6 ms·

> Contrast this with the American culture of honesty; fraud and cheating are national scandals, not the norm. Fraud is basically the biggest national industry

> Contrast this with the American culture of honesty; fraud and cheating are national scandals, not the norm. Fraud is basically the biggest national industry in the U.S. Just look at: - The 30% of all medical spending that is wasted. - The rise of for-profit colleges with super low graduation rates and even worse employment prospects. Same with law schools. - The fact that the majority of people who graduate high school and college are functionally illiterate. - The massive pharmaceutical settlements for faking safety/efficacy data, illegal marketing, bribing doctors, etc. - The complete lack of food safety regulations and/or enforcement. E.g. a third of fish sold aren't even really the species that they are claimed as, 80% of supplements sold don't contain any of the ingredients they are claimed to have, etc. - The crumbling of the train systems, city water systems, etc. - The massive subsidies on fossil fuels that are causing climate change and destroying the oceans. - The financial system - The fact that the vast majority of science isn't replicable, or isn't accurate even when it is replicable. Etc. The main reason corruption seems worse in China is because of the billion dollar propaganda campaigns that use schools and the media to systematically blind people to the underlying issues, and the fact that the vast majority of activists get arrested and threatened with life in prison if they ever protest again.

api 12y ago
All that is true, but most of that except maybe the infrastructure stuff is worse in China. (I have relatives who live there.)
adventured 12y ago
You're going to have to backup that claim that the majority of people that graduate from college are functionally illiterate. I call bullshit on that being true. The American food system is one of the safest and most regulated on earth. You may disagree with some of its practices, but that does not make it unregulated nor unsafe. The claim that America has a complete lack of food safety regulations is laughable, you couldn't be more wrong. America has always had for-profit colleges, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. They work perfectly fine. America has had by far the best university system for many decades and still does. The rest of the world has nothing like it. Massive subsidies for fossil fuels? In fact the subsidies are not massive compared to the industry and dollar figures in question, even if those subsidies should not exist. If you want to talk per capita fossil fuels and the destruction of the environment from that, let's talk about Norway's output - that bastion of everything America is supposed to aspire to. America merely contributes upwards of half of all global science and innovation. Given the immense output record the US possesses, you're going to have to do a lot better to discredit it than throw out an empty soundbite.
- Alex3917 12y ago
  http://www.alexkrupp.com/Citevault.html#literacy http://www.alexkrupp.com/Citevault.html#literacy
  - adventured 12y ago
    Your source proves me right. You're wrong in your claim that the majority of college graduates are not functionally literate. 2% of college graduates fall below a basic level of literacy. 14% of total adults fall below basic on prose; 12% on document; 22% on quantitative. The numbers of college graduates are vastly lower than those. And further, digging into the data, I'd be willing to bet that half of those numbers of people that struggle on basic literacy - in english - do so because their primary language is either not english and or they have very little command of the language (first generation immigrants etc).
    - Alex3917 12y ago
      > Your source proves me right. Are you sure you understand the concept of functional literacy?
      - Retric 12y ago
        Sure, the bar of 'fully understanding' is ridiculous. People don't have 100% accuracy with anything. Most people would also fail the same measure if the document was spoken vs written so despite the name it has little to do with literacy. Note: The bar for functional literacy includes banking paperwork which is intentionally designed to be confusing. If more people understood it they would rewrite it to be less clear. Also, your failure to understand what you linked precludes you from the ranks of 'functional literacy'. PS: While high, you might reasonably interpret at least intermediate as an acceptable level for college graduates and that's well over 80%.
      - adventured 12y ago
        The vast NAAL you referred me to has four grading scales: below basic, basic, intermediate, proficient Your term was "functional." Basic on the NAAL scale is what qualifies as being functional. ~85% of college graduates fall into intermediate or proficient (ie 85% above even the basic functional level). You're beyond blatantly wrong.
diydsp 12y ago
> The complete lack of food safety regulations and/or enforcement. There have been some major recalls due to food safety in the last 5-10 years(1). In the last 5 years, the Food Safety Modernization Act was passed (2). In the last 5 years, the "Egg Rule" was passed (3). "Over 15 months, FDA inspectors visited about 600 facilities nationwide that produce about 80 percent of the country's eggs to determine if they are in compliance with the Rule, which went into effect in July, 2010." You can also find thousands of warning letters the FDA has written to companies over the last decade on their website (4). I searched through the warning letters for "supplements" and found exactly 500. (5) The letters were issued for all kinds of reasons, from outrageous claims, to products not containing the advertised chemicals. (6) I'm not going to argue the other points you list, but when it comes to the FDA, your assessment of "completely lacking in regulations and/or enforcement" was overreaching. (1) http://www.investopedia.com/financial-edge/0512/the-5-largest-food-recalls-in-history.aspx http://www.investopedia.com/financial-edge/0512/the-5-larges... (2) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FDA_Food_Safety_Modernization_Act http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FDA_Food_Safety_Modernization_A... (3) http://www.fda.gov/Food/GuidanceRegulation/GuidanceDocumentsRegulatoryInformation/Eggs/ucm170615.htm http://www.fda.gov/Food/GuidanceRegulation/GuidanceDocuments... (4) http://www.fda.gov/ICECI/EnforcementActions/WarningLetters/ http://www.fda.gov/ICECI/EnforcementActions/WarningLetters/ (5) http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/warningletters/wlSearchResult.cfm?qryStr=supplements&sortColumn=&Go=Go&webSearch=true http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/warningletters/wlSearc... (6) http://www.fda.gov/iceci/enforcementactions/warningletters/2011/ucm262219.htm http://www.fda.gov/iceci/enforcementactions/warningletters/2...
chappi42 12y ago
> Just look at: I'd like to add: - how many people are in prisons (for imho minor offences) - screwed up (software) patent system - amount of money wasted on NSA - stale two party government - homeland security paranoia
- megaman22 12y ago
  > - stale two party government Stale one-party government?
  - chappi42 12y ago
    Stale zero party regime... There's always worse. US became a shadow of waht it should and could have been.

api 12y ago

All that is true, but most of that except maybe the infrastructure stuff is worse in China. (I have relatives who live there.)

adventured 12y ago

You're going to have to backup that claim that the majority of people that graduate from college are functionally illiterate. I call bullshit on that being true. The American food system is one of the safest and most regulated on earth. You may disagree with some of its practices, but that does not make it unregulated nor unsafe. The claim that America has a complete lack of food safety regulations is laughable, you couldn't be more wrong. America has always had for-profit colleges, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. They work perfectly fine. America has had by far the best university system for many decades and still does. The rest of the world has nothing like it. Massive subsidies for fossil fuels? In fact the subsidies are not massive compared to the industry and dollar figures in question, even if those subsidies should not exist. If you want to talk per capita fossil fuels and the destruction of the environment from that, let's talk about Norway's output - that bastion of everything America is supposed to aspire to. America merely contributes upwards of half of all global science and innovation. Given the immense output record the US possesses, you're going to have to do a lot better to discredit it than throw out an empty soundbite.

Alex3917 12y ago
http://www.alexkrupp.com/Citevault.html#literacy http://www.alexkrupp.com/Citevault.html#literacy
- adventured 12y ago
  Your source proves me right. You're wrong in your claim that the majority of college graduates are not functionally literate. 2% of college graduates fall below a basic level of literacy. 14% of total adults fall below basic on prose; 12% on document; 22% on quantitative. The numbers of college graduates are vastly lower than those. And further, digging into the data, I'd be willing to bet that half of those numbers of people that struggle on basic literacy - in english - do so because their primary language is either not english and or they have very little command of the language (first generation immigrants etc).
  - Alex3917 12y ago
    > Your source proves me right. Are you sure you understand the concept of functional literacy?
    - Retric 12y ago
      Sure, the bar of 'fully understanding' is ridiculous. People don't have 100% accuracy with anything. Most people would also fail the same measure if the document was spoken vs written so despite the name it has little to do with literacy. Note: The bar for functional literacy includes banking paperwork which is intentionally designed to be confusing. If more people understood it they would rewrite it to be less clear. Also, your failure to understand what you linked precludes you from the ranks of 'functional literacy'. PS: While high, you might reasonably interpret at least intermediate as an acceptable level for college graduates and that's well over 80%.
    - adventured 12y ago
      The vast NAAL you referred me to has four grading scales: below basic, basic, intermediate, proficient Your term was "functional." Basic on the NAAL scale is what qualifies as being functional. ~85% of college graduates fall into intermediate or proficient (ie 85% above even the basic functional level). You're beyond blatantly wrong.

diydsp 12y ago

> The complete lack of food safety regulations and/or enforcement. There have been some major recalls due to food safety in the last 5-10 years(1). In the last 5 years, the Food Safety Modernization Act was passed (2). In the last 5 years, the "Egg Rule" was passed (3). "Over 15 months, FDA inspectors visited about 600 facilities nationwide that produce about 80 percent of the country's eggs to determine if they are in compliance with the Rule, which went into effect in July, 2010." You can also find thousands of warning letters the FDA has written to companies over the last decade on their website (4). I searched through the warning letters for "supplements" and found exactly 500. (5) The letters were issued for all kinds of reasons, from outrageous claims, to products not containing the advertised chemicals. (6) I'm not going to argue the other points you list, but when it comes to the FDA, your assessment of "completely lacking in regulations and/or enforcement" was overreaching. (1) http://www.investopedia.com/financial-edge/0512/the-5-largest-food-recalls-in-history.aspx http://www.investopedia.com/financial-edge/0512/the-5-larges... (2) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FDA_Food_Safety_Modernization_Act http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FDA_Food_Safety_Modernization_A... (3) http://www.fda.gov/Food/GuidanceRegulation/GuidanceDocumentsRegulatoryInformation/Eggs/ucm170615.htm http://www.fda.gov/Food/GuidanceRegulation/GuidanceDocuments... (4) http://www.fda.gov/ICECI/EnforcementActions/WarningLetters/ http://www.fda.gov/ICECI/EnforcementActions/WarningLetters/ (5) http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/warningletters/wlSearchResult.cfm?qryStr=supplements&sortColumn=&Go=Go&webSearch=true http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/warningletters/wlSearc... (6) http://www.fda.gov/iceci/enforcementactions/warningletters/2011/ucm262219.htm http://www.fda.gov/iceci/enforcementactions/warningletters/2...

chappi42 12y ago

> Just look at: I'd like to add: - how many people are in prisons (for imho minor offences) - screwed up (software) patent system - amount of money wasted on NSA - stale two party government - homeland security paranoia

megaman22 12y ago
> - stale two party government Stale one-party government?
- chappi42 12y ago
  Stale zero party regime... There's always worse. US became a shadow of waht it should and could have been.