美国精英对美国选票制度的批判。
作者到天津参加了世界经济论坛，被震惊了。印度人也被震惊了，看下面的链接：
印度版刘晓波：把印度租给中国200年
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/22/opinion/22friedman.html
China’s CCTV aired a skit showing four children — one wearing the Chinese flag, another the American, another the Indian, and another the Brazilian — getting ready to run a race. Before they take off, the American child, “Anthony,” boasts that he will win “because I always win,” and he jumps out to a big lead. But soon Anthony doubles over with cramps. “Now is our chance to overtake him for the first time!” shouts the Chinese child. “What’s wrong with Anthony?” asks another. “He is overweight and flabby,” says another child. “He ate too many hamburgers.”
4个小孩，穿了中国、美国、印度、巴西的国旗的衣服的表演？穿美国国旗的小孩摔倒。有链接嘛？
Studying China’s ability to invest for the future doesn’t make me feel we have the wrong system. It makes me feel that we are abusing our right system. There is absolutely no reason our democracy should not be able to generate the kind of focus, legitimacy, unity and stick-to-it-iveness to do big things — democratically — that China does autocratically. We’ve done it before. But we’re not doing it now because too many of our poll-driven, toxically partisan, cable-TV-addicted, money-corrupted political class are more interested in what keeps them in power than what would again make America powerful, more interested in defeating each other than saving the country.
我并不是表扬他们的政治系统，而是担忧我们的正确的政治系统，我们的系统被滥用了（abused）。我们的系统以前很好，但现在被为了选票的政客、恶毒的党派对立、让人上瘾的电视媒体、腐败的政客阶级所滥用。他们不是为了国家的未来，而是为了打败对方。
“How can you compete with a country that is run like a company?” an Indian entrepreneur at the forum asked me of China. He then answered his own question: For democracy to be effective and deliver the policies and infrastructure our societies need requires the political center to be focused, united and energized. That means electing candidates who will do what is right for the country not just for their ideological wing or whoever comes with the biggest bag of money. For democracies to address big problems — and that’s all we have these days — requires a lot of people pulling in the same direction, and that is precisely what we’re lacking.
印度人说：我们怎么能够跟像公司那样组织的国家竞争呢！
“We are not ready to act on our strength,” said my Indian friend, “so we’re waiting for them [the Chinese] to fail on their weakness.”
我们不准备我们会更好，而是等着中国人失败。
－－－－－－－－－－
这个说明了经济才是最有说服力的，要是经济竞争上落后，人们也会对制度产生怀疑。
YST说得非常好：YST对美元有很精彩的论述。
注：Thomas L. Friedmen 是知名的评论家、作家，在纽约时报有专栏，每个星期有1、2篇文章，见文章开头的链接。他获得过三次新闻界最高的Pulitzer奖。 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Friedman
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