Different mindsets

Something Midwest Chick said made me remember when the wife first got here from Britain.

Midwest is talking about the floods up in the Dakotas, and the personal responsibility the people are showing...the Anti-Katrina mindset.

Anyway, when Karen first came over, she couldn't understand how we didn't want the .GOV involved in everything we did. I told her it was because we couldn't trust them to do it better than we could- mostly.

What I said was basically- you have had some kind of central gov't since the Romans were there. You've had gov't roads, some kind of gov't schooling, poor houses, laws from either Rome, the King, or London.

In America, once you got beyond the Appalachians- you were pretty much on your own.
You had to rely on your neighbors for anything you couldn't do yourself.
Neigbors got together for barn raisings, house raisings, taking care of those shifty people that somehow things went missing when they were around.
The .GOV didn't- and couldn't build roads or supply a school, build bridges that would make it easier for everyone- citizens got together and did it because it needed to be done.

She just couldn't fathom someone being out of reach of a central government, because she was born with the knowledge that a central gov't was and will always be there.
Now that she's in the wilds of Texas, she's starting to understand- and even starting to have contempt for the people she half-heartedly defended when she first got here.

Yes, we're making progress. All we need now is to come up with about $850 that we can do without so she can become a citizen and vote against Urkle.