The National Review has an article on Moore's new movie "Sicko." the article gets at the heart of what really bothers Moore and other liberals about Americans. That we believe in self-reliance and generally "live and let live."
This attitude stems from the nearly universal idea we have that America is different from other countries, that it is special, and better than other countries. This makes us stubbornly resistant to socialist rantings
America has a deep-seated individualistic value system that, coupled with the lack of European-style class conflict, inhibited the rise of social democracy here. As one historian has put it, if you were to set out to design a society hostile to collectivism, “one could not have done much better than to implement the social development that has, mostly unplanned, constituted America.”
This exceptionalism has its downsides — our high rates of violence, for one — but it also has created a extraordinarily dynamic and open society that can adjust to and thrive in the globalized economy in a way that sclerotic social democracies can’t.
So, three cheers for the red, white and blue, and . . .
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