the world: politics

As a young child about 8 to 10 yrs. (I'm 57 now and live in north-central B.C. Canada), I used to think a Columnist & a Communist were much the same thing.My mom once mentioned a columnist & I said is she a Communist?

When I first heard "USA PATRIOT act" from the news and in the magazine, I thought that "USA PATRIOT act" is something about the Americans involved in patriotism like people should love America and be patriotic about the nation.

I used to think the liberal democrats were giant crabs that would wander round town and turn everybody into slaves/clones that did nothing but walk all day.

Trust me to have a politician as a dad.

I thought that the world belonged to the president and could do anything he wanted. I always wanted to become the president so I could have the whole world to myself

I was born in the late fifties and went to grade school in the early to mid sixties-

JFK was asassinated in 1963- Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy asassinated in 1968.

I used to believe that all US Presidents died by asassination.

When I was 4/5 (U.S. kindergarten age), I believed that "the government" (which I often heard my parents discussing) was the title of a man who looked like George Washington.

I used to believe that heads of state had diferent kinds of heads on their shoulders

as a small child in the early seventies, i was desperately aware of shortages and the need to understand our resources: gasoline, climate change, CFC's, water (we lived in southern florida), solar cells, recycling, all these things blended together for me. When I heard that Nixon and Brezhnev were getting together for S.A.L.T. talks, I was astonished: i couldn't imagine that scarcity exteded to salt as well. I asked my father on the way to school that morning why salt was so inexpensive , seeing how it's so scarce. He fixed me with an odd little look, and then said that there was plenty of salt to go around. Well, why are they making such a big fuss and having salt talks then?" I asked, exasperated as only a small child can be. I give my father major parent-points for not laughing in my face there and then. Instead, he explained that it stood for Strategic Arms Limitation Talks.

In 1995 (I was 8) President Clinton and the Republicans in Congress were fighting over the budget, and I heard on the news that if they couldn't agree on one, the federal government would shut down. I thought that meant the government would cease to exist, the country would descend into anarachy, and we would have to move to Britain or somewhere. Then the government really did shut down, but it only meant a few offices were closed.

I used to believe that the leader of a country could get whatever he wanted for free because of patriotism and the fact that he was the leader.

i use to believe that democrats liked plastic bags from the grocery store and pepsi and republicans liked paper bags and coca-cola.

I used to believe the word "democrat" was a "bad" word since "crat" sounded like "crap" and we weren't allowed to say "crap".

I used to think Obama's name was short for Baraccobama.

When I was a kid I found out Hitler was an artist. I could not believe he was an artist. Artists are colourful creative people and they dont look like that.

When the politicians were talking about issues which begins with the word "pro-" as in pro-war, pro-immigration, pro-abortion, etc. I thought they were professional on war, immigration, gun-control, etc.

On the TV news I was used to them showing a photo of a person's face in the corner of the screen with the name of that person underneath. So one day they showed Ayatollah Khomeini, with "IRAN" underneath, and I thought Iran was his name.