[Culturechat] EUROPE - THY NAME IS COWARDICE

[Gerald J. Clancy, Jr.]

Man, in my view this guy hit the nail right on the head. It's a view I've 
held for years. A lot of us in this group are old enough to have lived 
through WW II and the noises coming out of the EU these days (and to some 
extent here in the States as well) are so reminiscent of Chamberlain's 
days. Britain and Italy, to their great credit, have stood with us. Yes, 
Vietnam, most would agree today, was a mistake (at least the way we went 
about it) and, while surely part of Bush's rationale for Iraq was to finish 
Old Dad's business, few would argue that taking out Hussein was a bad 
thing. And few argue that Korea, Bosnia and Afghanistan were bad moves.

The EU block, and particularly Germany and France, have greatly benefited 
first from the Marshall plan (and let's not forget the Berlin Airlift) and 
secondly from us carrying almost their entire defensive load militarily for 
almost 60 years, freeing their budgets and burdening ours. This European 
generation (with the noted exceptions above), which is fat and happy with 
growing economies, seems to be repeating the history of the 1930s.

Hooray for Herr Döpfner. Would there were more like him.

Jerry

At 04:07 PM 12/7/2004, Vance Roy wrote:


>This might be something to discuss with an European when he asks a tourist 
>about the USA policies.
>
>>This is written by a German.
>
>>
>>EUROPE - THY NAME IS COWARDICE
>>(Commentary by Mathias Döpfner)
>>
>>Matthias Döpfner, Chief Executive of German publisher Axel Springer AG, 
>>has written a blistering attack in the daily WELT against the cowardice of
>>Europe in the face of the Islamic threat. Hartmut Lau translated the 
>>article for us.

....