My father takes us on a LOT of vacations to exotic locales. He does this because he couldn't survive two weeks in a foreign country without somebody with a command of simple division to convert foreign prices into dollars, a memory for airlines, code-sharing agreements, flight numbers, and time zones. So I've become an expert at long distance travel. I can pack for any climate in less than 60 minutes and have only one light bag and a backpack. I never need to check luggage in and I never have anything to declare.
Yet, curiously, my father's vacationing has not made me more international but instead given justification to jingoistic ideas of American superiority. It's one thing for George and Laura Bush -- who have never crossed the Atlantic -- to think that America's the best place on earth. It's quite another for a person who's seen five continents to say that America is the best place on earth. We aren't perfect, and we have flaws. But as a whole we are a well-rounded nation and deserving of unique praise. So without further ado, let me give you my four best reasons why America is the best place on earth.
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Our economy is so free and unfettered by taxes that we have the unique distinction of foreigners coming to the United States to buy things that are made in their home countries. On a recent trip to Hawaii, I noticed that the Ala Moana shopping center in Honolulu was full of Japanese tourists buying Japanese products. Why is this? The United States welcomes competitiveness and allows the markets to shuffle capital towards the production of the items that only America can make. Have you noticed that in Germany the shops are never open when you want to go shopping? We don't have sclerotic Social Democratic regulations giving workers a 13th month of pay at Christmas or two years worth of severance pay. America is free of the absurd Japanese notion of lifetime employment. These regulations drive up the prices of everything that labor is involved in making. This is how America attracts investment capital that accelerates economic growth. The end result is that the United States has one of the most productive workforces in the world, with a 1999 per capita income of $33,000 and a 5% unemployment rate. The unemployment in the EU is something like 8.8% and the per capita income is $22,000. In Japan the unemployment is 6% and the per capita income is $24,000.
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The peaceful transfer of power is written in 44 successful presidential elections. There was controversy, no doubt. But the law was followed. The Supreme Courts of the United States and of Florida used their legitimate authority to manage this crisis. The very notion that the focus of the crisis was on the law and not on power is a triumph for the United States. Despite the fact that Al Gore won more popular votes than George W. Bush, he recognized the fact that the United States elects its presidents based on the Electoral College vote and not by any means the popular vote. Tanks did not roll in the streets. Look at the spectre of the Philippines, where the new president was sworn in by the power of the crowds surrounding Malacanang Palace. Look at the French Fifth Republic -- a simple matter of a North African colony caused the collapse of the Republic. In the United States, power does not rule. Law rules.
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We have the National Parks, the Smithsonian Institution and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Nowhere on earth is so much knowledge and beauty available for so little cost. The United States is alone among nations in that natural treasures remain largely unspoiled by mendacious commerce and tourist gauging. In Tagaytay in the Philippines the oversized vacation villas of the rich and powerful spoil the spectacular view of a lake inside another lake formed by a volcanic crater. The con artists and souvenir hawkers tugging at everyone's sleeve spoil the glory of the Pyramids at Giza. Even in France we see a ruinously expensive tariff applied to anyone who wants to enter the Louvre or Versailles. Teddy Roosevelt and John Smith and the trustees of the Met realized that there are some things that just can't be dealt with in economic terms. By God, every American rich or poor ought to be allowed a chance to see, unimpeded, the most excellent examples of what God and Man have wrought. So we are humbled by El Capitan and awed by the Wright Flyer. We see Van Gogh's glory in its original form for a suggested donation of four dollars. There's nothing like it in the world.
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American patriotism is pride in our freedoms. We take pride in our guaranteed liberties rather than maintaining an exclusionary American identity. We don't protect a particular culture by forcing conformity. In Germany, beer is protected by thousands of laws protecting that scion of German culture. In Japan, full citizenship is attained only through the adoption of a "Japanese" lifestyle. Each American is identified as an individual rather than a member of a hostile ethnic group or tribe. There's less of a fortress mentality here than in any nation I've seen. There's no sense that our culture is under attack because we have no culture!
