Stuff that I’ve Noticed #11 – The Greatest?

In this monthly essay I have not yet delved into politics but today the impetus to do so has become irresistible. So please indulge my urge and if you disagree let me know and we’ll kick some ideas around while remaining respectful friends (if possible). You’ll understand where I’m coming from (literally) when you read my memoirs.

This is the Greatest _________ (fill in the blank) In the World!

Really?

Last year, while watching the start ceremony of the 2017 NYC Marathon the fellow speechifying referred to New York City as “the greatest city in the world”. I do indeed Love New York, having chosen it as my home fifty-five years ago and never wanting to live anywhere else. I do think Gotham is a great city but the greatest city in the world?

Take that, London, Paris, Barcelona, Rome, Lima, Buenos Aires, Tokyo, Beijing, Phnom Penh, Brussels, Amsterdam and so on and so forth. Do you suppose statements like that add to the love and respect we get from other great cities?

Then there’s the well known “Greatest Country in the World” assertion that Aaron Sorkin ripped to shreds in the opening episode of Newsroom. (Watch it on Youtube.)

Note: The show from which that scene was extracted ran in 2012. Imagine how much worse Will’s stats have become since 20 January 2017!

Before the con artist now occupying the white house (between golfing trips) was in charge, the sophisticated, intelligent, articulate – if in some ways flawed as we all are – Gentleman who occupied the office for eight years helped to restore respect for the USA. We began recovery from inappropriate military activities and the malapropisms of the previous occupant became a quaint, if embarrassing, memory. We were once again if not the Greatest Country in the World at least a respected leader among nations. Well, my friends, that train has left the station.

An argument could be made that sometime around 1944 the USA may have indeed been considered by other nations briefly to be the Greatest Country in the World due to our intervention in WW II which dispatched the Nazis and put the quietus on Hirohito’s dream of world dominance. Well, my friends, (to put a twist upon my redundancy) that pirogue has left the levee.

And if subsequent events are any indication it appears that neither the train nor the pirogue is likely to reappear any time soon.

So why do people keep making such obviously inaccurate and offensive statements?

In the case of the con artist now occupying the white house (between golfing trips) it’s in his nature to make proclamations which everyone knows to be bald-faced lies. His prevarications are usually followed by lines such as: “Believe Me!” “Lots of people are saying…” and such meaning-free rhetorical devices.

But why would any, otherwise sane and normal person – except for our dear departed and accurate Muhammad Ali – make such obnoxious and unsupportable claims?

This does not seem all that “Greatest” to me. What do you think?

If you’re interested in my books you’ll find them here.

And if you’ve missed any previous “Stuff” here’s the index page where you’ll find them all.