Buenos Dias Coffee Hosers ... und Guten Morgen Frank. Gary wird nicht mit Frühstück in Ihrem Krankenhaus. Das abendessen sah... okay.
@Frank: While customs and habits are influenced greatly by the particular needs and desires of a region, America is much different than Europe because we purposely went out of our way not to British or even European. America had fought a long, hard, bloody war against the the most powerful country in the world, Britain and their German mercenaries. It was tragically more difficult, bloody and destructive because much of the population wanted to remain in the Commonwealth ... which created an internal war and struggle of family members against family members and neighbors against neighbors. By the end of the American Revolutionary War, Americans wanted nothing to do with Britain or Europe. From small things to big things America purposely changed its habits and customs. A dairy farmer told me that the Brits milked cows from the left side so after the war, Americans milked cows from the right side. Et Cetera. And we had this huge ocean, an isolationist mentality and a largely unpopulated continent to usurp, allowing America to go its own way.
American football certainly evolved from British Rugby, some argued that Baseball derived from the English Rounders, Cricket or the Scot's Dog & Cat. Others argument that it is a purely American game created by Abner Doubleday, (an American Civil War hero), and played by his troops. American basketball was clearly invented in Springfield, Massachusetts by a Canadian physical education instructor James Naismith, as a sport less violent than football. But I digress.
The country, unlike Germany, did not evolve over centuries into the modern state. America was born on July 4, 1776.*1 That was the day our Declaration of Independence was adopted, signed and we became the United States of America.
As far as declarations go, it is a pretty good non-binding document.
"In Congress, July 4, 1776,
THE UNANIMOUS DECLARATION OF THE THIRTEEN UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume, among the Powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. That, to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the consent of the governed. That, whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such Principles and organizing its Powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and, accordingly, all experience hath shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But, when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world."
... next comes a long list of grievances against the King George III which we can skip to the summary ...
"In every stage of these Oppressions, We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free People.
Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred, to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the United States of America, in GENERAL CONGRESS assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the World for the rectitude of our intentions, DO, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly PUBLISH and DECLARE, That these United Colonies are, and of Right, ought to be free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that, as FREE and INDEPENDENT STATES, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which INDEPENDENT STATES may of right do. AND for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor."
Gary read somewhere that the American Revolution is the first war to be fought solely over a change of political/government system.
Yes Frank, America's customs and habits are much different than Europe's. Much of that was purposeful adoption and much was created in of a vacuum of European influence. Yes, by European standards, we are a very new people/country ... but Gary thinks that in our short time of existence we're done pretty good for ourselves.
PS- Our freedoms are based upon what we tolerance ... not upon what we accept. Many/Most Americans give respect and tolerance to the cultures of our neighbors by recognizing and acknowledging the special customs of those difference than ourselves ... hence the broad spectrum of holidays on our calendars.
*1 With all due respect to the history of Native Americans
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