In the 18th century, you guys in Arkansas were either French or Spanish. But I could arrange a nice land deal for youā¦
Oui! Oui! I lived near Bayou DeRoche and the town I was born in was originally called Ecore a Fabri so a nice little chateau along the river would be nice.
I was thinking more of Louisiana.
That fits. Lol! Louisiana is still kind of like another country.
Until 1803, Louisiana comprised nearly half of the present United States. I donāt think a lot of Europeans appreciate just how big Louisiana actually was.
Or the influence the French had hereā¦
People here like to think Americans were always American
In fairness, from the start of WW1, there was a deliberate official policy of āAmericanizationā of immigrant and ethnic populations, promoting a single language and culture, and the idea that āWeāre all Americans nowā. Rightly or wrongly, the process began to fall into disrepute in the 1970s, and is now regarded by many as cultural imperialism.
Welcome to 2.0
The old may become new again with the upcoming administration change. 
It depends a lot on the implementation details, obviously, but purely conceptually, integrating immigrants into a common identity is the only reasonable way to give them a new home and to build a multi-cultural society. And for what itās worth, the US seems to have succeeded not too badly at it, having a wide range of cultures that consider themselves Americans while still retaining parts of their heritage.
The problem seems more to be that some people just wonāt accept some other people as american rather than they themselves objecting to the identityā¦
I very much agree. In my belief, it is impossible to build a cohesive and co-operative society when that society is fractured into insular cultural, ethnic and language groups. There has to be common ground, and, in my view, it is right that government should seek to increase that common ground.
There has, however, to be a balance. Thereās nothing wrong with people acknowledging their origins and their cultural heritage, but that should not be allowed to descend into separatism, or the mistaken belief that immigrants āhomeā culture is somehow superior to that of their host nation. Thereās a reason immigrants fled their home country - usually poverty, oppression, or lack of opportunity - and those deficiencies are, for the most part, a direct result of their culture of origin.
In my view itās madness to travel halfway round the world to escape a culture that is crushing you, only to then attempt to recreate that very culture in your new home.
In Britain we have a new, but growing, populist right-wing political party, Reform UK. Now headed by Nigel Farage, former leader of the UK Independence Party. For some years, Farage has been a friend and associate of Donald Trump - but there is now talk of Elon Musk bankrolling Reform UK for as much as 100 million. Letās be clear about this - Musk is not only trying to control the US government - heās trying to create a puppet government in the UK, too.
With Trump choosing 17 billionaires as cabinet members of his term, he has bankrolled himself right out of power. Undone by his own picks. Itās ironic and almost funny except it aināt funny at all.
āBy the billionaires, of the billionaires, and for the billionairesā tastes foul in my mouth.
Iām getting pessimistic about my optimism for our world.
A week or so back, I half-joked about Trump invading Canada. Now I see this:
Oh yeah. Started with him wanting to annex Canada and make it a state. Then he decided he wants to take back the Panama Canal. And now he wants to buy Greenland. All of this is to be done while reducing the deficitā¦I figure next thing he will do is punish Brits for not backing the American Revolution.