Perhaps the BEST B1G Forum anywhere, here at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

I always laugh when some derpy slapdick talks about Alaska's size, usually in some weak attempt to put a Texan in his place.

Nobody lives in Alaska.  Nobody wants to live in Alaska.  There's a significant reason why.

I'll give you a hint-- around 90% of Canada's population lives within 100 miles of the US border.

What is that slap dick trying to get at?

And when you really think about it, things have worked out really well for US despite our size. It seems like there is just so much that every little area specliazes in. Silicone Valley and Hollywood out West. Logging in the PNW. Oil and gas in the S and SE. Financial centers in NY and Chicago. Manufacturing in the Midwest. Vermont has…errr I have no idea.

Sometimes I think a lot of the problems of the US are caused because we’re so Damn physically large of a country. I mean, it gives us advantages as well I suppose. I’m well aware that there are other large countries ( physically speaking ) like Canada and Russia but to be frank they just don’t have enough of a population compared to us. I’ve seen a few map overlays and Texas alone is larger than most European countries.

Mind you, I’m not advocating for splitting us up or nothing like that. Just that we should find ways to manage a little better.

America's large size and all the advantages of geography and resources that comes with it is more beneficial that disadvantageous. But more than anything, it's Americans themselves that put America over the top.

The Hollywood we've known was invented by an elite yet isolated class of American Jews, and along with the music industry, our entertainment industry has projected American culture as a default pop culture across the globe.

After WWII, America, who up until WWII had little experience handling global affairs, did about as good of a job as anyone could've done to stabilize the world through the atomic age, the cold war, and into globalization.

And America's academic freedom and scientific ingenuity invented the age of aviation, the nuclear age, and the internet era, ushering the world into entirely new realities. And in tandem with England, America invented industrialization; in tandem with Russia, America invented the space age.

It's a credit to Americans themselves.

Compare that to nations with arguably just as many vast resources in terms of coastline, natural harbors, oil fields, minerals to be mined, agricultural capacity, rivers to be harnessed for energy, and tourism potential. Nations like Mexico, Brazil, Russia, and India come to mind. So what holds them back? Mostly it comes down to longstanding dictatorships and/or endemic national corruption that leads to a combination of unsound financial systems, widespread poverty and crime, limited educational opportunity, and national healthcare stuck in the 1970s.

well, someone is mostly having their way at the moment
time will tell if he'll turn us into that
I rather doubt it

don't forget the garbage disposal
he's using that the most

If someone had their way, we'd turn into this.  And we voted for him. 

Lulz. holy hyperbole and hysteria, batman! how is he trying to be a dictator?

Do we want to go back to the old days where powerful authoritarians decide to invade their neighbors?
How does this advantage the United States?
I remember when my former secretary's husband, who was displaced in WWII at age 11, returned to Estonia in the 1990s to request his family's property after Estonia became an independent state after the fall of communism which displaced his family's property, and Estonia was trying to restore property to former owners 50-years later. (It didn't go well as local cousins prevailed).
I understand that not all of you understand your heartfelt beliefs, but if you think appeasing Putin and Rusia is best, articulate why that is so great for America to destroy the system that kept us out of major military disputes for the past 80-years. Our alliances have kept us out of entanglements that the USSR and Russia presented us, in my opinion.
Explain your opinion.
Thanks.

the strong do what they can, the weak suffer what they must. this has been the way of the world since the dawn of mankind. it has not changed since Thucydides stated this obvious fact of human nature over 2,000+ years ago- and it remains the same, even today.

it's obvious there is a fucking lot you don't know about this conflict and it's origins, so Ill give you a pass. had we had actual intelligent forward thinking US diplomats and Presidents listening to esteemed foreign policy experts like Professor Noam Chomsky, Professor John Mearsheimer, Professor Jeffrey Sachs, or Professor Stephen Cohen (RIP) 10-15 years ago (or ironically to the US gov't own internal state dept memos) - all of which did nothing but call balls and strikes and called everything that has happened a decade plus later TO THE FUCKING T......Ukraine would not be in the dire situation that is in right now.

You're right, NATO not encroaching eastward and arms control agreements with USSR/Russia like the ABM & INF (which the US shredded up and left) helped keep the peace. What happened? Well as stated the US shredded those arms control treaties and went full-throttle in expanding NATO eastward- firstly with the Clinton administration- which went back on the verbal word of the Bush I administration (fyi Professor Jeffrey Sachs- who was an economic advisor to Gorbachev and an architect of "shock therapy" after the collapse of the USSR- was in many private meetings with US/West German/USSR leadership- and confirmed he heard with his own ears James Baker tell Gorbachev- "NOT AN INCH EASTWARD") - to expand NATO eastward.

George Kennan- who was the godfather and architect of US Cold War containment policy- and maybe the single most important diplomat in the history of this fucking country- wrote an OP ed in the NYTimes in 1997 railing against Clinton's decision to expand NATO eastward and said it was perhaps the single greatest foreign policy blunder in the history of the United States of America. But you know more than George Kennan and all those other esteemed aforementioned professors, amirite? Lulz. Bush II threw gasoline on the fire and exacerbated the situation by announcing at the Bucharest summit in 2008 that Georgia and Ukraine would become future members of NATO- despite objections by the Germans and French. CIA/State Dept overthrew Ukraine's gov't in 2014 and that is when the war started- and here we are today.

What planet are you living on when you say... "that system has kept America has out of major military disputes for the past 80 years?" Um...LOL. Wtf. What planet do you live on? The country which has exported more violence and war and been involved in the majority of major military disputes in the last 80 years is FAR AND AWAY the United States of America and it's not remotely fucking close.

the kitchen needs to be rebuilt, IMO