Obama — nothing but a useless symbol
Bookworm on Sep 03 2008 at 10:15 am | Filed under: Barack Obama
The good thing about living in a liberal community is that you get to hear how ordinary people — not the pundit class and the media — think. I blogged yesterday about one elderly woman’s absolute trust in the MSM. If they say it, it must be true, all actual evidence to the contrary.
To these liberals, it’s a “who do you trust” issue. You trust the media, no matter how often they’re proven wrong, and you don’t trust anyone else, no matter the fact that, even as to the one only verifiable point, they’re proven right.
Today, I got another insight into liberal think. A friend told me that he really doesn’t like Obama, but that this single quotation about McCain made it apparent to him that he couldn’t possibly ever vote for McCain: “I make them as quickly as I can, quicker than the other fellow, if I can. Often my haste is a mistake, but I live with the consequences without complaint.” Having heard that quotation, my liberal friend instantly assumed that McCain makes decisions without data, which is nowhere implied in what McCain says.
Aside from the fact that McCain never says he ignores data, it’s a useful mental exercise to realize that Obama thought long and hard about his VP choice, and then made a terrible mistake. More to the point, while I see McCain as exaggerating somewhat for effect, I think he was really saying that he’s a modern day Truman: “The buck stops here.” He makes his decisions and doesn’t immediately turn around and blame everyone else if they fail.
My liberal friend conceded that Obama has nothing personal going for him: My friend doesn’t like Obama’s policies and is not impressed by his resume. Why, then, will he vote for him? It’s all about image. Obama is the ultimate American advertisement. Voting for him, says my friend, will increase America’s standing in the world, make people of color feel good about themselves, and prove that America is not a racist nation.
If the Presidency was merely a symbolic position, those might be valid reasons. But the Presidency is a very powerful position. To vote for the most powerful person in the world, a person you concede is ineffectual and holds views antithetical to yours, simply because he looks good and you think he’ll make America “popular” strikes me as the height of irresponsibility.
This approach also shows remarkable ignorance. Barring the rare moments when America walks in and actually rescues Europeans from the arms of death, Europe has always been anti-American. Go back to writings from the 18th Century and you’ll see the same themes: America is a boorish, uncultured, ill-informed bully that needs to be reined in by wiser European heads. The only difference between now and then is that, while the American media historically took umbrage at and challenged those anti-American viewpoints, media members now echo and enlarge on those same views.
Likewise, what will it take to be friends with Iran? Conceding that it’s okay to launch a nuclear missile at Israel, perhaps? How about being friends with North Korea? “Yes, we’d love for you to be nuclear and, while you’re at it, we’ll just withdraw and leave South Korea to you.” Likewise, with Venezuela — “Please, go ahead with imposing Marxism on Latin America. And, dude, we love the neo-anti-Semitism you’re spouting. Sounds good.”
My liberal friend has reduced the presidential election to a high school level popularity contest. He wants to elect the “coolest” kid so that we “look good.” This is the Fernando Lamos school of voting. It was bad politics in high school, and it’s worse politics on the world stage.
Related posts:
- Who do you trust, McCain or Obama?
- McCain’s maturity
- Best analysis I’ve seen of Obama’s myriad failures re Iraq
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My liberal friends are small minded idiots. Blah, blah, blah… Therefore, all liberals should be ignored, ridiculed or marginalized. Straw men, straw men, everywhere… I thought this was a thinking person’s conservative blog.
On the Europeans, Bookworm, you should really get the facts straight. The majority of Europeans are not necessarily anti-American. They are anti-Bush, which is why the US standing in foreigners’ eyes has declined over the last 8 years. Also, polls consistently show that Europeans actually are less anti-American than the rest of the world (cf. http://pewglobal.org/commentary/display.php?AnalysisID=1019). When will conservatives stop the mindless “freedom fries”, France-bashing and actually cite REAL DATA?? For a more nuanced–you are a conservative that does nuance, right?–analysis of anti-American attitudes in Europe (Spain, in particular), check out the following article: http://www.worldandi.com/subscribers/feature_detail.asp?num=26309. Interestingly, it calls into question how problematic anti-American studies are. Which probably makes those who shun facts and rely on faith-based, selection bias smile.
And on the history, the US was boorish and uncultured relative to the Europeans in the 18th century, but it was not a bully. In fact, the US was incredibly weak and could not protect itself from Europe much less defend that old continent at that time. As the US developed economically, it started to build art collections, organize orchestras and do the other things that elevated its culture. By the 20th century, it had made huge impacts in science and the arts; and yes, we did help to bail out Western Europe from fascism and communism. So I guess they have no right to criticize us, at all, ever…
Dg, I come from European stock, I’ve lived in England, I’ve traveled extensively in Europe and, most importantly, I compulsively consume history books. Bush is merely the latest symbol of America hatred. Europe has never liked America. It’s needed America and been fascinated by America, but it has always disliked it. Yes, individual Europeans like individual Americans, but that’s rather like the racist saying, “some of my best friends are black,” or the antisemite boasting about “his good Jewish neighbor.” Individual likes and dislikes are not the same as national trends and the European national trend has always been anti-American.
book,
i’ve just got to get an answer from you about this. what do you think about gov. palin’s associations with her church and her pastor who in a recent sermon that she attended said:
http://blogs.jta.org/politics/2008/09/02/1226/sarah-palins-looming-pastor-problem/
there’s plenty more. being that you are an ardent supporter of israel, i was just curious about your take.
peace
“being that you are an ardent supporter of israel, i was just curious about your take.”
I doubt that Palin is an anti-Semite..
She can’t be held accountable for the things said in her church, anymore than Obama should have.
And honestly, when I heard that she was wearing a Buchanan button, I had my doubts, but, as a small town mayor, she says, she wore it to be welcoming.
It looks as if she was was just pandering. That’s what politicians do.
But, as for being anti-Isreal? Palin met with AIPAC just yesterday, so there’s no need for concern.
that’s exactly the point i was trying to make ozzie. but since bookworm et al had no problem salivating over the rev. wright fiasco; bringing it up over and over and over and over and over again. i wonder what book’s take would be now that a candidate she clearly supports has a pastor who apparently said some not cool things an issue she cares about.
would she finally let the wright smears go….or be true to form.
peace
Anti-Israel sentiment, and outright anti-Semitism, are today largely phenomena of the “progressive” Left. This is true both in the U.S. and in Western Europe.
Evangelicals have tended to be very strong supporters of Israel. This is partly due to theological reasons, but is also due to the fact that Evangelicals tend to be members of social groups which are outside the force field centered on academia and amplified by NPR, NYT, etc. Thus, their natural American tendency to sympathize with a beleaguered fellow democracy has not been overcome by “progressive” propaganda.
dg said:
Wow, what kind of research did you do to arrive at that scintillating conclusion?
Let me translate for you: “Europeans probably aren’t, well, maybe they are…Oh, heck, I don’t know.”
My experience was some time ago, at the end of the Vietnam war, when my wife and I went to spend time with her host families in Norway. The older folks, those that had lived through WWII were very appreciative of America. Younger Norwegians, you know, the college age crowd, we’re very critical of America because of the Vietnam War. They didn’t like America very much.
If I remember correctly, Bush wasn’t president then.
I lean toward Bookworm’s analysis, since that was my experience also.
dagon said:
I must be missing something. Fill me in why this bothers you, or why Bookworm should be bothered?
I assume you know something about biblical prophesy that I don’t.
but since bookworm et al had no problem salivating over the rev. wright fiasco; bringing it up over and over and over and over and over again. i wonder what book’s take would be now that a candidate she clearly supports has a pastor who apparently said some not cool things an issue she cares about.- dagon
The Wright issue provides red meat to the base, who would rather point to everyone else’s double standards than contemplate their own.
Victor Davis Hanson, today:
“Obama’s America, apparently unlike Rev. Wright’s Trinity Church, is a cruel, downright mean and dysfunctional place.. . . “
Fill me in why this bothers you, or why Bookworm should be bothered?- Brain
To paraphrase: The pastor is saying that the Jews are being bulldozed by Palestinians as a form of God’s punishment for not being Christians.
How on earth is that not bothersome?
It sounds a lot like Victor Davis Hanson’s description of Wrights’ church as a “cruel, downright mean and dysfunctional place.. . . “
brian
the pastor was basically saying that israel was getting what it deserved vis a vis the attacks because they still have not headed the word or the “one true god”.
read the whole link.
peace
“It’s all about image. Obama is the ultimate American advertisement. Voting for him, says my friend, will increase America’s standing in the world, make people of color feel good about themselves, and prove that America is not a racist nation.”
- Book, your friend is naive beyond belief. The U.S. is probably the least racist nation in the world as it is and we don’t have to prove anything to the world when it comes to basic human decency. Your friend really needs to get around more.
DG – I support 100% what Book replied to your statement about Europe and the world. That’s a good article on Spain to which you link, by the way.
I AM half-European, born and raised there in fact, and still have very many family members who are there prominent elites there. I can assure you that I don’t remember any time since 1960s (as the article you mention cites) in which most EUro elites did not have utter disdain for us.
In my view, Americans take what “others” (this usually means EUropeans) think about them far too seriously. You might note that EUros apparently have no problem with what Russia does to Georgia, China does to its own people, or Europeans have been doing to Africans, so why worry about how and why they bloviate about America’s perceived sins?
Once you get past elites, you might find that there is a lot of pro-Americanism in those countries among ordinary people. Also, realize that people overseas don’t have a totally free press – in Europe and elsewhere, most of the press is directly or indirectly government controlled (BBC, Agence France Press) or monopolized by Leftist elites and they get very skewed information about us (usually reprinted from AP, Reuters or the NYT).
Second, most of the information that people overseas get about the U.S. comes from Hollywood and the Left-dominated entertainment industry – they take idiots like Michael Moore, Sean Penn and Ben Affleck at face value because they have no way of getting competing ideas and insights about us from other sources.
Third, and this may be the most important point that your linked article does not address: the role of socialism. Socialism has been one of the most powerful political and social forces in Europe for the past 200+ years (following the French Revolution). I would estimate that socialism captures the political and social loyalties of close to half of Western EUropeans, at least. Since WWII, the U.S. has been the premier obstacle to the implementation of a socialist EUtopia in Europe and they don’t like it. We are the “anti-Socialists” (well, we conservatives, anyway). To DG’s linked article’s emphasis on Spain, I would point out that socialism’s historical lure in Spain has always been particularly strong and a great source of bitterness since their civil war.
The obvious material and political successes of U.S. values in Europe are a direct refutation of their ideology. Fundamentally (as your linked article indirectly suggests), this is an ideological struggle in which we will be vilified all the more in proportion to how successful we are. In for the socialists to overcome this, not only must our blemishes be magnified totally out of proportion (America polluted? Europe is far more polluted then we are, believe me), but our material, consumer, scientific, political, military etc. accomplishments must be villified at every turn…or socialism loses all meaning. It’s no accident that the same applies to American socialists (including a growing faction of the socialist-leaning Democrat Party). America CAN’T be successful, or Socialism falls.
If they (as many of my relatives are) anti-Bush, it is because they have had information drummed into their heads from only one very narrow anti-American point of view. When I point out to them WHY certain decisions were made by Americans and the Bush Administration (Iraq, Katrina, Islamic jihadism, pro-life, death penalty etc.), they usually acknowledge to me that they had never, never heard that point of view before and that it puts a totally different perspective on events.
When I talk to people overseas about America, I am truly amazed at how little these supposed EUro-sophisticates know about the U.S, not to mention the odd ideas they have about our society – the Brit who believe that vast numbers of people are denied healthcare and ordinary people are routinely slaughtered in the streets, the Frenchman who believed that the U.S. is one vast ocean of pollution and that the Mafia still rules Chicago, the Saudi Arabian who believed that the CIA routinely kills foreign leaders and presidential candidates, the Somali who was taught that there are no families in America, that instead children are abandoned to fend for themselves. Well…you can thank the Leftwing media and Hollywood for all that.
As far as ANY European accusing the U.S. of being a “bully”…oh, please! (What was EUrope’s versus America’s response during the Indian Ocean tsunami or Bosnia, or…Africa, for the past 20 years). I understand that the U.S.’s standing in South Asia, Africa, parts of South America and parts of the Middle East (yes, Iraq included) is actually quite good, media surveys of indentured elites notwithstanding. People still flock to come here, after all.
One area where we might agree is that the U.S. should be much more hands-off on EUrope. NATO is way obsolete. My conviction is that we invest far too much politically and economically in Europe and that both EUros and Americans would benefit if we would just let the EUros stew in their own socialist EUtopian juices.
On the Europeans, Bookworm, you should really get the facts straight. The majority of Europeans are not necessarily anti-American. They are anti-Bush, which is why the US standing in foreigners’ eyes has declined over the last 8 years ..
The “worldandi” link dg supplied had the following to say.
Perhaps dg should read an article before claiming that it supports his/her point of view.
My take is that anti-Americanism in Europe is stronger among the elite than the common man.
While I have never been to Europe, I have had extensive contact with Europeans in Latin America as fellow tourists, co-workers, or housemates, most from decades ago. Most were pro-American, or at least friendly-neutral. I formed a dislike of only one nationality: the French. One French woman informed me that there was something sick about American society, that it would be so friendly towards strangers. The reason: some of her compatriots back then, while hitching around the US as tourists, had been invited home by Americans who had stopped to pick them up. (that was back when people hitched) Most anti-Americanism was correlated with affinity towards Communism, which was not at all uncommon among Western Europeans before 1989.
Though one incident was not. A group of Europeans was talking in the lobby of a small hotel after midnight. I requested that they get to their rooms so that I could sleep, and likewise the young hotel employee who slept at the door to let guests in from the post-midnight bus arrival. “Just like an American,” was the reply of one of the Europeans as they dispersed. Pushy American, and all that .That morning the family who owned the hotel, whom I had known for years, thanked me for what I had done.
Anyone who claims that the French became anti-American only after Bush, doesn’t know the French.
dagon said:
Christians and Jews worship the same God.
God’s relationship with the Jews, both punishment and repentence is a theme throughout the Hebrew scriptures.
I think Paul, who was a Pharisee, trained under Gamaliel, who first set about driving the Christians out of the synagogues when Christianity was considered a sect of Judaism explains it the best in Romans 11. (He had converted to Christianity on the road to Damascus). Romans was written prior to the Temple being destroyed.
Paul answers the question whether God has rejected his own people, the nation of Israel and answer emphatically NO. God has not rejected his own people, whom he chose from the beginning. He recounts Elijah the prophet complaint that he was the only one of the prophets left after Ahab and Jezebel had slaughtered them. God replied no, there were 7,000 that had remained faithful.
He then brings to the present (60 AD), where a few of the people of Israel have remained faithful because of God’s grace—his undeserved kindness in choosing them. So today, there are a few who have remained faithful, but most of the people of Israel have “not found the favor of God they are looking for so earnestly”.
As the Scriptures say,
“God has put them into a deep sleep.
To this day he has shut their eyes so they do not see,
and closed their ears so they do not hear.”[d]
Then Paul asks whether God’s people have fallen beyond recovery? No is the answer. Because they were disobedient and rejected Christ, God made salvation available to the Gentiles. But what He wants is his own people to become jealous and claim it for themselves. If the Gentiles have been enriched because the people of Israel turned down God’s offer of salvation, think how much greater a blessing the world will share then they finally accept it.
Paul reminds the readers that he was appointed the apostle to the Gentiles. And he reminds the Gentiles that since Israel’s rejection meant that God offered salvation to the rest of the world, their acceptance will be even more wonderful. And since Abraham and the other patriarchs were holy, their descendants will also be holy—just as the entire batch of dough is holy because the portion given as an offering is holy. For if the roots of the tree are holy, the branches will be, too.
He reminds the Gentiles not to brag about being grafted in to replace the branches that were broken off. We’re just grafted branches, not the root. Paul reminds his readers that God is both kind and severe. He is severe toward those who disobeyed (including Gentiles), and urges everyone to continue trusting in God’s kindness (grace).
Paul reminds his readers that many of the people of Israel are now enemies of the Good News, and this benefits Gentiles. Yet they are still the people he loves because he chose their ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. For God’s gifts and his call can never be withdrawn. Once, the Gentiles were rebels against God, but when the people of Israel rebelled against him, God was merciful to us instead. But a time will come when the people of Israel will be restored.
brian
thanks for that but i already got the gist: i’m an atheist.
i’m not talking about how the word should probably be most beneficially applied. i’m talking about what the dude said in his sermon.
peace
We went to Paris for vacation in 1964. My husband got food poisoning from one of the tourist hot spots (one of the big name ones…I’ve forgotten the name – where the “Can-can” originated) and ended up in the hospital. The gendarmes wouldn’t speak to me in English when I asked for directions – but they would in German. I ended up hiring a cab to go to the hospital and following it.
BrianE, Pew Global Attitudes Project. Go read it. Then we can talk intelligently.
David Foster, contrary to what you might believe, NPR, NYT and academia cannot be simply dismissed as “propaganda.” They might report different views of Israel and the proper level of American support for that democracy than you would agree with, but it doesn’t make their reporting wrong or deceitful. Evangelicals, as I have seen them discuss the Israel-US relations issue in GOP debates, in television interviews and on programs like the 700 Club (which I watch about once a month to see where their heads are), take a supportive view of Israel largely, if not exclusively, based upon their religious faith. Many recognize no right of return to Paletinians and have a habit of calling them “guests” living on land given by God to Israelis. This view hardly takes into account a wide range of national security or other secular considerations that should inform our foreign policy. I wonder how much you listen to NPR, read the NYT or know about academia to dismiss them all so easily with such a stark generalization. I also wonder why guys like Mearsheimer are invited to Jerusalem or Tel Aviv to speak openly about the Israeli lobby, while in this country anyone who talks publicly about it is labeled an anti-semite. I have heard more than one Israeli journalist comment on how the chilled debate on Israel in the US hurts US and Israeli foreign policy, and I believe them.
Bookworm, if Europe is anti-American, then the rest of the world really, really hates us. Sorry, but the data on this, while scarce, clearly shows that our closest allies lie in Europe not elsewhere. Also, just because you lived in England and your ancestors hail from that country doesn’t mean that your assessment of Europe is correct. My ancestors hail from Italy and I have lived in London, Frankfurt, Milan, Luxembourg and Paris–so what?? I still disagree with you and your assessment of Europe. The place has a different view of the world because it has a different culture and history. They prefer their way of life and think it superior to ours. And that would differ from the average American’s view of his country and estimation of his land in what way?
You and other conservatives think that liberals all hate America; liberals think all conservatives hate all non-Americans. I think that when people realize that their views are largely accidents contingent upon where they were born, then maybe they’ll start to show a little less hatred…and, though many die hard nationalists fear it, it will not reduce or cheapen your love of country one bit. I have a friend, a Jewish rabbi, who once said that his religion came to him by the accident of birth, like his wife came to him by the accident of circumstance, but it doesn’t mean he cannot love his wife or his religion, just that he shouldn’t expect everyone else to love his wife or his religion as much as he does.
dagon said:
If you ask her pastor he will 100% agree with Romans 11. Jesus predicted the destruction of the Temple. On the 10th of August, in A.D. 70 — the 9th of Av — in Jewish reckoning, the very day when the King of Babylon burned the Temple in 586 B.C., the Temple was burned again. Titus took the city and put it to the torch, burning the Temple.
This also marked the beginning of the Jews being scattered throughout the world.
You can assign it to God’s judgement, or just say it was bad luck, but it doesn’t change the historical facts. And as I said before this isn’t the first time the Jews had been exiled.
Christians support Israel because of a promise given to Abraham:
“And I will make you a great nation,
And I will bless you,
And make your name great;
And so you shall be a blessing;
And I will bless those who bless you,
And the one who curses you I will curse.
And in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”
Suek, how do you know that they spoke English? Germany is pretty close to Paris too, so maybe they learned German rather than English… When I lived in Paris, people were very nice to me, and I don’t speak their language at all.
BrianE, thank you for helping to establish that the evangelical support for Israel is founded on unproveable religious beliefs rather than rational foreign policy and national security considerations. Those that exploit this ignorance for their narrow purposes is no friend of the US.
brian
i’m sure rev. wright would agree as well.
peace
Gringo, you really need to read the entire article. The part you quote refers to one view of the phenomenon, but later on the article notes the difficulty in narrowly defining anti-American from simple polls and goes on to note:
“…the best yardstick for measuring the high level of consideration Spanish society feels toward the United States is the importance Spaniards place on success in the United States. The list of Spanish personalities whose reputations have skyrocketed in their own country following success and acknowledgment in the United States is endless. The most obvious examples are actors and actresses such as Penélope Cruz, Antonio Banderas, and, more recently, Javier Bardem. Other personalities of different disciplines have experienced the same effect, including scientists such as Valentín Fuster and Luis Rojas Marcos ; basketball players like Pau Gasol ; cooks like Ferrán Adrià or José Andrés ; and writers like Ruiz Zafón and Arturo Pérez-Reverte. These are only a few examples of this social phenomenon that can only be explained in terms of admiration and respect.
These data demonstrate, as this article tries to prove, that Spaniards are not anti-American in their way of life, tastes, values, or aspirations, despite appearing anti-American in their public demonstrations.”
And also:
“Perhaps it is time to change this use of polls in measuring anti-Americanism and to consider other indicators that also can be measured and are empirical, such as private behavior. Anti-Americanism is one of the few social phenomena where it is widely assumed a schizophrenia exists between public attitudes and private behavior. ”
Now, I infer that the public-private distinction cited by the Pew study is a dicotomy between feeling anti-Bush vs. anti-American culture, lifestyle, et. al. I could be wrong, and would welcome a debate. But please cut the I-know-more-than-you-because-I-summered-in-Seville-reading-historical-novels nonsense. This stuff ain’t so black-and-white. And I hate it when people oversimplify so it fits in their little ideological boxes so neatly.
Danny, I wonder that your relatives don’t hate the US given your arrogance and self-assured sense of superiority over them. Do you really think people in Berlin are that dumb that they judge the US based upon our Hollywood movies? Do you think that they lack journalists that cover news stories here? Do you think that they do not travel here? Do you think they do not speak and read English far better than we read and speak German, and can use the internet (they have that?) to learn about us? Having lived in Europe, I can tell you that they know much more about us than we know about them. It is astonishing that you would think otherwise.
It is also amusing that you see them being somehow duped by their ideology and media and petty nationalism into missing the objective truth that we are better, as if the ideology, media and nationalism in this country didn’t impact the Americans’ assessment of their country.
I do agree that we should spend less abroad, but Europe isn’t taking nearly the amount of money that Egypt or Israel or a number of other countries are–not to mention Iraq and Afghanistan (cf. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Agency_for_International_Development#cite_note-3). I wonder, Danny, if your laissez-faire attitudes towards foreign aid extend to those other non-European countries also…
dg said:
I wasn’t aware it was a secret that Christians support Israel because of Israel’s place in history. I can certainly make a case for supporting Israel on rational foreign policy and national security considerations if that would make you feel better.
Now this is too subtle, though no one is exploiting anyone in their support of Israel. The only people being exploited are the Palestineans, who are the pawns of Islamists.
I support a two state solution, even though I am realistic enough to know that the Mullahs will never let this occur. They have too much to gain by keeping Israel in their gunsights and the Palestineans as their poster children of oppression.
dagon said:
I didn’t know he was a staunch supporter of Israel as well.
BrianE, please, make the rational case. Just because the witch doctor says I need the operation doesn’t mean I don’t want to hear it from the internist.
DG – you got the thrust of my post completely wrong.
I happen to love my European family and roots – but this does not apply to the socialist /leftwing elites that dominate public policy and social opinion and who, in my opinion, bear the responsibility for much of what has befallen Europe in the past 100 years. It has nothing to do with a sense of superiority – I will argue that the only difference between the U.S. and EUrope is a 10% swing in the voting population toward socialism in Europe and toward conservatism in the U.S. We have the same EUtopian socialist disease here and it is most evident in the Democrat party. We have the same social virus here, it’s just not as virulent yet.
If you want to get to one fundamentally, to explain the difference, I recognize that I still exist as a citizen of a free democratic nation where I can still exercise political power. Even my relatives are coming to the realization (esp. given the Lisbon Treaty) that they are increasingly subjects of a socialist uber-state with within which the can exercise very little and ever-diminishing political power.
As far as the Europeans’ use of the internet and the quality of media coverage they get on the U.S., we will just have to disagree.
Sorry, but my experience is that there are precious few EUropeans that understand the United States – tourism to New York or San Francisco (and vice versa, to Paris or London) doesn’t count – my experience is that you need to live someplace at least 2 years before you learn to look under the veneer and figure out what is happening.
You are correct, the average EUro elite knows more about the U.S. than the average American knows (or cares) about Europe. Then again, I would argue that the average educated American Elite knows more about Europe than the “average” European. But then, we have a vast country and I find that, in general, Americans in general know more about Latin America and Asia than Euros in general do. Foreign languages? Obama notwithstanding (Mr. “merci beaucoup”), most people that I know in the Chicago area do speak a second language (Polish, Spanish, Russian, Korean) because of their ethnic make-up and people along the borderlands tend to be bilingual in Spanish….because they have to be. For many manufacturing plants in my industry, a working knowledge of Spanish is required. Same as the EUropeans – they speak other languages because they have to. So what?
Regarding foreign aid…Europe doesn’t receive foreign from us, DG. They do depend upon us for their defense, however, and that has to stop. This is an apple /oranges issue vis-a-vis foreign aid to countries that really need it, which is an issue that we can probably postpone for a different day. What say you?
We have the same social virus here, it’s just not as virulent yet.
America’s political institutions were always less susceptible to corrupt tampering than Europe’s.
This is why we hold out and they fall. Doesn’t mean everybody won’t fall, though, in the end.
Danny, stop catering to false beliefs. It doesn’t matter who knows more over whom. What matters is “is what you know, true” or is “what you know, an anti-American fiction”?
What Europeans think of us?
From The Sunday TimesAugust 31, 2008
Danny, I do appreciate your more nuanced understanding of Europe. Bookworm’s Freedom Fries stereotypes are really getting old and are the more offensive since apparently she knows better.
On the sources of difference between the two continents, you’ll have to substantiate that those differences politically are based upon a 10% swing toward socialism. I’m skeptical but would like to understand the argument more.
More fundamentally, I think that Americans have to understand that our country would have a totally different outlook about the world if we’d been through what Europe has been through. The political diversity and continual warring has led to the sacking of every major city on that continent. That we have not experienced this has less to do with moral superiority or even that our political/economic system is better, but simply because our country was formed as one and insulated by two large oceans. If the US had experienced 200 years of being overrun by Russians, Brazilians and Chinese, we would have different worldviews than we do now. Europe is more reticent to engage militarily and is offended by the US lack of circumspection for this reason, among others. And if you look at the differences between us and them on a variety of issues, from the welfare state to genetically modified foods, you can see historical explanations for the differences. One should understand the historical contingency of those differences before disparaging the place. I tell my European friends the same thing about the US, by the way. Perhaps you do as well, Danny.
It seems we share more in common with Australia than any of the European weaklings.
Notice the EU backed down from any sanctions against Russia for its invasion of Georgia. In this case, it is all about the oil. Russia has a chokehold on Europe and its only going to get worse.
Australia and America share a common experience. Settled by criminals, taming a hostile environment parallels the American story. Settled by indentured servants, taming a hostile environment has given Americans and Australians a perspective of sacrifice and hard work, which still shows up in our attitudes today.
How many more generations will it take though, before we look like Europe, ready to appease, committed to no principle, sheep ready to be led by Brussels and the unelected bureacratic elite?
>>How many more generations will it take though, before we look like Europe, ready to appease, committed to no principle, sheep ready to be led by Brussels and the unelected bureacratic elite?>>
Judging by the d-g folks, we’re already there.
Gringo, you really need to read the entire article
I did before my previous posting, thank you very much. I apologize for my snarky comment that you should need to read the article.
But please cut the I-know-more-than-you-because-I-summered-in-Seville-reading-historical-novels nonsense.
Regarding the phenomena of anti-Americanism: I will trust my observations based on four years working overseas plus having had many foreign roommates during my time in grad school in the US. Also note what I said about anti-Americanism among Europeans I met: “Most were pro-American, or at least friendly-neutral.”
This stuff ain’t so black-and-white.
Apparently so, when an article you cite contradicts your assertion that anti-Americanism in Europe is primarily anti-Bushism. What parts of “majoritarian” and “1960’s ” do you not understand?
And I hate it when people oversimplify so it fits in their little ideological boxes so neatly.
“Most were pro-American or at least friendly-neutral.” Oversimplification to state that along w some observations of anti-Americanism?
Rather, you appear to hate it when you cite an article , and others find evidence in said article that flatly contradicts your point of view. What parts of “majoritarian” and “1960’s ” do you not understand? (Not to mention the article also mentions anti-Americanism in Spain being based on phenomena that clearly predate 2001.)
I would agree with you that anti-Americanism in Europe is often somewhat schizophrenic, which also dovetails with my previous assertion that it is stronger among the elite than the common man. See Orwell’s remark about intellectuals. Someone once made the observation that after several beers, anti-Americanism among Europeans often disappeared.
FWIW, I wonder what your reaction is to this example of anti-Americanism from an article written by Markus Günther, an award-winning German journalist- and reactions to it. While his article in German is apparently offline now, there is an English translation from commenter Poldi.