[rsj_hn]

I have noticed this thing where people get really offended if you were to say "America is a Western European nation", constantly pointing out that America is sampled from the whole world, and a rapidly shrinking subset of that world is Western Europe. In fact if one were to say that today, they might even be accused of Eurocentrism, racism or other bad things.

Right up until politics, crime rates, infrastructure, public policy, or really any matter of consequence is discussed, at which point we transform back into a Western European nation.

There must be a word to describe this type of dualist rhetoric but I can't quite put my finger on it. Also, those people complaining about the Democrat or Republican party being too right wing tend to be Americans who know nothing about right wing political parties in Europe. Yes, left wing parties in a multi-party system are much more radical in Europe, but so are right wing parties. What these people want is the stability and institutional weight of a party in the two-party system but the radicalism of a European left-wing party.