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Alan Pollock wrote:

In rec.travel.usa-canada Stephen Harding wrote:

I am coming around to absolutely despising Europeans, or
at least a fairly large subset of them!

My take is simply to not take the stupid, blanket-hatred posts too seriously.
Read the reasonable ones and completely ignore the Marie Lewis's you come
across.

The voice of reason!

You are correct of course. And I don't really even come close
to despising Europeans although their constant harping on how
evil the US is and especially Bush gets tiring.

Liberal in the US say pretty much the same thing about Bush as
the Euros do, so I guess it's actually more than a Euro/US thing,
and basically Left/Right politics.

As for the general tone of Anti-Americanism (which most will swear up and down
isn't the case), don't forget that it's a tender time for Euros at the moment.
If the US can be of help in their effort to combine, why not? Let them bitch
and moan. They're good at it. Been doing it for centuries against each other,
*and* other social classes within their own countries.

Where is all the tradition, all this pent-up cultural imperative to go now
that it's deemed uncool? Nex

Well the US and Europe are going their separate ways. I'm hoping
the divorce is a rapid one personally, and certainly better for
both I've come to believe.


SMH

On Mon, 05 Apr 2004 08:58:57 -0400, Stephen Harding
wrote:

Alan Pollock wrote:

In rec.travel.usa-canada Stephen Harding wrote:

I am coming around to absolutely despising Europeans, or
at least a fairly large subset of them!

My take is simply to not take the stupid, blanket-hatred posts too seriously.
Read the reasonable ones and completely ignore the Marie Lewis's you come
across.

The voice of reason!

You are correct of course. And I don't really even come close
to despising Europeans although their constant harping on how
evil the US is and especially Bush gets tiring.

Liberal in the US say pretty much the same thing about Bush as
the Euros do, so I guess it's actually more than a Euro/US thing,
and basically Left/Right politics.


That paragraph actually sums up the vast differences in the ways of
understanding things, not just between the US and Europe, but more the
US and much of the rest of the world. Liberalism is in no way
identifiable with left-wing politics, far from it. It is completely at
odds with any socialist/communist ideals. Ruling liberal political
parties in places as far apart as Europe and Australia are placed
firmly at the centre or centre-right of the political spectrum, with
labour, socialist and other left-wing groupings very much in
opposition to them.


--==++AJC++==--

Stephen Harding wrote:
Alan Pollock wrote:

In rec.travel.usa-canada Stephen Harding wrote:

I am coming around to absolutely despising Europeans, or
at least a fairly large subset of them!

My take is simply to not take the stupid, blanket-hatred posts too seriously.
Read the reasonable ones and completely ignore the Marie Lewis's you come
across.

The voice of reason!

You are correct of course. And I don't really even come close
to despising Europeans although their constant harping on how
evil the US is and especially Bush gets tiring.

Liberal in the US say pretty much the same thing about Bush as
the Euros do, so I guess it's actually more than a Euro/US thing,
and basically Left/Right politics.

As for the general tone of Anti-Americanism (which most will swear up and
down isn't the case), don't forget that it's a tender time for Euros at the
moment. If the US can be of help in their effort to combine, why not? Let
them bitch and moan. They're good at it. Been doing it for centuries against
each other, *and* other social classes within their own countries.

Where is all the tradition, all this pent-up cultural imperative to go now
that it's deemed uncool? Nex

Well the US and Europe are going their separate ways. I'm hoping
the divorce is a rapid one personally, and certainly better for
both I've come to believe.

You might be right if the world was driven only by political idealogies.
Unfortunately, we live in a global economy, like it or not, and it'll be a very
cold day in hell when US corporations divorce themselves from their
international trading partners. Don't hold your breath waiting for it to
happen, 'cause it's not going to happen any time soon.

George Z.


SMH

George Z. Bush wrote:

You might be right if the world was driven only by political idealogies.
Unfortunately, we live in a global economy, like it or not, and it'll be a very
cold day in hell when US corporations divorce themselves from their
international trading partners. Don't hold your breath waiting for it to
happen, 'cause it's not going to happen any time soon.

Absolutely true. I was speaking only in a political alliance
sense.

The business world is global and there's no getting around it,
nor should we want to. I'm all for businesses fighting it out
around the world, but no American blood or treasure to keep
some government in power or feeling secure; that means S.
Korea, Taiwan, Japan or even UK if it came to such a thing.

It means no NATO, WTF, IMF, World Bank or whatever. UN is OK
for debating practice.

Back to good old George Washington's admonition, "no entangling
foreign alliances".


SMH

"Stephen Harding" wrote in message
...
George Z. Bush wrote:

You might be right if the world was driven only by political idealogies.
Unfortunately, we live in a global economy, like it or not, and it'll be a
very
cold day in hell when US corporations divorce themselves from their
international trading partners. Don't hold your breath waiting for it to
happen, 'cause it's not going to happen any time soon.

Absolutely true. I was speaking only in a political alliance
sense.

The business world is global and there's no getting around it,
nor should we want to. I'm all for businesses fighting it out
around the world, but no American blood or treasure to keep
some government in power or feeling secure; that means S.
Korea, Taiwan, Japan or even UK if it came to such a thing.

It means no NATO, WTF, IMF, World Bank or whatever. UN is OK
for debating practice.

Back to good old George Washington's admonition, "no entangling
foreign alliances".

That'd be peachy keen in his day, when it took a couple of months to cross the
Atlantic, but now it's only a couple of hours via SST. The world has changed,
and no one has yet discovered how to make the clock run backwards in order for
us to not have to make adjustments.

George Z.

George Z. Bush wrote:

"Stephen Harding" wrote in message
...

George Z. Bush wrote:


You might be right if the world was driven only by political idealogies.
Unfortunately, we live in a global economy, like it or not, and it'll be a

very

cold day in hell when US corporations divorce themselves from their
international trading partners. Don't hold your breath waiting for it to
happen, 'cause it's not going to happen any time soon.

Absolutely true. I was speaking only in a political alliance
sense.

The business world is global and there's no getting around it,
nor should we want to. I'm all for businesses fighting it out
around the world, but no American blood or treasure to keep
some government in power or feeling secure; that means S.
Korea, Taiwan, Japan or even UK if it came to such a thing.

It means no NATO, WTF, IMF, World Bank or whatever. UN is OK
for debating practice.

Back to good old George Washington's admonition, "no entangling
foreign alliances".


That'd be peachy keen in his day, when it took a couple of months to cross the
Atlantic, but now it's only a couple of hours via SST. The world has changed,
and no one has yet discovered how to make the clock run backwards in order for
us to not have to make adjustments.

George Z.

Not quite that bad. Now that they've junked the SSTs it's a safer
place. Still hours but a reasonable number of them. FFM

S. Harding wrote:

no American blood or treasure to keep
some government in power or feeling secure; that means S.
Korea, Taiwan, Japan or even UK if it came to such a thing.

It means no NATO, WTF, IMF, World Bank or whatever.

UN is OK
for debating practice.

Back to good old George Washington's admonition, "no entangling
foreign alliances".

The attraction of making the US a large, economy size Sweden or Switzerland is
certainly powerful.
But you must consider that the withdrawal of the US from the world
political/military scene would leave a power vacuum. This would be filled by
another power--and not without serious disruptions and violence. A comparison
might be to what happened with the demise of Ottoman and Austria-Hungary power.
It's very likely the US would be drawn back onto the world military stage by
threats to its own security.
Right now, we are the 800 pound gorilla doing pretty much what we want to
preserve our own civilization, our leaders only worried about what we Americans
think about what they are doing. Bush worries about American voters turning
him out---not the UN or EU.
Also keep in mind the old rule that he who complains is without power. People
with power who don't like something don't bitch about it, they change it.
And remember that everybody carps about the boss.
The US is the boss of the world and has the power to change things it doesn't
like, should it choose to (remarkably, the US is such a benign boss that it
suffers quite a bit it doesn't like and could change--the US is no Soviet
Union, Nazi Germany, or even British Empire).
It's a nuisance being the top dog, endlessly having to go out and fight wolves
and coyotes to keep the sheep safe. But it's a lot better than being the cur
hiding under the porch and barking at every noise it hears, worrying that the
top dog is antagonizing monsters but also terrified that the top dog might get
sick of the whole business and leave it in charge, a responsibility it really
doen't want and can't handle.

The attraction of making the US a large, economy size Sweden or Switzerland
is
certainly powerful.
But you must consider that the withdrawal of the US from the world
political/military scene would leave a power vacuum. This would be filled by
another power--and not without

serious disruptions and violence. A comparison
might be to what happened with the demise of Ottoman and Austria-Hungary
power.
It's very likely the US would be drawn back onto the world military stage by

Well this is basicly "the redistrubition of post WWII accumulated wealth" game
but accelerated because of scientific and technological advances.
If you and your potential adversaries have ability today to use HPM weapons as
tectonic and climatic weapons and if you know today that they (HPM) going to
render nuclear weapons useless,then must do something and very fast.
The Martialization of society might be one of the answers to face HPM weapon
threats and natural disasters.

"Stephen Harding" wrote in message
...

Well the US and Europe are going their separate ways.

Oh, I do hope you include the UK in this.

I'm hoping
the divorce is a rapid one personally, and certainly better for
both I've come to believe.

True.

M.Lewis

Stephen Harding wrote:

Well the US and Europe are going their separate ways. I'm hoping
the divorce is a rapid one personally, and certainly better for
both I've come to believe.

There is an old saying that people who fail to learn from history are
destined to repeat it.

In the case of isolationism, the US has tried that numerous times
before, and has thoroughly regretted it each time. You had better
rethink you position.