The Soviet Union was very successful for decades.
No it wasn't.
For a while, it led the US in science and in space.
It never led the US in science.
Talk to someone who lived in the former USSR.
A turning point in Yeltsin's intellectual development occurred during his first visit to the United States in September 1989, more specifically his first visit to an American supermarket, in Houston, Texas. The sight of aisle after aisle of shelves neatly stacked with every conceivable type of foodstuff and household item, each in a dozen varieties, both amazed and depressed him. For Yeltsin, like many other first-time Russian visitors to America, this was infinitely more impressive than tourist attractions like the Statue of Liberty and the Lincoln Memorial. It was impressive precisely because of its ordinariness. A cornucopia of consumer goods beyond the imagination of most Soviets was within the reach of ordinary citizens without standing in line for hours. And it was all so attractively displayed. For someone brought up in the drab conditions of communism, even a member of the relatively privileged elite, a visit to a Western supermarket involved a full-scale assault on the senses.
"What we saw in that supermarket was no less amazing than America itself," recalled Lev Sukhanov, who accompanied Yeltsin on his trip to the United States and shared his sense of shock and dismay at the gap in living standards between the two superpowers. "I think it is quite likely that the last prop of Yeltsin's Bolshevik consciousness finally collapsed after Houston. His decision to leave theparty and join the struggle for supreme power in Russia may have ripened irrevocably at that moment of mental confusion."
On the plane, traveling from Houston to Miami, Yeltsin seemed lost in his thoughts for a long time. He clutched his head in his hands. Eventually he broke his silence. "They had to fool the people," he told Sukhanov. "It is now clear why they made it so difficult for the average Soviet citizen to go abroad. They were afraid that people's eyes would open."
.....
When Nikita Kruschev first visited the United States, he was taken to a normal supermarket. What he saw appeared so beyond belief to him that he could only rationalize that it was set up to deceive him. He could not accept that this country had that rich a variety of food and household goods readily available for all.
sheilaomalley.com
its infrastructure was antiquated and falling apart.....sound familiar...it should.
Its infrastructure didn't deteriorate, it was always bad and worse than we can imagine in this country.
Were you guided by a government in making your real estate decisions?
No
Then your example doesn't support your theme.
As a consequence, Seattle is one of the few built out cities that is experiencing population growth.
Normal for TX, for decades, heck I guess since the time of the Republic. |
