My pre-awakening worldview was one that was uninformed and blindly accepting of the underlying "goodness" of the US. I believed that we had been betrayed by the ones who got us into Vietnam, and i always thought that it was the Republicans who were evil. I voted for Obama because I believed his lies. I wanted to believe them.

It has been a slow awakening, but a steady one. It started when I realised just what Neoliberalism is and what it means. I swallowed bitter pills, like realising that Jimmy Carter was the precursor for Reagan's bellicosity and his anti-worker Neoliberalism. I had to let some sacred cows die, like believing in the Democratic Party. I had always believed that there were good elements in that Party. After witnessing the Bernie Sanders campaign in 2016, I know that is not true.

So basically, my older worldview was that there were good p[arts of the American system, and we just needed to tweak things, promote the good and suppress the bad. I was wrong. I must admit that I am not sure how much I changed and how much America changed, but suffice it to say I cannot find anything good in that system now.

That said, Americans are wonderful people, even if they are very superstitious and ignorant in many ways. And those that are "woke" are the worst, I must say. I prefer Europe, but even there I am constantly disappointed by the creeping "Americanization" and the rampant Neoliberalism of clowns like Macron and Scholz. I am even disappointed in Meloni's toadying.