Luann by Greg Evans and Karen Evans for July 05, 2015

That’s Austria, Mrs. DeGroot.

Yes I agree with this so much. Back when we didn’t have cable, I always looked at the world channel and even though we have cable now, I still look at the world channel

OK, it is now July 5th so STOP THE FIREWORKS PLEASE! I heard enough in Nam & I’m tired!

Steve Irwin! Mel Gibson! Skippy The Bush Kangaroo! Who DOESN’T know about Australia?

As also proven when Jay Leno used to “interview” people on the street, or quizzed them….

Happy 4th to everybody!

Don’t forget Captain Boomerang!

“A Study In Social”“Hit And Miss….Mostly Miss”“An Uneducated Guess”“Life In A Vacuum”“Battle Of The Quill-walk All Stars”“A Flat Globe”“China: Where All The Dishes Come From”“Year Round Insulation”“Super Self- Absorbent”“The Quicker Put-er Down-er”or“Don’t Know Much About History Geography Pretty Much Everything..…” (♪)

It’s kind of embarrassing that we don’t know much about our allies, but it’s more embarrassing that we know so little about our own history. These days, though, if a subject can’t be called ‘science, technology, engineering/electronics, computer coding or math’, the assumption is that a kid can’t use that subject to get a job. So schools are being steered away from teaching history, languages and other so-called ‘liberal arts’ (which has nothing to do with politics)…

I always try to listen to BBC radio when I’m on nightshift, nice to get a different perspective on the world. I put it on in the control room and can catch a few minutes of it now & then,

“who can it be now” and the capital is Canberra(I did it without google) and I don’t know name right now, but prime minister was a woman a few years back

When I first read this over at Arcamax Comics, I thought they were only kidding, but considering how much real-life Americans don’t know much about the rest of the world, much less their own country, it’s no joke. In fact, it’s pretty sad.

New Zealand has the Southern Alps. That’s as close to being right about Australia having Alps as she could get.

Make it a quiz on political correctness, and any school kid will pass the test. Make it on something that they USED to require you to know before you graduated to the next class (or graduated high school) and you’re probably out of luck.

Some young women might be aware that the Hemsworth brothers, Chris and Liam, are from Australia.

Welcome back!!!

I wonder if people from Australia take offense at being called “Aussies”? I knew a girl from there years ago, one of the most down-to-earth, straightforward people I’ve ever met. She had some great observations about the US.

(Switzerland:) True! The Swiss are probably the ones most would associate with the Alps (along with St. Bernards)…

I think the main problem is that children are not encouraged to read from an early age. They spend too much time watching TV. If the TV was switched off for a specific period every day and the whole family read more and sat around the dinner table discussing points of interest adults and children would benefit. It’s very easy to blame the education system but education begins in the home.

@pointspread , Australians are very happy to be called “Aussies”. (I’m one). There are “Australian Alps” and skiing is popular up there each winter and early spring. We have an unpopular prime minister (Recently the position seems to be associated with unpopularity). Many Aussies (but not enough to overturn the system) want a republic in which we would have a presidential figure replace the current head of state (The Queen).

Dumbing down, brought to you by marijuana.

I’m kind of partial to RT, the Russian TV news channel. For the longest time I couldn’t figure out why Regional Transit (Sacramento) had a cable TV presence.

lol @ pointspread – nope – Aussies is how we generally name ourselves.

Everything get’s shortened or made a nickname of

The point made in the cartoon though is generally correct unfortunately – did some work back in the late 90’s in the US , and 99.9% of the news was about the US, very little on world news, let alone Australian!

contrasting that when I spent some time in the Middle East, and when explaining I was Australian … taxi driver said “John Howard” – who was the current prime minister at the time.

However most Australians could name the first president of the USA rather than the first Australian prime minister.

On the flip side – didn’t seem to be any downside to being an Aussie in the US… very friendly when people found out where I was from.

Of course there is the famous tourist questions that get asked… the below has been going around for a long time

http://www.amazingaustralia.com.au/faq.htm

Sad but true about us.

How many Americans know what Padadol is?

No kidding. I was visiting in Canada when I was a kid and a friend there could name all 50 states and their Capitals, and I couldn’t name all 10 Provinces. I did know Regina was the Capital of Saskatchewan, however. Embarrassing.‘course American kids can’t name the 50 states, their Capitals or point them out on a map these days, so…

I arrived in Sydney the day after the 2008 election and our cabbie asked whether we’d flown through Hawaii—“that’s where your new president was born.” Obvious comments to be made here, right?! And I think it’s Panadol, not Padadol. The PM is Tony Abbott, who wears budgie smugglers ( that piece of slang ought to amuse everyone). And yes, I’m American.

Luann’s family sounds like low information Obama supporters.

Ayers Rock (Uluru) is nowhere near the Australian Alps. There’s a Wikipedia article on the Australian Alps—they actually ski down there, but my back yard in Colorado is higher.

Quill has an advantage. He lives in the U.S. and possibly even took an American history course in school. I bet the average Aussie wouldn’t know who John Adams was.

Oh? So “Americans Know Little Little about Anyone one Else,” Eh Pretty Boy?

Well TELL THAT To The NSA, and about a half Dozen “Other” Agencies that NOBODY Outside of the Beltway Even KNOWS About.

I’ll BET “They” KNOW When Your Friggin’ VISTA Is UP!

Aw, we know all about Australia, that singing nun and those kids and all.

People on the street were asked the meaning of Independence day and only one guy had a clue. Most had no idea. A big success. That is why Faux News rules.

The tragedy is that so many Americans are proud of that lack of information. In some weird, delusional way, it confirms their feeling that only America is worth knowing about.

You are SO spot on!!! It is really embarrassing being an american and living in a foreign country. Some of the idiotic things we do..

BBC World news is accurately named. Far better coverage of world events than the Cretin News Network.

Except Adams had the wrong date – he thought the future celebrations would be on July 2 (when the resolution for independence passed) rather than July 4 (when the revisions to Jefferson’s Declaration were finished and the document approved).

This is a horrible stereotype. To imply that the US is the only nation with citizens who don’t know their history is offensive and insulting. There are many Americans who know our history and the history of other nations. I am sure there are people in other countries that don’t know their history.

Try Canadian road signshttp://www.cbc.ca/news/trending/american-tries-to-figure-out-what-canadian-road-signs-mean-and-fails-1.3137763

Do you suppose Luann’s next guess would have been Yogi Berra?

With Luann’s level of intelligence, anything is possible.

It’s Canberra, Luann!

More stupid stereotyping. The average Australian follows sports and beer perhaps more than in the USA..One odd fact, although most in the US know little of Australia, they tend to know more about it than Canada. .US citizen ignorance of Canada is amazing given the propinquity.

Most of what non-USA persons THINK they know about the USA is wrong or wildly distorted. .They are victims of the commercial US media that feeds on things that are bizarre and worrisome, of wildly atypical Hollywoodizations, of anti-US propaganda (from both rightist and leftist regimes), of oversimplifications based on pure ignorance, of misleading “facts and statistics” put out by US lobbies and political think-tanks for their financial masters, of the efforts of much of the state-sponsored world media to discredit the US in order to decease its influence on local populations, etc.

Oh come on not all of us are that brain dead.

Quill is a bit off. Adams did predict in a letter to his wife, that fireworks would be used to celebrate the Second of July (when the Declaration of Independence was actually signed). .But as far as I know, he was not responsible for the actual custom. .Until much later, when his correspondence was published, it is likely that no one but Abigail knew of his prediction.

I said:Most of what non-USA persons THINK they know about the USA is wrong or wildly distorted..I must sadly add : A great deal of what US citizens think they know about the USA is wrong or wildly distorted.

Lighten up!It’s July 5th, a Sunday morning.Be grateful the folks could have this discussion.A lot of guy’s put up with a lot of "Fireworks’ so we could have this….Freedom isn’t free, and the gift of humor is very dear indeed!Enjoy your day

In our own defense:*Perhaps commenters are “above average”, but a year or so ago when I quizzed everyone to 1) name the capital of Australia and 2) identify the newly elected prime minister, y’all aced the test (though one person disclosed he had googled the prime minister).

“More Than I Canberra”^LOL!

“Try watching “Who Wants To Be A millionaire” some time”^Jeopardy, too! – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8QsClISUW0 – http://www.stupidgsa.com/american/jeopardy/

“True, but for the purposes of the joke in today’s comic, Austria is the one that works…”^True (the whole “Austria vs. Australia” thing being the punch line), but I brought that out, only out of a "late ‘re-active’ reflex’ (ding! ding! ding! new term!). – But there was a second joke, in Nancy’s question. As mentioned by several people here, there is an “Australian Version” of mountains named the Alps, and as Greg has spent a couple of years “down under”, it may be “an inside joke, inside of an inside joke” for some….

“Do you suppose Luann’s next guess would have been Yogi Berra?”^LOL, only if it were having to do with the Himalayas!

(Taylor Swift’s Army:) “Hope there’s no penalty for going “AWOL”!”^Or being an “Objector!”

Forgot these gems from “Millionaire”, “5th Grader”, etc:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Urjr2RCwis – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQc4V_wTT_I – (Beauty Pageant map question:)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lj3iNxZ8Dww

It shows what’s really important.UsUS?Crocodile Dundee.

I may be wrong… but I understood it to be the nun, Maria and the Von Trapp family of the musical ‘The Sound of Music.’ It was set in Austria.

I also thought the comment was meant to be facetious. Again, I could be wrong.

Why would I care anything about Australia? Quinn came to America for the opportunities that he apparently couldn’t get at home. If there was anything there, Donald Trump would have bought it years ago.

I hope that you were kidding Nancy.

Australia has a number of internationally known professionals in my field, whom I have met, and has even lured (in one way or another) some people born in the USA over there.Australia also has Tabrett Bethell (Cara, the Mord-Sith, in Legend of the Seeker), whom I have not met (but wish I had)….More could be said, but need not. Hope everyone had a pleasant and safe 4th.

Wrong the first 4th of July fireworks were in Philadelphia on July 4, 1779.

This Yank, for one, would reply, “By ‘President’, do you mean the Prime Minister or the Governor General?”

Seriously though who didn’t know that John Adams suggested fireworks or that Australia has a prime minister.

>You maybe right. It’s just that I’m conditioned to automatically think of the song “Dominique” whenever I see the name The Singing Nun.<

I thought of The Singing Nun too. I even thought of Sally Field’s The Flying Nun (tbh/lol!) A confusing couple of seconds.

It was the mention of the kids that brought me to the Von Trapp Family. I felt it fit the situation best – tongue in cheek wise anyway.

Yeah, “ORMouseworks” was her name!

Yes, she sorta “disappeared”. She and “Mr. Mouse” were both busy with some things, though, but it’s been a few months.

On another topic, does anyone know if the Evans team is presenting anything at Comic Con?

Way to make us all feel like a bunch of dumb ego- centic Americans. Happy Belated 4th! I had a great one. Family, friends, food, and fireworks!

Mad Max for the win.

Yes, and she also stated that they weren’t feeling well at the time, too….

Me, too. That’s why I commented with a “shout out” for her and Wiselad (at the time) and Dave (the “return of the cowboy”)…

Well, I do know that they’ve had a woman Prime Minister, unlike us. However, if it isn’t Elizabeth Warren, I don’t want a woman this year. Time for a Progressive!

Al Jazeera America is owned by Fox….