2005-06-16
Response to the Responses
First of all, thankyou to everyone who posted a nice comment on my blog or other blogs, or who sent me an email in response to my "Thanks America" post. I didn't reply to the good comments, because I wanted to reply in one go, which I am doing now. There was very little negative feedback. I had to go out of my way to find the reaction of the left-wing loonies, and sure enough, they found the most bizarre things to fault.
E.g. one of them tried to deny that I was an Australian, because I used the word "butt" instead of "arse". ROFL! I didn't even know that this word had crept into my vocabulary. For your information, English is a growing language. It is defined by common usage. No-one owns it. I can remember an Australian (of Italian descent) insisting that in Australia we don't use the word "jail", we use GOAL. That's right, the word "gaol" is so archaic that he didn't even know how to spell it. When I went to the UK, I made a point of asking someone how they spelt "jail" and yep, even in the UK they use "jail". They don't actually teach us at school which words are Australian, so the people in the UK had no concept of what a "dole bludger" was. In actual fact, I was about 10 years old before I even figured out by myself that "gidday" was a shortened form of "good day". Don't say "good day" to someone in Australia. It is weird. Just say "hello". I noticed that the NSW Police now have signs out saying "NSW Police targeting speeding". We normally spell it "targetting" here. I wonder if the language police are going to report this to the real police?!
Another thing the lefties tried to say is that Australians don't thank others. Yeah, right. We've got a population of 20 million, and not one of them has any manners. In actual fact, several Australians posted entries echoing my thanks. THANKS GUYS - THAT WAS A BIG HELP. This also eliminates some of the spurious arguments about me personally being a nutcase due to other things I have written about. The fact is that these sentiments are shared by other, presumably "more normal" Australians. Regardless, in this sort of pissing contest, you can't really judge based on individuals, you need to look at opinion polls. I don't actually have an opinion poll showing "who appreciates America saving our butts?", but I'll give you some other opinion polls. During Gulf War I, we had around 90% supporting the liberation of Kuwait. During Gulf War II, we had a peak of 57% supporting the liberation of Iraq. The country is generally on the right track, although obviously has room for improvement. This country even has sick twisted individuals who supported the Soviet Union in the middle of the Cold War. God forbid we have people who want to thank America for ensuring their gulags never arrived on our shores.
And would you believe that some people managed to pick apart one of my paragraphs, where I was talking about America giving stuff away for free, and saying that the third world shouldn't have to thank America for the Mars rover images since they're not that useful. Ok, what about all the others free stuff, like money, food and medicine, that America gives? And that the Soviets did most of the fighting in WWII. Yeah. With American weapons. And only after the Soviets STARTED WWII in the first place, along with their Nazi allies. And the Soviets didn't liberate Eastern Europe. They just changed who was enslaving them. Do you moonbats have any grip on reality at all? Or is it all "for the cause"?
Ok, next thing is that everyone wants to buy me a beer. While I have the traditional Australian ethos of freedom-loving coursing through my veins, multiplied 1000-fold, I don't share the majority view on alcohol. Every time I've tried it it tastes like shit. I prefer chocolate thickshakes. In my entire life, the sips of alcohol I have tried add up to maybe half a glass. So thanks for all the offers of beer, but I'll have to turn them down. I made the same mistake when I had builders over. I bought some beer for them. It never occurred to me that maybe Lebanese-descent builders don't like beer. They didn't want it and I didn't want it either. Fortunately they drank it anyway.
And finally, some people misinterpreted my thanks for America as being an abandonment of Australia. Um, no. I could have written an equally glowing thanks to Australia. First time the supposedly-invincible Nazi land forces were beaten was by Australians at Tobruk (Libya). First time the supposedly-invincible Japanese land forces were beaten was by Australians in Papua New Guinea. Israel wouldn't even exist if the Australian Lighthorse hadn't done the supposedly impossible feat of charging machine-guns at Beersheba in WWI. No, Australia traditionally pulls its weight. But that doesn't alter the fact that America has done more for world freedom than anyone else since 1941. Both as a country and on a per-capita basis.
Also, since some people asked - all my posts here, both past and future, unless otherwise stated, are hereby released to the public domain. You don't need to seek my further permission if you want to reproduce them somewhere. I'm trying to spread world freedom. I'm not trying to be an opportunistic blood-sucker like Martin Luther King Jr's relatives.
UPDATE: Another Australian has gone on public record to echo my sentiments.
|
E.g. one of them tried to deny that I was an Australian, because I used the word "butt" instead of "arse". ROFL! I didn't even know that this word had crept into my vocabulary. For your information, English is a growing language. It is defined by common usage. No-one owns it. I can remember an Australian (of Italian descent) insisting that in Australia we don't use the word "jail", we use GOAL. That's right, the word "gaol" is so archaic that he didn't even know how to spell it. When I went to the UK, I made a point of asking someone how they spelt "jail" and yep, even in the UK they use "jail". They don't actually teach us at school which words are Australian, so the people in the UK had no concept of what a "dole bludger" was. In actual fact, I was about 10 years old before I even figured out by myself that "gidday" was a shortened form of "good day". Don't say "good day" to someone in Australia. It is weird. Just say "hello". I noticed that the NSW Police now have signs out saying "NSW Police targeting speeding". We normally spell it "targetting" here. I wonder if the language police are going to report this to the real police?!
Another thing the lefties tried to say is that Australians don't thank others. Yeah, right. We've got a population of 20 million, and not one of them has any manners. In actual fact, several Australians posted entries echoing my thanks. THANKS GUYS - THAT WAS A BIG HELP. This also eliminates some of the spurious arguments about me personally being a nutcase due to other things I have written about. The fact is that these sentiments are shared by other, presumably "more normal" Australians. Regardless, in this sort of pissing contest, you can't really judge based on individuals, you need to look at opinion polls. I don't actually have an opinion poll showing "who appreciates America saving our butts?", but I'll give you some other opinion polls. During Gulf War I, we had around 90% supporting the liberation of Kuwait. During Gulf War II, we had a peak of 57% supporting the liberation of Iraq. The country is generally on the right track, although obviously has room for improvement. This country even has sick twisted individuals who supported the Soviet Union in the middle of the Cold War. God forbid we have people who want to thank America for ensuring their gulags never arrived on our shores.
And would you believe that some people managed to pick apart one of my paragraphs, where I was talking about America giving stuff away for free, and saying that the third world shouldn't have to thank America for the Mars rover images since they're not that useful. Ok, what about all the others free stuff, like money, food and medicine, that America gives? And that the Soviets did most of the fighting in WWII. Yeah. With American weapons. And only after the Soviets STARTED WWII in the first place, along with their Nazi allies. And the Soviets didn't liberate Eastern Europe. They just changed who was enslaving them. Do you moonbats have any grip on reality at all? Or is it all "for the cause"?
Ok, next thing is that everyone wants to buy me a beer. While I have the traditional Australian ethos of freedom-loving coursing through my veins, multiplied 1000-fold, I don't share the majority view on alcohol. Every time I've tried it it tastes like shit. I prefer chocolate thickshakes. In my entire life, the sips of alcohol I have tried add up to maybe half a glass. So thanks for all the offers of beer, but I'll have to turn them down. I made the same mistake when I had builders over. I bought some beer for them. It never occurred to me that maybe Lebanese-descent builders don't like beer. They didn't want it and I didn't want it either. Fortunately they drank it anyway.
And finally, some people misinterpreted my thanks for America as being an abandonment of Australia. Um, no. I could have written an equally glowing thanks to Australia. First time the supposedly-invincible Nazi land forces were beaten was by Australians at Tobruk (Libya). First time the supposedly-invincible Japanese land forces were beaten was by Australians in Papua New Guinea. Israel wouldn't even exist if the Australian Lighthorse hadn't done the supposedly impossible feat of charging machine-guns at Beersheba in WWI. No, Australia traditionally pulls its weight. But that doesn't alter the fact that America has done more for world freedom than anyone else since 1941. Both as a country and on a per-capita basis.
Also, since some people asked - all my posts here, both past and future, unless otherwise stated, are hereby released to the public domain. You don't need to seek my further permission if you want to reproduce them somewhere. I'm trying to spread world freedom. I'm not trying to be an opportunistic blood-sucker like Martin Luther King Jr's relatives.
UPDATE: Another Australian has gone on public record to echo my sentiments.
# posted by Paul Edwards @ 21:12 
