world's worst tourists

Miguel Cruz writes:

Most Americans are highly ambitious overachievers?

Compared to Europeans, yes. In the U.S., you're much more likely to
starve if you don't work for a living, and that's a powerful motivator.

--
Transpose hotmail and mxsmanic in my e-mail address to reach me directly.

On Sat, 11 Oct 2003 14:19:09 +0200, Mxsmanic
wrote:

Jim Ley writes:

I fail to see what information that gives that is useful to fraud,
other than the fact that you pay Bob money on occasion, something that
anyone with account acccess can see with cheques or anything else.

Then you may be unusually vulnerable to fraud.

Please explain how, I'm scared now that phoning by bank and telling
them to pay Bob is a risk... I might I alleviate it (please don't say
by cheques, as I have had wrongly debited cheques on numerous
occasions)

David Horne writes:

There's quite a lot of material out there which questions
the deeper motivations behind a lot of Gates's philanthropic
giving ...

I don't know anyone who questions the "deeper motivations." There's
nothing to indicate that the deeper motivations of Bill and Melinda are
any different from those of, say, Andrew Carnegie. But there were
probably angry young males whispering about Andrew's "deeper
motivations" in his time as well.

Some people can't imagine giving something away without expecting
anything in return. To them, any giving without an obvious demand for
something in return is evil and suspect, since then the latter is
certainly being "hidden" in their view. The possibility that no such
demand may exist in the first place never crosses their selfish minds.

Personally, I don't know enough about it to form an opinion either way-

And yet you've just done so.

... but there does seem to be a lot of convenient 'self-interest'
at the very least.

And Albert Schweitzer set up hospitals in out of the way places just so
that he'd have a guaranteed supply of patients.

--
Transpose hotmail and mxsmanic in my e-mail address to reach me directly.

Mxsmanic wrote:

David Horne writes:

There's quite a lot of material out there which questions
the deeper motivations behind a lot of Gates's philanthropic
giving ...

I don't know anyone who questions the "deeper motivations."

Manifestly.

Personally, I don't know enough about it to form an opinion either way-

And yet you've just done so.

I absolutely have not- you mistakenly confuse having a hunch, or
suspecting something, with forming an opinion. I'm happily on the fence
on this one- _you're_ the one that seems convinced of your opinion.

David

--
David Horne- www.davidhorne.co.uk
davidhorne (at) davidhorne (dot) co (dot) uk

"Deep Freud Moors" wrote in message .. .
Does this make the inhabitants of Paris 'less rich' somehow?

Yes. Less freedom.


What freedoms do Americans have that Europeans don't?

(I have asked this question a number of times in usenet land, and never
gotten much of an answer)
---
DFM

I can tell you that Europeans have considerably more freedom of
political choice than Americans. The number of political parties is
higher in every European country and the spectrum of political choice
much broader. Americans complain loudly and constantly about their
lack of choice but nothing much seems to be changing.

No one asked, but I find intellectual life in Bali and Nepal more free
than either Europe or the US. Surprising, isn't it?

le 11 Oct 2003 06:24:40 -0700, dans l'article , Patrick Powers a dit ...

{ snip }

No one asked, but I find intellectual life in Bali and Nepal more free
than either Europe or the US. Surprising, isn't it?

The word 'intellectual' is an insult in the United States.

--
Desmond Coughlan |desmond [at] zeouane [dot] org
http://www.zeouane.org/

David Horne writes:

... you mistakenly confuse having a hunch, or
suspecting something, with forming an opinion.

Uh ... they are the same thing.

--
Transpose hotmail and mxsmanic in my e-mail address to reach me directly.

"Mxsmanic" schreef in bericht
...
Sjoerd writes:

You live in the 19th century. The entire concept of social strata
doesn't
really exist anymore in most of Europe.

Where have you lived outside of Europe?

Lived nowhere. But visited for longer periods in 50+ countries outside
Europe. Anyway, your remark has nothing to do with my earlier statement.

Sjoerd

Mxsmanic wrote:
Jim Ley writes:

Really, but it's less secure than the current electronic transfer
methods, takes longer, costs more to process, takes longer and ...

I'm not convinced of this. The end-user interfaces to EFT are
incomplete and often incoherent. When I can press a button on a Web
page and pay anyone, anywhere, then it will be secure and convenient.

Well, I can do this. Since several years via the web and all in all
probably for the last 15 or so years (i.e. before the web and before the
(general avalability of the public) Internet). "anywhere" is (at least)
any account at any bank in any country.

Again projecting the inefficiencies in your french bank to the entire
banking system of Europe...

Other European countries may not be as efficient, true.

I think (to put it politely) that you can not project your limited
experience as a foreigner in France on France in general, but surely not
on the rest of Europe. After all, you don't want me to project my CA
experience on all of CA, let alone the whole US, do you?

Mxsmanic wrote:
Frank Slootweg writes:
[secure EFT issue deleted, already addressed in another response]

It looks like you are confusing France with Europe. The French are
known to make that mistake, but I didn't expect some Americans to be
equally clueless.

Some other countries are even worse, some are better, but Europeans
overall resemble each other a great deal, when compared to people from
other parts of the world.

You should really refrain from comments like that. It makes you lose
any credibility which you might have.