Oh, so these examples are "demonstrations" of political backwardness? Could you please elaborate on that? Cause, quite frankly, you haven't demonstrated anything. What is the problem with the fall of the 4th republic? What is specific in the '68 crisis as compared to what happened in the US in the same time? What is "backward" in the French revolution, and what followed (did you notice that most of your examples are 100 or 200 years old)? Where is the "backwardness" in the fact that a defeated country could not avoid having a puppet government at his head in WWII?
Now, seriously, what was this enumeration for? To show that you've opened a book? To avoid making a similar enumeration on the US? May I suggest that you study the political rhetorics in America, as compared to European (French included) counterparts? Did you notice at what insane level of populism the Presidential campaign was? And the children this and and that, and let me bestially kiss my wife while cameras are watching, and I trust the people while he's for big government, and I want to restore dignity, and I'm gonna fight for you, and , blablabla... Also, what about the incredibly stupid things that you can hear from Congressmen on C-Span when the cameras are here?
No wonder there is no strong far right party (actually, there is, it's about one half of the Republican party...), as there was in France with the National Front. In the US, pure populism is the mainstream.
I forgot one thing: you seem to ingore that JM Le Pen is history in France, too. The National Front has lost most of its influence during the last 5 years.
I've actually been living here for one year now (I'm in Manhattan, and I like it, but I've decided to come back in one year). I didn't want to mention it before because I'm not very proud of my English after all this time.
Now, aren't you forgetting Tipper Gore's PMRC, Judas Priest' trial, or MacCarthysm? Where was the first amendment by this time? Also, what is even much more important in the US is social pressure: there may be few regulations, but there is much more brainwashing which makes these regulations mostly unnecessary. What is all this PC stuff about? Don't you feel around you how puritanism is preventing you to do or say this or that? Don't you feel how reluctant people are to accept cynism? Have you ever worked in a latin European country (by "latin", I mean Spanish, Italian or French) and had a chance to compare the nature of relations between employees?
> but why do you keep on bashing everybody who
> disagrees with this law as misofrancic [...]
I don't. I wanted to bash the "Oh, thanks God we have our holy Consitution and 1st amendment, it could never happen here" morons, and also the usual "the French are a bunch of faggots that got their ass kicked and we bailed them out and now they're bitter and they're fascist and they're language biggots and they're lazy, and they have a reduced workweek because they are socialists dumbasses, and there's no freedom in France blablabla" stuff. Which, if you read the commentaries in this story, are omnipresent. I'm just tired of this ranting, of hearing the same old cliches again and again because a (maybe tiny, but vocal) portion of the Anglo-Saxon people really has a problem with us. Trust me, if you were French, after 1 month on \., you would understand.
Ahah, funny. If you had staid a little bit longer, you would have seen that this whole story was a fake that was organized by the directors of those night-clubs, and it turned out later:
1- Many non-gays club has been checked.
2- Non-gay clubs were among the ones to be closed.
3- Most importantly, the gay clubs in Paris are more flourishing than ever.
Now, wanna talk abour Giuliani's policy in New York?
I forgot: The simple fact that you seem to consider, as most of your compatriots, Madonna's "Sex" as a provocative and highly erotic work pretty much illutrates your level of backwardness on these issues.
You are indeed less coercitive on the web than on movie and TV shows importation. Now, maybe you should learn a bit about the insanely high proportions of European movies who got an X-rating in America (and as such have no chance of being distributed) because they were more explicit than American counterparts.
> 1) We got whumped and have a right to be bitter
> and irrational 2) You have idiotic laws, and
> that gives us the right to have idiotic laws.
Bull. I've never implicitly claimed any "rights for...", I've just provided explanations and reminded a few things to some of the fellows who had immediately started insulting the French as they usually do each time we're mentioned, and who seemed to have forgotten a few of their own "specificities" despite their oh-so-protective 1st amendment. The rest is just your twisted interpretation, and nothing else, I don't have to justify myself with respect to what comes out of your imagination.
> And as for the yahoo.fr/.com, business; sorry,
> sucko, read the article:
Yeah, apologies, I was wrong on that one, I realized that while rereading the article.
How many times will I have to repeat it? I _do not_ support this ruling and the corresponding laws. Period. I'm just trying to explain the circumstances, why this is more understandable (even if it's wrong) than many Americans seem to think, and, why, relatively to other restrictions in other countries, the impact is, in comparison, almost negligible, which is the reason why I was upset while reading these good old Francophobic bullshits.
Last but not least, the ruling adresses yahoo.fr, not yahoo.com, and yahoo.fr is under the French legislation.
I was expecting such an answer; Even if these restrictions are supposedly designed for children, everybody is a victim. For example, the whole Hollywoodian movie production is calibrated to avoid a PG-17 rating: this has HUGE consequences on the artistic nature of American cinema. What also pisses me off is that, since many Hollywoodian major companies have purchased all across the world (France included, even though more lately) most movie distribution companies to ban non-Hollywoodian competition (in other words, 99% of worldwide theaters are just not allowed, except in very few occasions, to show non-Hollywoodian movies...), well, non-Americans are becoming victims of this too. The situation is not better on TV. Another example: adult or not, don't even think about being topless (when you're a woman) on a Californian or a Floridean beach.
Also, what's all this about "failing to learn from history"? I've read this 100 times in this story. We are spending an incredible amount of energy on studying the nazi era, and I can safely say that every French citizen is, as every German citizen, pretty well-informed about what happened. Some of us (a minority, but a powerful because determined one), mostly Jewish associations, still want to ban nazis artefacts from commerce, but, of course, we study these artefacts at shool. These associations are wrong, I agree. But this has nothing to do with the French refusing to face history.
Usually, you just have to track for the word "inappropriate". Just listen around and think about all the things that can't be said in the name of "appropriateness". Try to be cynical, for example, especially on issues related to protestant Anglo-Saxon ethics. Then, try a similar experience in Western Europe. This should be quite "enlightening".
I don't remember the Japanese armies parading on Manhattan's 5th avenue while you're looking them from your window hearing your wife or your mother crying, slaughtering entire villages in Texas because they had heard there were resistants around and coudn't find them even after torturing most males, nor enforcing an important part of the American population to work for their own plants, nor stealing most of the wealth and agricultural production, nor putting a puppet government in Denver trying to implement a system copy/pasted from the Japanese one. All this during 4 years. I actually don't remember seeing the Japanese armies on the American soil...
In other words: for the French, the nazi era has nothing to do with other wars in which we've been involved.
I've already answered to this: the reason why France is so irrational when it comes to nazism is that France has been among its victims, while France has not directly suffered from communism. I don't deny that the French vision of these two catastrophes is blatantly unbalanced, but communism has not reached us in our flesh and blood.
I'm getting tired of this. First, you obviously don't know that the French "socialist" party is. It's just a moderate left-wing party, as Tony Blair's labour, Schroeder's social-democrat party, of even the American Democrat party. Second, the American system, like the British one, is designed to have only two strong parties. And, dude, THIS is censorship. You can be sure that there are much more than 3% Americans who feel close to Nader, and much than 1% Americans who feel close to Buchanan. Remember how much Buchanan scored at Republican primaries a few years ago? And we're talking about a guy who seems to consider Auschwitz as an amusement park... And do you seriously think that there is less racism in the US that in European countries? Less nationalism? Also, on many issues, JM Le Pen would appear as moderate as compared to many right-wing Republicans.
Last, your 1st amendment protects NOTHING. I should have mentioned that I'm spending a lot of time in the US (I have professional collaborations here), and I really don't see it a land of freedom of speech, far from it.
There are actually strict regulations for TV networks, imposed by the government. As there are strict laws regarding toplessness on the beach, and censorship/rating of movies before they can be distributed in theaters.
Oh, really? Interesting. Well, it seems that I have to be a little more explicit so that everybody can get it:
I'd rather live in a country which is irrational about nazism than in a country which is irrational about sex, alcohol, and stuff. Is it clearer now?
Last, no, I DO NOT support this ruling (even though, deep inside, I wonder why the hell is Yahoo selling such crap), as I thought I had made it clear before. I'm only reminding a few Americans out there, who have immediately jumped on te bash-the-froggs bandwagon as soon as this story appeared, that they have similar problems with much more far-reaching consequences (banning nudity/explicit language/etc., for example, on THE mass-medium, aka TV, has a somehow greater impact than banning nazis-related items auctions on a website...).
Bull. The French are obsessed with the past when it comes to the collaboration. Most of our historians, philosophers, intellectuals and even politicians are spending much of their energy on this issue to understand and study accurately what happened. Many powerful Frenchmen are now in jail for having been collaborators. This is a permanent debate on the French intellectual scene. So, no, we're not trying to escape what happened, not at all. And your own vision of the resistance and the collaboration also seems to be slightly biased, isn't it?
As far as the Vichy government is concerned, it was nothing but a puppet government, chosen by the nazis who were omnipotent in France after their victory, and serving the nazi's interests.
PS: May I suggest you to read "Trading with the Enemy", by Charles Higham? It has some interesting information on the (excellent) relations between Nazi Germany and American business. It seems that, in every country, people are tempted to collaborate with the (even temporary) winner, whoever he is...
When the day when it is possible to see a frontal nudity (or even a breast, for god's sake!) on American TV before 22:30 or to hear 4 letter words, or to see somebody giving a finger without having a ridiculous mosaic on it has come, then maybe Americans will be able to start teaching lessons. 1st amendment, my ass, I've never seen such a bunch of blind hypocriticals.
For us, nazism means deads in our families, collective humiliations, foreign tanks parading in Paris, hunger, poverty, entire villages slaughtered (women and children included), genocide, shame on some of our citizens who became collaborators, etc... So, yeah, we're irrational about nazi icons, Jewish associations are very agressive to keep it that way, and in the end we're probably wrong. But I'd rather leave in a country which is irrational about nazism than in a country which is absurdly puritan about sex, alcohol and related, sorry.
Even if the business model can work in the long term (ie profit is made with support, services, and other specific developments on order), which is highly questionable, I wonder if they can raise enough money to start. It seems that they're currently broke, and they haven't attracted many investors (who, if they expect short term profites, will screw up the project anyway). So how will they fund all their developpers? Vapor long-term stock options? Doubtful.
Of course, Netscape is too self-serving! Hey, this is an American company, which tried to self-persuade itself and to persuade its investors that it could make money by enforcing people to come, even accidentally, on their web sites. All this in a country where most newspapers are unreadable because 90% of their content is commercials, or where most movies and TV shows are impossible to watch for the exact same reasons, and where hospitals and lawyers advertise on the street and on TV. So what did you expect, exactly?
The modern form of democracy, Switzerland's direct democracy put aside, is not British. The British system was censitarian, not democratic. The modern form of democracy first took place in people's minds, thanks to the ideas of Diderot, Locke, Rousseau, Voltaire, and a few others.
Then came the American system which was more democratic, but still censitarian (slavery, etc...) and "pre-modern" in the way it was distributing the powers. Then came the French revolution. Then came decades of mess. And then came democracy.
First, you obviously have no clue on how to interpret economic figures.
Second, people have already posted an answer in another story in which you've written exactly the same things, and you apparently refuse to take answers into account.
Third, the numbers from NYT greatly differ from numbers from more international and more neutral organizations. Also, GDP is a measure of economic activity, not wealth. This is a completely different matter. For example, the cost of healthcare in America represents approximately 15% of the GDP, for very poor results. In Europe, it is far below 10%. Also, purchasing power parity does not incorporate the cost of real estate, which has become insanely high in many American places, and is, on average, much more expensive then in Continental Europe, especially Germany and France. The only place in Europe in which the real estate is as expensive or more expensive than in the US is Britain.
Fourth, if you look at unemployment and salaries in the Western world, you can observe a very simple phenomenon: unemployment is low in places where salaries have been stagnating. This is not a welfare issue, or whatever. Unemployment is low in the US and the UK because salaries have stagnated. It is high in France where salaries, especially the lower ones, have permanently risen since the last 25 years. The salaries have been more stagnant in France for the last 3 years, in part because of the reduced work week, and unemployment is currently dropping sharply (it is now at 9.5%, while it was still at 11.5% less than 2 years ago, and the pace of the decay is very fast.) But unemployment is not an issue of welfare or social protection: in the Netherlands, which is a "welfare state", the salaries have staid at a moderated level for the last 15 years, thanks in part to the Wasemaar's agreement, and unemployment is very low.
Fifth, be _very careful_ with official unemployment rates. In part because there are countries, such as America, in which the official unemployment rate is very low but the level of poverty is insanely high (whether we're talking about the poverty line as a purely economic figure, or as a more social criteria which measures the right to get decent healthcare, education, housing, etc...). And also (and this is related), because official unemployment only measures the number of people which are actually registered as job-seekers, but does not measure the number of people which are unemployed but completely out of the system: homeless, criminals, people in jail, people who have been job-seekers for too long and as such do not get any more benefits from the employment agency,etc...
Last, you can't measure the wealth of the average citizen of a country by just looking at te average GDP. Not only because GDP does not measure wealth, but also because the level of inequalities greatly differs from a country to another one. In other words, there are country in which the median income is ridiculously low as compared to the average income, because the vast majority of the wealth is concentrated in very few hands. America has the worst figures on this criteria, followed by Britain and France. But Scandinavian countries have excellent figures.
Well, no, the 35 hours work week is not mandatory, at least not in many cases. There even is a joke in many French start-up companies: "I like the 35 hours so much that I do them twice a week". This law has an actual impact mostly for "blue collars", plant workers, janitors, secretaries, etc... Indeed, they're not supposed to work more than 35 hours a week, or, more specifically, if they do, their boss is supposed to pay them at a higher rate because the overtime is considered "heures supplementaires" (supplemental hours), which are more expensive. Besides, he cannot force them. In this kind of jobs, almost everyone does not want to work more than they have to, so employees are very happy with this law. It is a typical case where the law brings freedom: now they're free to work less, which is what they wanted to. Before this law, they had no chance of getting there by negociating, of course. As Lacordaire says, sometimes "between the strong and the weak, freedom oppresses and law frees".
Now, about the "10-20%". I don't subscribe to your point of view. These people are not the people who drive the economy, at least not the only people. They couldn't get anywhere without the work of their employees. They need their employees as well as the employees need them. But why should they get all the credit? This story about them being those who "take the risks" makes no sense. You need specific qualities to "take risks", ie to run your own business: you need to be a good manager, and you also need to be good at negociations. Many people do not have these skills, but in the meantime, can be great engineers, great software developers, scientists, designers, etc... These people deserve reward as well as their CEOs do. Where would be venture capitalists and CEOs without engineers? Where would be restaurant managers without a good chef? How do you run a business without secretaries?
The problem is that, for the last decades, employees have kept on improving their productivity thanks to technological achievements. This means that each employee creates much more wealth for his boss/his company than he/she did before. In the meanwhile, their salaries have not improved. You were talking about the "comfort zone". You may have a point, but not in the sense you're thinking. Employees in America have become too soft, too scared, too obedient, too brainwashed. They 've been told to accept sacrifices after sacrifices not to hurt the economy. Moreover, the Reagan government has done everything it could to destroy unions and to weaken the negociating strength of employees. And today, the only employees who can negociate high salaries and good benefits are the one working in areas where there is a shortage. How come that in a country as rich as America, many people (the majority) still only have 2 or 3 weeks of holidays/year? That's insane, really.
One last thing: you've written that everyone who wants to get to the top can have his chance. This is somewhat true in a period of strong economic growth, when opportunities do exist. In a period of recession, it's just not true. The wealthiest stay where they are, but the poors and the middle class are just screwed. And history as well as economic theory tells us that recessions will keep on happening as they always have.
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Oh, so these examples are "demonstrations" of political backwardness? Could you please elaborate on that? Cause, quite frankly, you haven't demonstrated anything. What is the problem with the fall of the 4th republic? What is specific in the '68 crisis as compared to what happened in the US in the same time? What is "backward" in the French revolution, and what followed (did you notice that most of your examples are 100 or 200 years old)? Where is the "backwardness" in the fact that a defeated country could not avoid having a puppet government at his head in WWII?
Now, seriously, what was this enumeration for? To show that you've opened a book? To avoid making a similar enumeration on the US? May I suggest that you study the political rhetorics in America, as compared to European (French included) counterparts? Did you notice at what insane level of populism the Presidential campaign was? And the children this and and that, and let me bestially kiss my wife while cameras are watching, and I trust the people while he's for big government, and I want to restore dignity, and I'm gonna fight for you, and , blablabla... Also, what about the incredibly stupid things that you can hear from Congressmen on C-Span when the cameras are here?
No wonder there is no strong far right party (actually, there is, it's about one half of the Republican party...), as there was in France with the National Front. In the US, pure populism is the mainstream.
I forgot one thing: you seem to ingore that JM Le Pen is history in France, too. The National Front has lost most of its influence during the last 5 years.
> You clearly have never been to the US.
I've actually been living here for one year now (I'm in Manhattan, and I like it, but I've decided to come back in one year). I didn't want to mention it before because I'm not very proud of my English after all this time.
Now, aren't you forgetting Tipper Gore's PMRC, Judas Priest' trial, or MacCarthysm? Where was the first amendment by this time? Also, what is even much more important in the US is social pressure: there may be few regulations, but there is much more brainwashing which makes these regulations mostly unnecessary. What is all this PC stuff about? Don't you feel around you how puritanism is preventing you to do or say this or that? Don't you feel how reluctant people are to accept cynism? Have you ever worked in a latin European country (by "latin", I mean Spanish, Italian or French) and had a chance to compare the nature of relations between employees?
> but why do you keep on bashing everybody who
> disagrees with this law as misofrancic [...]
I don't. I wanted to bash the "Oh, thanks God we have our holy Consitution and 1st amendment, it could never happen here" morons, and also the usual "the French are a bunch of faggots that got their ass kicked and we bailed them out and now they're bitter and they're fascist and they're language biggots and they're lazy, and they have a reduced workweek because they are socialists dumbasses, and there's no freedom in France blablabla" stuff. Which, if you read the commentaries in this story, are omnipresent. I'm just tired of this ranting, of hearing the same old cliches again and again because a (maybe tiny, but vocal) portion of the Anglo-Saxon people really has a problem with us. Trust me, if you were French, after 1 month on \., you would understand.
Ahah, funny. If you had staid a little bit longer, you would have seen that this whole story was a fake that was organized by the directors of those night-clubs, and it turned out later:
1- Many non-gays club has been checked.
2- Non-gay clubs were among the ones to be closed.
3- Most importantly, the gay clubs in Paris are more flourishing than ever.
Now, wanna talk abour Giuliani's policy in New York?
I forgot: The simple fact that you seem to consider, as most of your compatriots, Madonna's "Sex" as a provocative and highly erotic work pretty much illutrates your level of backwardness on these issues.
You are indeed less coercitive on the web than on movie and TV shows importation. Now, maybe you should learn a bit about the insanely high proportions of European movies who got an X-rating in America (and as such have no chance of being distributed) because they were more explicit than American counterparts.
> 1) We got whumped and have a right to be bitter
> and irrational 2) You have idiotic laws, and
> that gives us the right to have idiotic laws.
Bull. I've never implicitly claimed any "rights for...", I've just provided explanations and reminded a few things to some of the fellows who had immediately started insulting the French as they usually do each time we're mentioned, and who seemed to have forgotten a few of their own "specificities" despite their oh-so-protective 1st amendment. The rest is just your twisted interpretation, and nothing else, I don't have to justify myself with respect to what comes out of your imagination.
> And as for the yahoo.fr/.com, business; sorry,
> sucko, read the article:
Yeah, apologies, I was wrong on that one, I realized that while rereading the article.
How many times will I have to repeat it? I _do not_ support this ruling and the corresponding laws. Period. I'm just trying to explain the circumstances, why this is more understandable (even if it's wrong) than many Americans seem to think, and, why, relatively to other restrictions in other countries, the impact is, in comparison, almost negligible, which is the reason why I was upset while reading these good old Francophobic bullshits.
Last but not least, the ruling adresses yahoo.fr, not yahoo.com, and yahoo.fr is under the French legislation.
Sorry, I meant "American ground", not "American soil".
I was expecting such an answer; Even if these restrictions are supposedly designed for children, everybody is a victim. For example, the whole Hollywoodian movie production is calibrated to avoid a PG-17 rating: this has HUGE consequences on the artistic nature of American cinema. What also pisses me off is that, since many Hollywoodian major companies have purchased all across the world (France included, even though more lately) most movie distribution companies to ban non-Hollywoodian competition (in other words, 99% of worldwide theaters are just not allowed, except in very few occasions, to show non-Hollywoodian movies...), well, non-Americans are becoming victims of this too. The situation is not better on TV. Another example: adult or not, don't even think about being topless (when you're a woman) on a Californian or a Floridean beach.
Also, what's all this about "failing to learn from history"? I've read this 100 times in this story. We are spending an incredible amount of energy on studying the nazi era, and I can safely say that every French citizen is, as every German citizen, pretty well-informed about what happened. Some of us (a minority, but a powerful because determined one), mostly Jewish associations, still want to ban nazis artefacts from commerce, but, of course, we study these artefacts at shool. These associations are wrong, I agree. But this has nothing to do with the French refusing to face history.
Usually, you just have to track for the word "inappropriate". Just listen around and think about all the things that can't be said in the name of "appropriateness". Try to be cynical, for example, especially on issues related to protestant Anglo-Saxon ethics. Then, try a similar experience in Western Europe. This should be quite "enlightening".
I don't remember the Japanese armies parading on Manhattan's 5th avenue while you're looking them from your window hearing your wife or your mother crying, slaughtering entire villages in Texas because they had heard there were resistants around and coudn't find them even after torturing most males, nor enforcing an important part of the American population to work for their own plants, nor stealing most of the wealth and agricultural production, nor putting a puppet government in Denver trying to implement a system copy/pasted from the Japanese one. All this during 4 years. I actually don't remember seeing the Japanese armies on the American soil...
In other words: for the French, the nazi era has nothing to do with other wars in which we've been involved.
I've already answered to this: the reason why France is so irrational when it comes to nazism is that France has been among its victims, while France has not directly suffered from communism. I don't deny that the French vision of these two catastrophes is blatantly unbalanced, but communism has not reached us in our flesh and blood.
I'm getting tired of this. First, you obviously don't know that the French "socialist" party is. It's just a moderate left-wing party, as Tony Blair's labour, Schroeder's social-democrat party, of even the American Democrat party. Second, the American system, like the British one, is designed to have only two strong parties. And, dude, THIS is censorship. You can be sure that there are much more than 3% Americans who feel close to Nader, and much than 1% Americans who feel close to Buchanan. Remember how much Buchanan scored at Republican primaries a few years ago? And we're talking about a guy who seems to consider Auschwitz as an amusement park... And do you seriously think that there is less racism in the US that in European countries? Less nationalism? Also, on many issues, JM Le Pen would appear as moderate as compared to many right-wing Republicans.
Last, your 1st amendment protects NOTHING. I should have mentioned that I'm spending a lot of time in the US (I have professional collaborations here), and I really don't see it a land of freedom of speech, far from it.
There are actually strict regulations for TV networks, imposed by the government. As there are strict laws regarding toplessness on the beach, and censorship/rating of movies before they can be distributed in theaters.
> Well, you said it. You prefer being irrational.
Oh, really? Interesting. Well, it seems that I have to be a little more explicit so that everybody can get it:
I'd rather live in a country which is irrational about nazism than in a country which is irrational about sex, alcohol, and stuff. Is it clearer now?
Last, no, I DO NOT support this ruling (even though, deep inside, I wonder why the hell is Yahoo selling such crap), as I thought I had made it clear before. I'm only reminding a few Americans out there, who have immediately jumped on te bash-the-froggs bandwagon as soon as this story appeared, that they have similar problems with much more far-reaching consequences (banning nudity/explicit language/etc., for example, on THE mass-medium, aka TV, has a somehow greater impact than banning nazis-related items auctions on a website...).
Bull. The French are obsessed with the past when it comes to the collaboration. Most of our historians, philosophers, intellectuals and even politicians are spending much of their energy on this issue to understand and study accurately what happened. Many powerful Frenchmen are now in jail for having been collaborators. This is a permanent debate on the French intellectual scene. So, no, we're not trying to escape what happened, not at all. And your own vision of the resistance and the collaboration also seems to be slightly biased, isn't it?
As far as the Vichy government is concerned, it was nothing but a puppet government, chosen by the nazis who were omnipotent in France after their victory, and serving the nazi's interests.
PS: May I suggest you to read "Trading with the Enemy", by Charles Higham? It has some interesting information on the (excellent) relations between Nazi Germany and American business. It seems that, in every country, people are tempted to collaborate with the (even temporary) winner, whoever he is...
When the day when it is possible to see a frontal nudity (or even a breast, for god's sake!) on American TV before 22:30 or to hear 4 letter words, or to see somebody giving a finger without having a ridiculous mosaic on it has come, then maybe Americans will be able to start teaching lessons. 1st amendment, my ass, I've never seen such a bunch of blind hypocriticals.
For us, nazism means deads in our families, collective humiliations, foreign tanks parading in Paris, hunger, poverty, entire villages slaughtered (women and children included), genocide, shame on some of our citizens who became collaborators, etc... So, yeah, we're irrational about nazi icons, Jewish associations are very agressive to keep it that way, and in the end we're probably wrong. But I'd rather leave in a country which is irrational about nazism than in a country which is absurdly puritan about sex, alcohol and related, sorry.
Even if the business model can work in the long term (ie profit is made with support, services, and other specific developments on order), which is highly questionable, I wonder if they can raise enough money to start. It seems that they're currently broke, and they haven't attracted many investors (who, if they expect short term profites, will screw up the project anyway). So how will they fund all their developpers? Vapor long-term stock options? Doubtful.
Of course, Netscape is too self-serving! Hey, this is an American company, which tried to self-persuade itself and to persuade its investors that it could make money by enforcing people to come, even accidentally, on their web sites. All this in a country where most newspapers are unreadable because 90% of their content is commercials, or where most movies and TV shows are impossible to watch for the exact same reasons, and where hospitals and lawyers advertise on the street and on TV. So what did you expect, exactly?
The modern form of democracy, Switzerland's direct democracy put aside, is not British. The British system was censitarian, not democratic. The modern form of democracy first took place in people's minds, thanks to the ideas of Diderot, Locke, Rousseau, Voltaire, and a few others.
Then came the American system which was more democratic, but still censitarian (slavery, etc...) and "pre-modern" in the way it was distributing the powers. Then came the French revolution. Then came decades of mess. And then came democracy.
First, you obviously have no clue on how to interpret economic figures.
Second, people have already posted an answer in another story in which you've written exactly the same things, and you apparently refuse to take answers into account.
Third, the numbers from NYT greatly differ from numbers from more international and more neutral organizations. Also, GDP is a measure of economic activity, not wealth. This is a completely different matter. For example, the cost of healthcare in America represents approximately 15% of the GDP, for very poor results. In Europe, it is far below 10%. Also, purchasing power parity does not incorporate the cost of real estate, which has become insanely high in many American places, and is, on average, much more expensive then in Continental Europe, especially Germany and France. The only place in Europe in which the real estate is as expensive or more expensive than in the US is Britain.
Fourth, if you look at unemployment and salaries in the Western world, you can observe a very simple phenomenon: unemployment is low in places where salaries have been stagnating. This is not a welfare issue, or whatever. Unemployment is low in the US and the UK because salaries have stagnated. It is high in France where salaries, especially the lower ones, have permanently risen since the last 25 years. The salaries have been more stagnant in France for the last 3 years, in part because of the reduced work week, and unemployment is currently dropping sharply (it is now at 9.5%, while it was still at 11.5% less than 2 years ago, and the pace of the decay is very fast.) But unemployment is not an issue of welfare or social protection: in the Netherlands, which is a "welfare state", the salaries have staid at a moderated level for the last 15 years, thanks in part to the Wasemaar's agreement, and unemployment is very low.
Fifth, be _very careful_ with official unemployment rates. In part because there are countries, such as America, in which the official unemployment rate is very low but the level of poverty is insanely high (whether we're talking about the poverty line as a purely economic figure, or as a more social criteria which measures the right to get decent healthcare, education, housing, etc...). And also (and this is related), because official unemployment only measures the number of people which are actually registered as job-seekers, but does not measure the number of people which are unemployed but completely out of the system: homeless, criminals, people in jail, people who have been job-seekers for too long and as such do not get any more benefits from the employment agency,etc...
Last, you can't measure the wealth of the average citizen of a country by just looking at te average GDP. Not only because GDP does not measure wealth, but also because the level of inequalities greatly differs from a country to another one. In other words, there are country in which the median income is ridiculously low as compared to the average income, because the vast majority of the wealth is concentrated in very few hands. America has the worst figures on this criteria, followed by Britain and France. But Scandinavian countries have excellent figures.
Oh, ok, well... my wife wanted a three, but it's OK.
Well, no, the 35 hours work week is not mandatory, at least not in many cases. There even is a joke in many French start-up companies: "I like the 35 hours so much that I do them twice a week". This law has an actual impact mostly for "blue collars", plant workers, janitors, secretaries, etc... Indeed, they're not supposed to work more than 35 hours a week, or, more specifically, if they do, their boss is supposed to pay them at a higher rate because the overtime is considered "heures supplementaires" (supplemental hours), which are more expensive. Besides, he cannot force them. In this kind of jobs, almost everyone does not want to work more than they have to, so employees are very happy with this law. It is a typical case where the law brings freedom: now they're free to work less, which is what they wanted to. Before this law, they had no chance of getting there by negociating, of course. As Lacordaire says, sometimes "between the strong and the weak, freedom oppresses and law frees".
Now, about the "10-20%". I don't subscribe to your point of view. These people are not the people who drive the economy, at least not the only people. They couldn't get anywhere without the work of their employees. They need their employees as well as the employees need them. But why should they get all the credit? This story about them being those who "take the risks" makes no sense. You need specific qualities to "take risks", ie to run your own business: you need to be a good manager, and you also need to be good at negociations. Many people do not have these skills, but in the meantime, can be great engineers, great software developers, scientists, designers, etc... These people deserve reward as well as their CEOs do. Where would be venture capitalists and CEOs without engineers? Where would be restaurant managers without a good chef? How do you run a business without secretaries?
The problem is that, for the last decades, employees have kept on improving their productivity thanks to technological achievements. This means that each employee creates much more wealth for his boss/his company than he/she did before. In the meanwhile, their salaries have not improved. You were talking about the "comfort zone". You may have a point, but not in the sense you're thinking. Employees in America have become too soft, too scared, too obedient, too brainwashed. They 've been told to accept sacrifices after sacrifices not to hurt the economy. Moreover, the Reagan government has done everything it could to destroy unions and to weaken the negociating strength of employees. And today, the only employees who can negociate high salaries and good benefits are the one working in areas where there is a shortage. How come that in a country as rich as America, many people (the majority) still only have 2 or 3 weeks of holidays/year? That's insane, really.
One last thing: you've written that everyone who wants to get to the top can have his chance. This is somewhat true in a period of strong economic growth, when opportunities do exist. In a period of recession, it's just not true. The wealthiest stay where they are, but the poors and the middle class are just screwed. And history as well as economic theory tells us that recessions will keep on happening as they always have.