I look at Australia, see rampant racism against aboriginals, a lack of same-sex marriage rights, limited abortion legality, and if they had any Muslims, I'm sure they'd have more than their fair share of Islamophobia just like America or Europe.

So, what makes the USA twice as bad again? Religious people? Because the way I look at it, those American religious zealots aren't getting their way much lately (or ever, really). You see a lot of negativity from American press because the nutjobs always rise to the top. Really, we're no more or less progressive than most of the rest of the western world.

Australia is not very racist, especially when you take into consideration it is the most multicultural country in the world. And the lack of gay marriage and abortion, so what? its never been a massive thing here. And yes, no thanks to The USA invading the middle east, Australia is very afraid, just like every other western country.

So you dont think the USA is very split up? Because it is the belief of many that the USA is going to be involved in another civil war because  the difference between the poor and the rich is astounding, the amount of extremist groups, which are mostly religious is also ridiculous.

You can argue all you like that the USA is much like Australia, but its not.
Australia is extremely unified between the states, And look at the homeless percentage between the two countries, or the crime rate.

 Whether you like it or not, the USA is scene through out most western countries as the country that wants to prove its a massively powerful country, but has a large amount of internal problems.

I just read the first page.

I think the Tea Party is the best thing that has happened in my lifetime politically. It's a rebellion done right. No wars, no violence, no intimidation. Just everyday American people pulling there heads out of the sand, and paying attention again to politics.

Fox News hates them. Liberal Media hates them. Every established party and media outlet is afraid of them, because they can't control them. This is how it's suposed to be. The people should have the power.

I am sure whatever story you are getting from whatever news source your getting it from, has a motivation to present the Tea Party is the worst light they possibly can.

All I can say is go to a rally, and look for yourself. You will be pleasantly surprised to find 99% of the people there, are far more like you, then they are like the 1% you see on youtube.

What makes america worse is we're louder about it.

Though statistically things are problems are usually a lot less troublesome... people think it's worse then their countries because we allow anyone to say what they want.

I really do want to see a revolution in American politics where the entire system gets cleaned up, slimmed down and sorted out. Something that makes the American government actually function.

I also really wish the Tea Party movement wasn't the closest this had got to happening.

Fox News started the Tea Party. You sound like an advertisement, a political one.

Fox hates them NOW, because they're going to tear apart the republican party. The tea party and all the things that scare people about them are going to pull the vote the wrong way. People are going to be voting democrat simply to keep them out of office.

Fox News did not start the Tea Party

http://www.shtfplan.com/headline-news/who-started-the-tea-party-movement_02162010

And as for crazy, if Ronald Reagan was alive today, he would be the leader of the Tea Party.

I wish we had 1000 Ronald Reagans in Washington today.

First reply at the top of the page:

You couldn’t be more wrong.
Trevor Lyman is the guy who launched the concept of using the phrase “Tea Party”  borrowed from history books when he organized the December 16, 2007 Tea Party Money Bomb (online fundraiser) for Ron Paul.
Taking a page from Trevor Lyman and long after the Ron Paul presidential campaign, other persons decided to protest TARP and deficit-increasing stimulus spending under the moniker, first on April 15, 2009,  and then again on July 4, 2009 .
Sites like meetup.com facilitated these protest meet ups. Fox News covered these meetings, which gave them credence and voilá, the Tea Party Movement was born.

This is exactly how just about everyone perceives the tea party. Regardless of your random blogger guy who counts himself as one of the first people "chances are, you got my email". 

There's something about your posts that seems so ingenuine, I can't tell what it is. From saying we would be better off with 1000 Reagans, and posting a video of him....no doubt he was a great president, probably either the best or second best in the last 10 presidents. But your posts don't come off to me as such....it slightly feels like parody. 

Surely, Reagan was a great president, but that doesn't mean he was infallible. If we try to apply everything Reagan believed in at this present juncture, we would be worse off than we are.

Guess who spends 1B dollars a day fighting socialized health care? I'm not going to trust in Reagan when the people who stand to lose the most money (and who've shafted me times over) are on the same side.

For freedom of speech and the press America ranks pretty highly, but not near the top.

http://www.freedomhouse.org/uploads/fop/2007/pfscharts.pdf