Reply #20: As an American in Britain...

[Spider Jerusalem]

I have to say that American news media compare unfavourably not just with the BBC (although NOT with Murdoch-owned Sky News), but also with the Guardian--as far as newspapers go, at least, the New York Times and Washington Post are really the top contenders for 'serious' and in breadth and depth of general coverage as well as culture and arts and so on they're not quite in the same league as the Guardian and tend to be more generally conservative. The Guardian probably wouldn't give Ross Douthat or Charles Krauthammer a job.

American politicians are generally more insane, especially the right-wingers, but American politicians of both parties bang on at great length about a lot of things that very few mainstream British politicians would (particularly the importance of their personal religious faith and their borderline-nationalistic 'patriotism'). This isn't to say that British politicians are neither religious or patriotic, but fervour on those issues in public is seen as unseemly and suspect.

The religiosity of Americans generally seems quite, well, backward. The opposition of fundamentalist evangelical Christians to evolution, abortion, homosexuality, and a whole host of other things that are social issues in the States BECAUSE of evangelical Christians MAKING them an issue seems pretty generally insane. But then around six percent of the UK population regularly attend religious services, and for the most part even those who are religious (the Christians, anyway) tend to be a good deal more private about it and less inclined to make a great public thing out of their belief.