US

"Of all the animosities which have existed among mankind, those which are caused by difference of sentiments in religion appear to be the most inveterate and distressing, and ought most to be deprecated. I was in hopes that the enlightened and liberal policy, which has marked the present age, would at least have reconciled Christians of every denomination so far that we should never again see the religious disputes carried to such a pitch as to endanger the peace of society." – George Washington

Overview

This page is about issues which primarily affect The United States of America.

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Issues

• gerrymandering
• US Electoral College
• US immigration
• US economy
  • US military spending
  • United States health care costs
• United States politicians
• The Pledge of Allegiance

Politics

• Presidential Administrations
  • 2000-2007 US Presidential administration (George W. Bush)
  • 1992-1999 US Presidential administration (Bill Clinton)
  • 1988-1991 US Presidential administration (George H.W. Bush)
• Multi-Administration Data
  • US Presidential administration budgets
• Parties
  • United States Republican Party
  • United States Democratic Party
• Other
  • 2006 US elections

Links

• Wikis about the U.S. Congress:
  • Congresspedia: "citizen's encyclopedia on Congress"
  • CongressWiki: to introduce new legislative ideas, and to provide information about legislation currently in Congress
• Other resources
  • The Federation of American Scientists: information and documents on a wide variety of issues
  • US Census Bureau: US population data

Opinion

• 2005 Post-Soviet Lessons for a Post-American Century by Dmitry Orlov: a rather non-modernist but also non-romantic look at the US from a Russian perspective
• 2004-12-22 Believing in miracles by Hal Crowther: some discussion of the backward attitude which seems to have seized the US lately

Notes

The US is often criticized for being by far the world's heaviest per-capita consumer of natural resources (natural resource consumption is often referred to as the "ecological footprint" of a given entity). However, some additional facts should be considered:

• If the ranking is calculated in terms of consumption per gross domestic product, the US is far down the list and well under the global biocapacity per gross domestic product [1] The question then becomes: who is benefitting from all that GDP?
• The US government contributes $27 billion in foreign aid, and "American charities accounted for $6.9 billion, or fully half the world's overseas private aid and relief donations." [2] So we are not just keeping all that domestic product for ourselves.
• Much of what the US produces (and invents) is technology to help others use fewer resources over the long term, e.g. cellphones, solar power, the internet. (Consider also the Peace Corps, and other such exports.)

These bits of information seem like good cause for rethinking some things.