系可做理由吗？美国人沉迷于社交媒体，并将他们的灵魂和个人数据卖给美国社交媒体可做理由吗？说客付钱给美国政客以换取于己有利的法律法规，这一事实可做理由吗？头脑正常的人怎么会认为美国是世界上最伟大的国家？美国正活在泡沫中。总有一天，它会破裂。Hello, I am the European and I make videos that matter to you. Thank you for watching. America is living in a bubble. Hollywood movies, American songs and American politicians tell the American people that they live in the greatest country on earth. While in reality, there are so many serious problems in America that need to be addressed. That"s why I made this video in which I give you 11 reasons why America is not the greatest country on earth. Now, if you think it is important that I spread my message to a bigger audience, then please smash that like button and subscribe to my channel. If you do that, YouTube will show this video to even more people. Thank you very much. With that out of the way, let"s continue.America is living in a bubble. Hollywood tells Americans that their country is the greatest country on earth. Movies like Top Gun, Transformers, Battle Los Angeles, Red Dawn, American Sniper, Iron Eagle, Pearl Harbor and Independence Day glorify American military force and American military violence.Many American movies portray people from Russia as evil, people from Africa as poor and corrupt, people from Mexico and Latin America as criminal, and people from India as plainly stupid, millions of Americans watch these movies and kind of believe the racist message behind it. It is no secret that the American military and the American military industry are paying Hollywood millions of dollars to glorify the USA, to portray American soldiers as extremely heroic and American military operations as a just cause no matter the reality of dropping bombs on innocent people all over the world.The bubble continues in American music culture. Songs like Living in America and God Bless the USA are all telling Americans how great they are and what a great country they live in. When these songs are performed, we are usually treated with images of huge American flags waving in slow motion. But in reality, the USA totally fails on many levels. I know I"m going to get a lot of debate because of this video, but I need to speak out about all the dirt that many American politicians and media personalities gladly sweep under the carpet to keep the American dream alive and to keep their voters and fans happy. Therefore, today I will present you 11 reasons why America is not the greatest country on earth.Reason number one, poverty and homelessness. I have dealt with this in several of my videos. 200 million Americans that is 63% of the population, they live paycheck to paycheck. They simply don"t know if they can pay their rent for the next month. And an alarming number of Americans at least half 1 million and probably a lot more are living in slums on the streets, in cities like Los Angeles. This is a complete disaster. There are hundreds of videos on YouTube dealing with this problem and showing you crystal clear evidence that the streets of Los Angeles are exactly like a third world slum.Reason number two, low wages. The effective minimum wage in America is $11.80 that may sound reasonable. But in reality, it means that many Americans simply can"t live on that kind of payment. The rent for an average apartment in Los Angeles is over $2,300 per month. Even if you could set aside a full minimum wage income, just to pay for that rent, that wouldn"t be enough. In places like San Francisco, in New York city, it is even worse. That brings us to the number three, the debt crisis. 80 % of Americans are living in debt. They have credit card loans, car loans, student loans, personal loans, et cetera. The whole financial system of America is not based upon spending money you have. It is based upon spending money you don"t have by getting more and more loans. Debt is a disease in America, and it is enabled and encouraged by the US government that has the largest national debt in the whole world. As we speak, America is $28 trillion US dollars in debt. Do you really think it is even possible that these $28 trillion are ever going to be repaid? One day, the whole financial system of America will collapse. It almost happened in 2008 when America gave the world a global financial crisis. 13 years later, many countries still struggle with the consequences of that crisis. It even created a golden opportunity for China to get many countries within its realm of influence. And American politicians are now complaining about that while it is the result of their own mis-management. Of course, since America still has $28 trillion US dollars in debt, the problem has only gone worse, so brace yourself for the next financial crisis in America because that one might break the mighty US dollar.Reason number four, then there is another national disease in America. It"s called obesity. Over 42 % of Americans are obese. Obesity is costing America $150 billion US dollars. Each year, additionally, obesity causes millions of Americans to get ill. They get all kinds of heart diseases and diabetes. Even millions of American children are now obese. Why is that needed in the greatest country in the world?Reason number five, speaking of health, about 30 million Americans do not have any health insurance. They even avoid going to a doctor because they can"t pay for it. Why doesn"t the American government take care of this? In many countries, all over Europe and Asia, governments arrange for a decent health-care program for everyone. Why can"t that be the case in America?Reason number six, low quality of life. Find any list or ranking on the internet of countries with the highest quality of life. And America is not on that list. Usually you will see countries on those lists like sweden, denmark, canada, the netherlands, austria, switzerland, norway, finland, but not America. Large scale surveys tell you, America simply has not enough quality of life, too much crime, too much inequality, pollution, racism violence, et cetera. Yes, that means I"ve got some more issues to cover. Let"s continue.Reason number seven, violence. So many Americans are proud of their second amendment, which gives them the right to bear and carry firearms. They think it will help them to keep the country safer. No, you fools. Once you allow guns, you are going to meet them because people are going to use them against you if they feel like it. It has resulted in a never-ending arms race. There are now 393 million guns in the hands of American civilians that is 40 % of all these civilian guns in the whole world. No wonder America is one of the most violent countries in the world. Homicide and gun violence levels in America are among the highest in the world. What would you expect if you give random people millions of guns? Now Europe is not perfect, but when it comes to guns in Europe, we have a simple rule - guns are illegal. There are basically no guns on the streets in most European countries. If you do have a gun, you are very likely a criminal and the police will come for you. The result is that in most European countries, the streets are safe. There are no people running around with guns.Reason number eight, traffic jams and bad roads. It is ironic that in a country where there is so much room, a country that was designed to make way for transport by car, there is now so much traffic congestion. Los Angeles and many other American cities are infamous for their traffic jams. It"s even more ironic that in many American cities, roads are hardly maintained. Anyone can see in Google street view, how bad many of the American roads are. Where is the money going to that should be spent on American roads? I"m not even elaborating on the poor status of the American railroads. There is only one high speed rail connection in the entire USA. At the same time, many countries all over Europe and Asia connect all of their major cities with comfortable, clean and frequent high-speed rail connections. Why isn"t this possible in America?Reason number nine, fake democracy. America has only two political parties to choose from for about two centuries. Now, there are huge barriers for independent candidates to run for office. That is not democracy. Democracy is that anyone who wants to start a political party can be admitted to the political system. And then the people can vote for them if they have good ideas. That is how democracy is arranged in many European and Asian countries. Why is America still not a mature democracy? You had two centuries to take care of that. The answer, of course, we all know. America is managed by a corporate elite of rich and powerful families who would like to limit the scope of the political landscape. They don"t want you to have the opportunity to freely choose whatever politician you want, because they can"t control that.Reason number ten, limited freedom of speech. It has become more and more clear that in America, freedom of speech is under threat. If you don"t proclaim the right opinion, the large media companies will block or cancel you. I do realize that these big American media companies, they are not the government, so it"s not official censorship, communist style, but it"s getting increasingly hard to distinguish today situation in America from the way communist regimes deal with opinions that they don"t like.Reason number 11, war mongers. For the past 75 years, the USA has been one of the most aggressive countries in the world. When it comes to waging wars, there is an endless list of wars and conflicts in which America attacked a sovereign nation. In some cases, the reasons were pretty ridiculous. Waging wars has costed the American people trillions of dollars. No wonder that many Americans are fed up with this, and such a shame that the new American president has dropped bombs on the middle east, only in his 5th week in office. I thought America elected him because he would unite everyone.I have given you 11 reasons why America is not the greatest country in the world, but there are still 11 more reasons on my piece of paper. Yes. There is even more. How about the completely incompetent response of America to the Covid pandemic? How about the fact that America has the largest prison population in the world? How about the racism, the pollution, and the corruption? How about the mass shootings, the domestic terrorism, and the widespread drug abuse? How about the fact that America for a century now has been implementing a policy of neocolonialism by establishing military branches and operations all over the world? How about the fact that America has been depleting natural resources from countries all over the world? How about the fact that America has developed into a divided nation that even appeared to be on the brink of a civil war when people with guns sieged the American parliament? I mean normally you would only see that in the kind of countries that America would call a banana republic. How about the poor response of American government officials to tornadoes, and floods, and wildfires? How about the fact that the mighty state of Texas almost perished and had no more electricity because of a few days of bad weather? How about the intolerance towards homosexuals? How about American music culture, glorifying gun, violence, and objectifying women? How about the poor American education system that greatly damages the opportunities of American children? How about Americans being addicted to and selling their soul and personal data to the American social media? How about the fact that lobbyists pay American politicians in return for favorable laws and regulations? How can anyone in their right mind think that America is the greatest country in the world? America is living in a bubble. And one day, it"s going to explode. （观察者网由冠群听译自"THE EUROPEAN"视频频道）本文系观察者网独家稿件，文章内容纯属作者个人观点，不代表平台观点，未经授权，不得转载，否则将追究法律责任。