109 Comments

1. Joseph:

Victor, Europe may be hell on earth but still nice enough to visit every year. Enjoy.

May 22, 2009 - 1:41 am 2. Joseph:

Victor, Europe may be hell on earth but nice enough to visit every year. Enjoy.

May 22, 2009 - 1:42 am 3. steve macdonald:

having spent the last decade living in Spain and England I can verify this post. Having recieved billions in infrastructure Euros from the EU, the Spanish readily voted for the Constitution. However hiding income is a national pastime as well. I must admit however that if I had a “leader” like Zapatero I would hide my money from him as well.

May 22, 2009 - 2:46 am 4. T. O'Connor:

Whenever I’m on the continent and more often than not dealing with irritations answered by rudeness, the thought invariably arises, “How did these people create so many astoundingly beautiful artworks?” The answer of course is that “these people” didn’t.
Thanks always, VDH.

May 22, 2009 - 3:50 am 5. Jack Marcotte:

Essential vdh

Listening to BHO’s speeches becomes painful
when one understands how far away he is from being aware of what America is, was and needs to be. If any one offers up a prayer to God, it now should be for himself.

“To give back” is now the most tired, meaningless phrase in the idiot lefts “cult phrase book”. Equivalent to “Chairman Mao’s little read book. It is being mouthed by those who can’t take care of themselves much less anyone else. It is mouthed especially by those “on the make” within the PC hypocritical environment of government welfare, bailouts, handouts, and control.

Reading vdh’s summary of the expected BHO results, results that any American operating in a real world should expect, one wonders “who would vote for Obama” and call himself an American? Where do we, Americans, go from here? is now a question that everyone must ask himself.

The elections coming up in 2010 will begin to show if Americans can vote to save America and it’s values. Americans can let their “idiot representatives” know now if they can plan on being reelected by their contact. That may do amazing things to those Politicians who have no real core values other than a finger in the wind and a hand in the collection pot.

America is now at stake and will disappear if BHO and his cult flocks are not kicked out of office. His age old call to human weakness to gain power, perfuming a scorpion, must be challenged in the schools, in the workplace, in America.

If not for American, pre hippie values and power the world becomes a dangerous place. That you will know as a fact should BHO’s fossilized, failed ideas be allowed to take root in America.

MSM now must be seen for what it is. A subversive propaganda machine that must not be allowed to spread its propaganda to the masses of dumbed down Americans without answer and refute.

ACORN must not be allowed to play its games of subversion, theft of funding, and ballot box stuffing without the legal consequences already in place. Enforce the dam laws!

GWB has a lot to answer for in this fall. His “compassionate conservative” was the most dumbed down comment every made.

Chaney is now trying to play a role that should have occurred much earlier, before BHO and the Lefts MSM gained ground by simply lying and selectively reporting “facts”. Without corrective comment by Bush.

It is now evident that Americans coming out of the perverted school systems of equal brainwashed outcomes be exposed to the real America, real Americans like vdh, T. Sowell, Walter Washington, and others, even the great Gatsby, Ann Coulter and her irreverent but from the heart and gut comments. Her humor in the face of the ridicule from the MSM is a lesson in life itself.

Individual Americans who have gone through the corrupted school systems at all levels need to enter the world and hear words from conservative leaders and family members, those that have a family and not wards of the state, on what individual humans are expected to do to fulfill their place and purpose on earth.

Their heads full of mush must be emptied and refilled with hard core American values. Values that build on strengths and needs. Not just wishes and Utopian thoughts.

Being an affirmative action welfare recipient or proponent for power purposes is not being an American. In fact quite the opposite. This includes corporate welfare.

May 22, 2009 - 4:04 am 6. Dave the Kapampangan:

This is like the story of the anti-military protester who yelled, “Help! Marines!” the moment she got her purse snatched. Or like the folks who buy daintily packaged meat at the store and forget to tell their kids where meat comes from. I think certain social classes — the disdainful “paternalistic overseers,” so-called academics, and the entitlement classes of Europe– don’t want to dignify the underlying truths and elements of human yearning that make their world tick. The polar bear hugging German woman who jumps into the zoo exhibit only to get her ass chewed by a bear refuses to apprehend the real world. Was reality THAT horrible for Europe that they mostly all look the other way now?

May 22, 2009 - 5:55 am 7. Lawrence Kohn:

The US has evolved from a free wheeling capitalist society with no safety net and restrictions based on race, gender and physical disability to one that maintains the engine of capitalism but does two crucial things: 1. breaks the barriers of race, gender and physical disability in a way that engenders among the previously excluded the drive to innovate and succeed; 2. takes into account the cost of damage business activity creates and compensates for it-smoking is not personal-just one cigarette on the Union terrace at Lake Mendota at the U of Wisconsin Madison travels over the whole terrace and forces it into everyone’s lungs. Multiply that by dozens of smokers and it is really bad; hence banning smoking in doors. Same with pollution. The cost of polluting belongs on the business not the consumer (cost of the clean up or prevention). But this second aspect will, if Professor Hanson is correct, be extended to everything, to bans on things that are matters of taste, not on things that hurt others. American capitalism and American democracy actually took to heart much of the socialist critique without the down side of actual socialism. Labor unions saw this early on to the dismay of their European cousins and we had a tamed rivalry among government, labor and business that followed the American tradition of checks and balances. We need arguments against the President’s vision to be made from this reformed capitalist view (hence acknowledging that Congress and White House pre Obama failed in the areas of credit and derivatives to sustain the approach of a tamed but still dynamic capitalism). Arguing from a classic capitalist approach as some conservatives do (as if government is always the problem and business is always innovative) will not convince Americans of a generation that grew up with the protections of a mixed economy with its ambiguities and a little good is better than a lot bad view that purists despise.

May 22, 2009 - 6:03 am 8. Ron Kean:

Thank you professor for another valuable defining snapshot of the moment.

I’m waiting for Obama to tell us to eat our vegetables and to dress warm before going out on a cold day. And don’t forget the SUNSCREEN! Obmomma says so.

I remember an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie called RUNNING MAN. It was about a media/government complex or each seemingly indistinguishable from the other. Life may imitate art again. Food riots in Bakersfield and gladiatorial reality game shows. It would give SURVIVOR a whole new meaning.

Ralph Peters had a theory that given Europe’s violent past, they still might not go so quietly into Sharia. He suggested that the US might even be forced to send aircraft carriers to evacuate Muslims on the run from the natives.

One can be in awe of the architecture over there but there’s still the specter of the Greek wars, Roman wars, the 30 Years War, Napoleon, WW1, WW2…have I missed any? :- (

May 22, 2009 - 6:09 am 9. Fausta:

it is ironic to travel through Italy and see nearly all of its artistic treasures

When you get to see them. Years ago I lived in Italy for a couple of months and (except for the Vatican) nearly every place was closed due to mini-strikes that lasted for a few hours. Brera, the Poldi-Pezzoli, name it. Let’s hope that has changed.

May 22, 2009 - 6:29 am 10. ET:

Remember that voting process on the new European constitution? That one bureaucrat said, “It is not possible for one person to read the document” – yet he was busy lecturing everyone on how critical it was to vote “Yes”, and adopt it.

That said it all, for me.

May 22, 2009 - 8:57 am 11. Minerva:

Will be in Italy in a couple months so looking forward to your next post!

May 22, 2009 - 9:22 am 12. njcommuter:

Capitalists, farmers, eccentrics, and individualists created the American Constitution; clerks, bureaucrats, ministers, and appointees wrote the Constitution of the European Union. Are we then surprised at the comparative results?

This is an inspired statement, and one which deserves to be trumpeted to the heavens. (Readers, copy and propagate–with proper attribution, of course!)

In industry, in testing, a distinction is made between verification and validation. Verification is making sure that the thing tested meets specs. Validation is making sure that it meets the need for which it is made.

Clerks, bureaucrats, and ministers may be good at verification. Appointees validate to the needs of their patron. A good mix of capitalists, small farmers, individualists and sometimes-inspired eccentrics can validate to the need of all.

May 22, 2009 - 9:52 am 13. J.E. Dyer:

Thanks, Professor. What a succinct and crystalline set of observations. I look forward to the rest of them.

May 22, 2009 - 11:46 am 14. Michael:

This is pretty much right-on, at least in its appraisal of Europe. I disagree with VDH that Obama seeks to Europeanize America, however, which I can go into later (have some reading to do currently).

I am amazed at the degree to which many of my my liberal friends (all highly intelligent) admire Europe; I think if they had to operate businesses or work in the countries rather than study abroad, they would not admire it nearly so much. Knowing American friends who operate a small business in Europe, I can attest to the validity of VDH’s comments on moonlighting, evading taxes and the petty bureaucracy, etc.

But then, I am chagrined at the arrogant ignorance most of my conservative friends when it comes to appreciating Europe’s cultural riches and the continent’s American legacy.

May 22, 2009 - 12:00 pm 15. Rob Mandel:

Europe has demilitarized (understandably so after the 20th century) but refuse to provide much more than an anti-terrorist (re: bader meinhoff or ETA) constabulatory. The refused to help in Iraq because they couldn’t. They are failing miserably to uphold their meager NATO commitments in Afghanistan. They can not, nor will not, fight.

Their birth rate is far below sustainability, hovering around 1.3. Mark Steyn noticed recently that for a society that terribly family-friendly laws, there are no families.

As you said, they won’t even defend their own culture and society.

Those are clear signs they have simply quit. They tapped out, threw in the towel. The only question remaining, is have we?

May 22, 2009 - 1:55 pm 16. Smee:

I am living in Europe right now. (It’s a long story.)
Europeans hate to admit it, but they would love to live like suburban Americans live.
So much of their resentment towards us most definitely comes from this difference in expectations and lifestyle.
You just have to wait until they’re drunk (not a very long wait in some European countries) for them to admit the truth about it.
Also, class warfare is EASY to incite over here, despite decades of governments trying to bring everyone down to the same level.

May 22, 2009 - 6:45 pm 17. Marino:

I’ve been to Ireland many times visiting the in-laws. After watching me politely wait my turn at the bar to buy a round of drinks my future father in-law advised me on the Irish way – “push” yourself to the front. He demonstrates the jabbing out of the elbows, turning your back on the person you just cut off etc.

And forget about placing a wager at the race track. You have to practically step on someones head to place a bet. Then back to the house to be lectured on how vulger and rude Amercians are and how we don’t care about our fellow citizens..

May 22, 2009 - 7:45 pm 18. Jack Marcotte:

#7, Mr Kohn,

I commend you for writing your (a) name. I commend you for outlining your thoughts in a complete way. It allows me to comment on its cogent content.

It leads me to think of what Ronald Regan said once about the left. I will need to paraphrase: “It isn’t that left wing people don’t know a lot, Its just that so much of what they know is wrong”.

May 22, 2009 - 8:01 pm 19. Class Clown:

Ron Kean,

I’ve been lately pondering that exact essay from Ralph Peters. I have lived in France, and I speak the language well. The hatred of Arabs runs very, very deep in many a common Frenchman, and it is socially acceptable to express that hatred on a level that most Americans can’t imagine. I have heard, in open and casual conversations, vile jokes about Jews and Arabs of a sort that I have literally never heard in the U.S.

If Peters is ever proven right, it will be a tragic and bitter irony after their multi-generational effort to paint Americans as intolerant bullies.

May 22, 2009 - 10:52 pm 20. Meryl:

I appreciate Mr. Hanson’s description of the oh-so-precious simple reality of personal liberty that we enjoy…

…and that we have, relatively speaking, a great deal of space in which to exercise it.

Both extremes infuriate me: the left who say we don’t deserve to have it so good and must give it up (in order to “be fair”) and the ignorant who act like we really don’t have it that good and “not to worry, there’s nothing here to protect”.

The welfare class that has always been taken care of at the public trough is running the country. They have no idea what it is to live free, because they never have: they have always been dependent on someone else’s largesse or on their ability to intimidate someone weaker.

Maybe the fact that obama just absolutely cannot help but reveal himself for what he is, is what will save us from what he has planned.

May 23, 2009 - 12:14 am 21. DavidN:

My favorite story with regards to socialized medicine is Belinda Stronach. She was a member of Canada’s parliament, and a big advocate of their single payer system, where the government pays for everything and you’re not allowed to buy health care, other than what you’re allocated by the government. She was diagnosed with breast cancer, and would have had to wait for several months to be treated…so of course she flew to California and had surgery here, immediately. Various idiots insist we could have such a system here, but if we did…where would rich Canadian politicians go, when they didn’t want to wait in the line that they advocated for everyone else?

May 23, 2009 - 12:30 am 22. Donna V.:

Was reality THAT horrible for Europe that they mostly all look the other way now?

Yeah, it was. The defining moment for Western Europe was, I think, WWI. We came in at the tail end – by that point, the British had lost practically a whole generation. It took some time afterward for the British Empire to die, but the process started at Ypres and the Somme.

And the French fought very bravely in WWI. After that, it’s like they never wanted to fight for anything again – not even their own country in 1940.

WWI was really when Western Europe started losing it. And WWII, an even more massive conflict, finished them off for good. Oh, they rebuilt and managed to construct their lavish welfare states. But European dominance of the globe ended in 1945.

Americans came out of WWII believing in their military and knowing that force is necessary to defeat evil. But it seems Europeans took exactly the opposite tack – they decided war was a bad thing and should be avoided at all costs. (Nevermind that that line of reasoning didn’t get Chamberlain anywhere.)

Hence the Euro preference for “soft power,” let’s talk, let’s negotiate. If you see it as akin to the reaction of a child who has been severely beaten and will do anything to avoid being beaten again, it makes sense. (Of course, that analogy is not entirely accurate, since children don’t beat themselves, while Europeans were responsible for the traumas of WWI and WWII.)

May 23, 2009 - 1:43 am 23. Class Clown:

Marino,

That is because the welfare state mentality is not actually about compassion for your fellow man, it is about getting the state to take care of others so you don’t have to care….

May 23, 2009 - 3:03 am 24. David Thomson:

“The cost of polluting belongs on the business not the consumer”

This is intrinsically impossible. All costs of doing business are passed along to the consumer in one way or another. What constitutes polluting? How is this defined in particular instances? How have we arrived at a cost/ benefit analysis? Is there a reasonable standard—or is it set by environmental extremists? But this is something that best not be forgotten: every single American will pay the price tag. It cannot be truly be shoved onto other people.

May 23, 2009 - 4:02 am 25. Bilgeman:

#20 Meryl:
“The welfare class that has always been taken care of at the public trough is running the country. ”

Close, but I think that that could use some tweaking.

The government that claims to serve the welfare class, (and that includes the subsidy and government-contract crews as well), is running the country.

For that government to grow, and consolidate the gains it makes by that growth, it cultivates and expands the welfare class.

May 23, 2009 - 4:51 am 26. RobertG:

I have only been to Europe a few times and must admit I did not like what I saw-rather rude, hostile and anti-American to the extreme. The great cities, cathedrals and such must be seen. Without Europeans it would be a nice place to visit.

May 23, 2009 - 5:23 am 27. glenn:

The Belinda Stronach story is the perfect allegory of the problems the rest of the world is going to have as we become more like them. Where are the “special people” going to go for health care and less expensive luxury goods. More inportant where are the remaining Western democracies going to turn for protection. I spent 2 1/2 months in Europe last year, almost everyone was agog at the possibility of Barack Obama getting elected, many thought it couldn’t happen and when I told them his election was virtually assured we had some very interesting conversations. Some (not many) grasped the idea that his election might not be in their best long term interests. That made for some really interesting and long late night sessions. Theyre about to get that lesson in the realities of “realpolitik”

May 23, 2009 - 5:48 am 28. Gary Ogletree:

Twenty years ago I was running a reforestation project in Northwest British Columbia. We had a couple treeplanters who were obsessed with earning money for a trip to wonderful, wonderful Europe. Meanwhile we were camped in the lower Nass Valley, not far from the coast and SE Alaska. Breathtaking vistas of snowy mountains, ancient rainforests all around. We drove through lava flows on the way to work, one cut block was next to a cinder cone. We had a great cook and a lot of sweet people on the crew. Our Nishga neighbors had nearly adopted us since the dad of one planter was Nishga and she had found her relatives, so we had the novelty of Indian tourists in our camp. All this meant nothing to these guys who could think only of the money they needed to get to wonderful Europe, never enough money, they were completely miserable, although they were high ballers making over $200 a day. I figured there untold millions of young Europeans who would have given anything to be where we were that spring.

May 23, 2009 - 6:23 am 29. LeighB:

I’m not interested in being a euroamerican or any other hyphenated American. I am a law abiding, God fearing, country first citizen who loves the USA, pays taxes, and works hard. I believe in American exceptionalism. And I am willing to produced my birth certificate if asked. Huh, wonder why I think BHO and I are not in sync…

May 23, 2009 - 7:28 am 30. Saltherring:

Rob Mandel @ 15, speaking of Europe, states “As you said, they won’t even defend their own culture and society. Those are clear signs they have simply quit. They tapped out, threw in the towel.”

What is there to defend? A cookie-cutter society where the state (and its media mouthpieces) determines (or limits) where one can live, work, eat and worship. Thought police determine what can be written and spoken so no one is offended, or likewise, encouraged to be creative, productive or unique.

What Europe is about, and Obama pursues, is the absolute destruction of individuality. To attain his goal, America and Americans must:

Be separated from their guns and religion
Accept the role of the state in determining what is best for us
Buy into whatever the state-run media tells us
Worship the earth and nature
Relocate from farms and forests into urban apartments
Use public transportation
Not question the state and its ultimate authority
Accept multiculturism as rule of law
Embrace moral relativism and sexual diversity
Exchange constitutional rule of law for what leaders determine is “fair”
Give up personal ambitions and personal wealth for the good of all
Learn to live with less
Embrace all aspects healthy living as defined by the state
Understand that your Ivy League-educated leaders know what is best
Accept that other nations (Iran, North Korea, Russia, Venezuela, etc.) can do whatever they please
Ultimately give up all rights and claims to individuality and the liberties associated with such

This is what Eupope has become. Would you fight for this?

And remember, Obamanites, this is what you voted for!

May 23, 2009 - 7:31 am 31. Ian Blackwell:

Oh how I pity you having to spend some time in the socialist hell of Europe. It must be terrible to take clean and efficient public transportation in London and miss sitting in your massive SUV for 3 hours of urban gridlock in the States. It must be awful to flip a light switch in Paris and see energy generated by nuclear fission and miss burning huge hunks of coal in the states. It must be terrible to use the unrestricted portions of the autobahn in Germany in ’small’, ‘puny’ cars instead of rolling along I90 at 65 in something with all the efficiency of a tank.

I think its time we all acknowledge it takes all sorts to make a world. Sure Europe has problems – the taxes, the racism … I could go on. It is however, high time Americans, especially those on the right acknowledge the fact that we do some things far, far better than you.

May 23, 2009 - 8:05 am 32. shaui-jan:

great article…this one point stood out to me;”If heaven is retiring at 55, leaving the apartment each mid-morning to sit in the local coffee shop, and then protesting on weekends about my lower than anticipated pension cost of living increase, then I would prefer hell.”
amen.

a country adopting socialism always seemed to me akin to life suport for the terminally ill.hook them up and make it as comfortabe and worry free as possible…until they perish.

May 23, 2009 - 8:35 am 33. Fred Beloit:

#28
Well, Mr. Ogletree, I now see where you got your name. From freeonlinedictionary:
“o·gle (gl, ôgl)
v. o·gled, o·gling, o·gles
v.tr.1. To stare at. 2. To stare at impertinently, flirtatiously, or amorously.
v.intr. To stare in an impertinent, flirtatious, or amorous manner.
n. An impertinent, flirtatious, or amorous stare.”

Think of it. Just so you, and some other fortunate few, could have your ogle at the sights in the Northern wilderness, the unfortunate many, under control of the far left environmentalists, must pay too much for fuel. This is not your doing of course. You too are probably being overcharged for fuel. But wonderful, wonderful Europeans are overcharged for everything, except, one supposes, beer and wine. Their governments prefer not to have any more revolutions I’m sure.

May 23, 2009 - 8:38 am 34. michiganruth:

I go to France every year for vacation, to visit my old college roommate who lives (quite well) in Paris. I love France, but I’m also always happy to get home to the States.

she seems contented with her life, and slightly contemptuous of mine…but she is an East Coast liberal who really found her metier in Europe.

anyway, the point being: Europe, for whatever reason, seems relatively content to be Europe. America, on the other hand, is being dragged toward Europeanization kicking and screaming.

I don’t think this is what those millions of Obama voters signed up for last November. I wonder how they’re feeling about their decision now…and I thank God I had the wisdom not to cast the same vote.

May 23, 2009 - 9:24 am 35. JasonS:

I am an ex-Brit who now considers himself to be American. I have owned and run businesses on both sides of the pond. As an employer in both countries I have come to see a glaring difference between the nature and work ethic of Americans and Europeans.

The difference in the attitude toward work is tremendous. Europeans, the product of nanny-statism, have a tendency to resent their employer for having the audacity to sign their paychecks. The union mentality pervades and persists even when there is no union in sight. They talk about how they’d like this new car, this house, this holiday in the tropics – and yet when you offer them the chance of the overtime to save for these things, they act as if you’ve just asked them to sell their souls, as if nothing could possibly be worth a couple of hours extra work a day. What if they were to miss their favorite soap opera? Is saving for a nicer house really worth missing an hour in the pub every evening? What good is deferring gratification when it means the sacrifice of a couple of the meaningless daily rituals they apparently cannot live without?

Americans, in contrast, have a much stronger work ethic. The idea that you have to work to improve your life is accepted and even celebrated – unlike many Europeans who feel like they’re being “oppressed” by such metaphysical reality. In Britain, it’s widely acceptable to spend a few years of youth “on the dole,” even if you’re educated and would otherwise have no trouble finding a job. You will find entire social circles in which not one single person works – and if one of them does get a job, they’re perceived as strange, an outcast, a “mug” who obviously hasn’t discovered the sublime joy of having the state pay you to sleep until noon every day.

Americans are working in their summer vacation as kids. They’re working through college. They leave school or college and get jobs, no matter how lousy or low paid. They figure, this is how you do it. This is what you have to do. Work hard now, climb the ladder, reap the rewards later. Work is seen as a fact of life, not some artificial construct forced upon them by evil capitalists who are somehow oppressing their natural state (which is to spend the day frolicking with friends on someone else’s dime). Americans are go-getters. They’re worth far more to me as an employer. They’re keen, have ambition and it shows. They have goals in life. Big goals.

Back in Britain, I had trouble motivating employees. Big goals? To most of them, life is a dreary sentence. You know your place, think small, expect nothing and if some random piece of good luck comes your way, that’s a bonus. They see Americans on TV with their big detached houses, big cars, boats and voracious appetite for life and they think “greed.” The ambition-effort-reward dynamic doesn’t occur to them so much. I came to resent running a business in Britain – miserable faces, reluctance to give any more than the bare minimum to get through the day, resentment at being asked to go the extra mile, people who feel the state has carved them a comfortable-but-dreary little niche and that who the hell are they to question it or rock the boat.

It’s so much nicer here. The smell of freedom and individuality is intoxicating. Back home, you wear sunglasses on a sunny day in winter and they say “who does he think he is…a movie star?”

May 23, 2009 - 10:11 am 36. Viking:

GIVE ME LIBERTY or GIVE ME A PENSION
————————————

Although I greatly admire Dr. Hanson for a multitude of things, not the least his expertise as a classics scholar, he gives what I can only call a distorted picture and idea of what it means to live in Europe today.

In almost every paragraph, he seems to be getting close to the truth of the matter when suddenly he does a hop, a skip and a jump and reaches unconvincing conclusions.

For example, it is true that our health care system is the best in the world. In theory.

But the trouble with theory is that often it doesn’t trickle down to the “people” as expected.

Yes, a lot of foreigners who can afford it, do come to the USA for treatment (the Mayo Clinic in Minneapolis is famous as a beacon for ill but wealthy foreigners).

But it is also true that hundreds, perhaps thousands of Americans now go to places like India, Thailand, Hungary and Latin America for medical treatment that they need but couldn’t possibly afford in the US. Eastern Europe is especially well known for its excellent and very cheap dental services.

So in this regard, it’s tit for tat.

Again, in principal I’m “against” socialism per se, particularly a socialism that takes care of you from birth to grave as I believe they have in the Scandinavian countries.

But how can anyone say there’s nothing wrong with a system such as ours in which hundreds of thousands and even millions are losing jobs every month? Or are getting kicked out of their homes or are watching their life’s savings and retirement plans go down the toilet?

Doesn’t matter the “reasons” for any of this. The fact is it happens.

What can possibly justify such a savage treatment of our citizens? The fact that “it’s mostly their fault” is not the issue. That statement is an avoidance of the issue.

If European socialism can be
called “stifling”, then American capitalism can be called “barbaric”.

There’s simply no doubt that there’s a brutality to American life particularly when the chips are down that is staggering and unbelievable to Europeans.

I could go on. How can anyone compare living in, say, Italy with living in the US? You can’t. There’s a depth to life, a refinement in manners and so on that are commonplace in Italy but are totally unknown in the US.

Anyone who doesn’t believe this simply doesn’t know what he’s talking about.

When Americans say, as many have said in the comments section here, that they find Europeans rude, what they really mean is that Europeans don’t generally suffer fools lightly. (You figure out what I’m trying to say).

As an American I am all “for” America as far as defending her and so on.

But you simply can’t compare the kind of life available to you in Europe with the sterility and silliness of modern American lifestyles.

Poverty or wealth is not the issue. Style is. Something nearly totally lacking in the good ol’ USA.

May 23, 2009 - 10:55 am 37. herman_blume:

Mr. Hanson, I must disagree – it would serve the US well to adopt the urban density of European cities. The development of tract housing (and the spread of suburbia in general) has left many without the choice of anything but suburban living. There are those that would gladly trade the dullness of the suburbs and the mowing of the lawn for a home near a city’s center, where daily needs are within walking distance.

There are no great suburbs, only great cities.

May 23, 2009 - 11:04 am 38. wGraves:

Rob, you need to apply for your Carte Famille Nombreuse. If you have four children, you can ride for free on the Metro. Time to cash in on the big opportunities coming your way.

May 23, 2009 - 11:22 am 39. Sara123:

The American limo liberals and their Rino friends across the asile who want to transform us into Europeans, should never forget that Europeans have been known to go on head chopping sprees when the elite get too uppity and insufferable. Personally, I think our wannabe global socialist royality is much safer with Americans who are polite enough to warn them “don’t tread on me” before shooting.

I read an article yesterday where the British politicans, caught with their hands in the cookie jar, are actually feeling terror concerning the public outraged response… There is a reason for that.

May 23, 2009 - 11:39 am 40. Jason:

We will rediscover it again. It’s just frustrating that people who have no grasp of history make us all suffer through the same results again and again. People who don’t believe there is a higher power tend to think 20 years is an eternity, and they are arrogant enough to believe that they are somehow smarter than all the others who have tried their experiments before. Progressive my arse.

Jason S – do you follow UK politics these days? I have started to a little more, and it looks as though the tax payers are getting fed up with the current system and will not touch Labor in the next election with a 10′ pole. I’d say they are about 10 years ahead of us, so maybe be can save ourselves some misery by waking up in the next election.

May 23, 2009 - 11:39 am 41. Cheryl Williams:

Jason. What a great post. It was very informative. I really enjoyed learning about the different contrasts of work ethics on both sides of the Atlantic.

May 23, 2009 - 11:42 am 42. shaui-jan:

36.viking.”There’s simply no doubt that there’s a brutality to American life particularly when the chips are down that is staggering and unbelievable to Europeans.”

i can sum it for you nicely..liberty and freedom do not go hand and hand with safety and comfort…they never will.it is the price to be paid and i will gladly do so.

May 23, 2009 - 12:18 pm 43. eme:

My thought on all this is that we are American’s and we like capitalism…

People should be able to rise to greatness – and whatever else we pride ourselves on as Americans…

but also as American’s we are for whatever reason getting to a place, where we want to give people as much freedom as possible, but we also want to help facilitate people still being able to have positive outcomes in their life if they are putting in effort… we don’t want to see people suffering due to lack of access to medical care… but we also don’t want to be a socialist democratic state… so how do we reconcile this desire for freedom and capitalism with the desire to not have to see others suffer too much?

I dunno… but it is worth a try, perhaps…

May 23, 2009 - 12:21 pm 44. Michael:

Capitalists, farmers, eccentrics, and individualists created the American Constitution. Mostly Englishmen I believe.

May 23, 2009 - 12:45 pm 45. Blackwell:

37: Herman:

Dense cities are adored by urban planners, childless couples and so on: but most people crave privacy, green grass they can call their own and a detatched house for all the obvious reasons. People offered a choice tend to gravitate away from hot, dense cities, with their loud sirens, belching exhausts, banging garbage trucks, trash piled on the sidewalks and parks infested by homeless people fed and sheltered by the city, who panhandle as avidly as they avoid work, frequent liqour stores and sleep on your sidewalk or steps.

People with options quickly find they have little or no control over their lives in such a place. Taxes increase to pay for the homeless, the departments of diversity, the mayor’s pal who has a piece of land on the outskirts of the city, the firefighters paid large pensions at age 40, and what not.

Parking is prohibitively expensive, while overcrowded dirty buses driven by uncaring and strike-prone unions are the only option unless you have a city funded auto as an urban planner. Of course, the department head of the city’s transportation department, as in Los Angeles, will drive a Hummer that is parked in a city paid for psace: no sense of irony there huh?

The growing populace becomes only too ready to vote for higher taxes they don’t pay, to pay unionized employees that strike at will.

Security is a bit off, what with roaming bands of kids, esp in the summer when they feeits hot, the municipal pool is closed fo repairs like last year, a there is “nothing to do.” Of course the urban planner works in a city building just like the judges that have baliffs to protect them and, the city council that does too.

So the Urban PLanner with a degree from some no name univeristy, head filled with theory and studies and ignorant of history and common sense, a man who couldn’t sell beer on a troopship, parks his volvo, ties the laces on his hush pupies, and wonders: “why do stupid, ignorant people persist in driving their own cars? Why don’t they stay in my service dense city?”

Why indeed.

May 23, 2009 - 1:23 pm 46. Dave Goin:

Another Crusade would not come amiss but we had better not wait too long.

May 23, 2009 - 1:26 pm 47. LeighB:

Just a minor point…the Mayo Clinic is not in Minneapolis.

May 23, 2009 - 1:35 pm 48. Blackwell:

31 Ian Blackwell:

We do see it. The euro airports operate much better than ours and the people are more helpful: our TSA does not compare to any abroad and entering JFK or LAX from deGaulle or heathrow is quite a contrast; signs everywhere are better and not as haphazard as here; its like someone actually took time to custom place them after noticing what was needed: the streets are maintained so much better its embarrassing-the roads in and about london are smooth as a new one here (However they are built, maintained or patched, its impressive-same in Germany: why our road crews can’t do that is a mystery to me). France was indeed smart to go nuclear, and I hope we will start again.

May 23, 2009 - 1:39 pm 49. Dan:

Wow, so this is where all the ugly Americans gather. And congratulations to VDH – still getting paid for writing the same article over and over.

May 23, 2009 - 1:47 pm 50. Red Fred:

re: #37. herman_blume:”There are no great suburbs, only great cities.”

Great suburbs do not stamp their feet and demand attention. They are jewels that are unearthed by the patient. We do not stand on our roof tops and proclaim for all to hear that our village is a great village. We who live here already know that; that’s why we’re here.

May 23, 2009 - 1:48 pm 51. Pace:

Cheryl @41.
I agree, an interesting post by Jason. But, please consider another perspective. I have lived almost half my life in the U.S. The other half was spent in Europe. I am impressed by the “can do” attitude in the US. When I get off the plane at Heathrow, I am always overwhelmed by the palpable sense of depression emanating from the population. However, unlike Jason, I do not find the smell of freedom here as “”intoxicating.” I spent ten years living in the mid west and I must say my overwhelming impression was of conformity, on multiple levels: intellectual, consumerist, even culinary! It was not only suffocating, it was dangerous, literally, to a few of my friends whose only “sin” may have been to refuse to eat corn dogs!

All I am saying is that, as EME@ 42 wrote, we all want as much freedom as possible. But I think we are kidding ourselves if we hold the U.S. and Europe up as opposing images of each other. That disguises the real injustices that exist here, and it obscures some things that Europeans ARE doing right.

May 23, 2009 - 2:01 pm 52. Sonja:

I second that, #43 Michael: ’twas in fact the Englishmen who sowed the seeds of the United States. And they were SETTLERS, not immigrants.

May 23, 2009 - 2:14 pm 53. J.E. Dyer:

Viking at #36 is pretty funny. I wasn’t going to waste everyone’s time with my worthless reflections on living overseas, in Europe and Japan (and traveling everywhere else), but what can I say, I’m a brutal Yank.

Just a few thoughts. One, it’s hilarious to assert that people who suffer the EU to chart their course to the future don’t suffer fools gladly. Europeans seem to suffer fools enthusiastically. They go out and hunt fools down so they can lionize them and give them political charters.

This doesn’t make them all that different from at least some Americans — but that’s the point. We all seem, in aggregate, to suffer fools about the same.

Two, regarding medical tourism, I’m quite familiar with it as a European practice. Eastern Europe; clinics in North Africa; ships that anchor offshore from Malta and Cyprus where Egyptian and Turkish doctors perform dental work, joint replacements, and laser eye correction. I even had a Dutch naval officer friend who would have had to wait 8 months for a hernia operation (he had to line up behind all the civilians in the national health care system), but instead managed to get his navy to send him on temporary assignment to Curacao, where he was able to pay cash to have the operation in less than 2 weeks.

Perhaps some Americans go India, Thailand, and Hungary for medical procedures, but they must have an awful lot of money to do so. It certainly isn’t “the poor” jetting off to the Eastern hemisphere for medical work. Where cash-for-service clinics are setting up to cater specifically to Americans is in Mexico and the Caribbean.

But the biggest difference between American medical tourism and that of Europe and Canada is that when Yanks go abroad and pay cash, it’s to save money. When the others go abroad and pay cash, it’s to get the procedures done before they lose limbs, go blind, lose their teeth, or die.

Nothing Victor said here means Americans can’t enjoy visiting Europe and even living there. I loved Italy when I lived there. I loved going TAD to Germany when I lived in Italy, because Germany is so orderly and well-run. In spite of her manifold sins and weaknesses, I love France and always will. Can’t get enough of the Czech Republic. Greece — wonderful. The British Isles — fantastic. The Low Countries — awesome. Scandinavia — can’t beat it. Spain — such weather, such people, such food.

But I don’t want to BE Europe. Perhaps even Viking would recognize that “style” is a matter of taste, and some things matter even more to brutal Americans.

Here’s what needs to never change about America: the fact that I can set up water service to my home in a few minutes on the phone, and 99.99% of the time can assume that I’m being billed honestly, the same as everyone else, and the size of my water bill is under my control — and no matter what time of year it is, water will come out of the tap, and if it’s not going to for some period of time, I’m notified of that in advance.

For all the fabulous food in Italy, the great people, the resplendent architecture and history and charm, the Naples area of southern Italy did not offer these reliable and convenient features with local water service. It took a week to get water service turned on (and it was that quick only because you requested service through the ombudsman for the US military); you had to learn to read your meter yourself and watch the bills like a hawk; if there was a problem you had to spend hours working it through the ombudsman; and in the summer, your water could go off for days at a time (especially during the Total European Holiday in August) — UNLESS, you were fortunate enough to have a neighbor with connections in the Chamorra (the local Mafia), who looked out for your interests and made sure your water stayed on all summer, once you had figured out that an occasional gift of American whisky or cigarettes was the key to his solicitude for your welfare.

No, northern Italy wasn’t so much like this. That’s why the southern Italians referred to it dismissively as “Germany.” Northern Italy was bureaucratic and snappish in the fullest European sense. The food was OK there too, but not to be compared with Neapolitan or Sicilian. And the water still wasn’t as reliable as in the US.

(It seemed to be quite reliable in Germany, although there you ran the risk of being shouted to death by enraged citizens if you forgot yourself and drove like an Italian. Still, no one could live more than six weeks in southern Europe and not think, on arriving in Frankfurt, God bless the Germans!)

I choose to have water that runs whenever I need it, on the convenient basis expected by brutal Americans. Unstylish, I know.

A general impression across all of Europe has been that the entrenchment of bureaucracies in every facet of life presents obstacles, and creates “friction” (in the Clausewitzian sense) that impedes both productivity, and the energy and aspiration to accomplishment that pervade the American culture.

Yeah, they sure enough know how to slow down and savor life in Europe — they’ve had to develop a talent for that, because it takes weeks to do there what you can do in three hours in the USA. But what will they do if they ever need to speed up?

We had a joke, in the US forces, that went variously as follows: NATO actually stands for “Never at the Office,” “Not After Two O’Clock,” or “Not American? Take Off!”

The obstacles are high in Europe to doing what makes America strong: starting out with nothing, and DECIDING how much you want to end up with. The sheer power of this freedom is a force it has taken the human race a long time to systematically give rein to — most of our history has been a tedious march of despots laboring to stamp it out. Europeans have the luxury of trying to pick and choose how much of it they will allow — principally because, since they’re not American, they can take off whenever they feel like it.

Maybe Viking DOESN’T know that there’s more than one “style.” But the rest of us will brave his disdain and be Americans — and maybe, if we are American enough, Europe will survive as “European.”

May 23, 2009 - 2:44 pm 54. Oscar Wao:

“I hope that urban density, apartment living, Smart cars, and motorbikes are not the envisioned future of the United States. For all our perceived sins, the American with his suburban house and yard, and pickup and boat, enjoys a freedom of choice and ease unmatched anywhere-and unappreciated in most surveys of comparable standards of living.”

Yes, heaven freakin forbid we use our brains. Someone at work might think we’re gay.

May 23, 2009 - 3:34 pm 55. Gary Ogletree:

Fred Beloit at 33: I guess you’re named for the city on the border of IL and WI. Kidding. For some people treeplanters are environmental heroes, for others they are the scum of the earth. The far left greens you refer to are of the latter opinion, saying we planted, steady yourself, PLANTATIONS! Mono cultures! More green drivel, of course. Most of the northern old growth is mono culture spruce and pine. In the coastal bioregionalclimatic zone of the Nass Valley we carried four species in our tree bags to match the terrain, elevation water table, etc. Count on the greens to say much about which they know nothing. The other crime we committed, which resulted in high earnings for Canadian youth, was paying by piece rate, by the tree or by the hectare. The harder and smarter you work, the more you make. The Horror! (Curiously, we had a lot of visiting Brits [are they really Europeans?] who jumped at the chance with fake Social Insurance numbers ready to go. And about a third of most crews and high ballers are Quebecois, proving they are not really French, although they speak a somewhat similar language with quaint and archaic swear words and mixed English such as this from an avowed separatist: “‘And me le bucket blanc.” The real world is so confusing.

May 23, 2009 - 3:52 pm 56. herman_blume:

45: Blackwell

And dense, well-planned cities (and even dense small town downtowns) are opposed by zoning boards and city planners, who take extreme measures to separate the uses of civil life and whose primary goal is to satisfy the car, not the person. You’re mistaken to think that people are offered choices – if you look at the last 60 or so years of construction, you’ll see that there’s nothing but a lack of choice, a set of codes adopted throughout the nation that separates a dwelling from such ‘dangerous’ activities like a bakery or a corner grocer.

And I’m sorry, but you have a flawed view of the city and those that support it. I’ll save the parade of horribles on suburban life, but are there are no shady politicians in suburbia? Are there no overpaid bureaucrats or stubborn unions in suburbia? Don’t believe for one second that these are only ‘city’ problems. Speaking of crime, aren’t Watts, Compton, and Inglewood suburbs of Los Angeles?

You have a misguided view on city planners, given that most helped build the suburbs.

May 23, 2009 - 3:53 pm 57. Gary Ogletree:

Herman and Blackwell: It all depends on the city. Downtown Vancouver is very livable with clean electric transit and lots of condos and apartments. Or there is more space, cheaper rent and yet good transit in the suburbs. As a truck driver I’ve seen similar and quite opposite conditions in major US cities. Portland or Chicago look livable, Detroit doesn’t. Just wait til we get a housing czar who requires permits for choosing where you live. It will be for our own good. TOTUS may be drafting a speech right now.

May 23, 2009 - 4:38 pm 58. ChipD:

I won’t bother taking VDH’s bait and get drawn into a Euro-socialism vs.. American capitalism debate. Mostly because the sterotypes of lazy childish Europeans and brave self-reliant Americans is a bit too pat, too self-agrandizing to really hold water.

However, as an architect, I can discuss the suburbs vs. urban density remarks.

The era of suburban sprawl really was a strange one-time product of post WWII affluence and cheap energy.
For all of human history, both land and energy were expensive- energy, because of technology, and land because of the costs of transportation from one place to another.

The automobile, and the cheap oil that resulted from technological advances in the early 20th century changed that equation. It becam cheap to travel, and land that was economically unbuildable due to distance, suddenly became feasible. This produced the millions of suburban houses we see today.

That era is in its twilight. Here in Southern California, there will be no more large subdivisions and single family sprawls.
Period.

Ever.
I can say this with such emphasis and conviction because the economic model that produced Levittown and the thousands of other suburban tracts is over.
Moreover, several studies -

http://articles.latimes.com/1995-01-31/news/mn-26488_1_suburban-sprawl

by such leftwing groups as Bank of America have concluded that the costs of suburban sprawl are more than the potential paybacks, and the financial model is unsustainable- in sum, the suburbs can’t generate enough revenue to pay for their long-term maintenance and replacement of infrastructure.

So the point is, the seductive vision of American suburban life of cheap land, cheap energy, with sprawling ranch houses and acres of green lawns, was not the product of superior American anything. It was the freakish, once in a blue moon confluence of technology that produced cheap abundance, until both the land and energy stopped being cheap and limitless, and have now returned to their historical norm of being expensive.

Whether VDH likes it or not, our future is one of urban density, mass transit mixed with more energy efficient vehicles.
We can sit and impotently whine about not being given the free wealth we feel entitled to, or adapt and thrive in a world where once again, energy is expensive, and land is scarce.

May 23, 2009 - 4:46 pm 59. Sebastian Shaw:

Most Americans do not want to be like Europe; however, the liberal Left has wanted this nightmare for years. Today, America is like Europe. Tomorrow, America will like Cuba.

May 23, 2009 - 5:22 pm 60. Bill:

Lived and worked in Europe over a period of 14 years. Most Americans who love living in Europe are there on the payroll of a US company or our government. They are better paid than the locals who would be doing comparable work, so they have the freedom to do more.

Regarding the end of suburban growth, I just spent two weeks touring the scenic areas from Portland Oregon to Laramie, Wyoming, and people are actively building around the edges of all of the cities and towns I went through. They are also operating a lot of new pick-up trucks and SUVs.

May 23, 2009 - 6:15 pm 61. Wallace:

I accept all this is the reaction to the horrors of the 20th century, but we too went through the horrors, although to a lesser extent, and socialism need not be the only corrective to nationalist fascism or communism.

To use socialism (a leftist idea) to be a corrective solution to national fascism (also a leftist idea) or communism (yet another leftist idea) is like digging deeper with a spade to get out of a hole you’ve dug with a shovel.

May 23, 2009 - 7:08 pm 62. Mike:

As always, Dr. Hanson, insightful commentary. Just a brief note regarding “Viking” who asserts that, when compared with our European betters, Americans lack “style.”

Would this be the “style” that causes Europeans, Asians and others around the globe to adopt American fashions such as the ubiquitous blue jeans? Would this be the style of American electronics, appliances, cars, trucks, aircraft, medical tools and drugs? Would this be the style of American cinema and American writers? Would this be the style that has caused millions from around the globe to flock to America to participate in the potential and promise of freedom, a potential and promise available nowhere else in the world? Would this be the style of the American military which makes possible the feckless lifestyle of far too many Europeans? Hmmm. For a nation lacking style, the rest of the world does seem to emulate the style we seem not too have…

May 23, 2009 - 7:32 pm 63. TLM:

Viking:

“But how can anyone say there’s nothing wrong with a system such as ours in which hundreds of thousands and even millions are losing jobs every month? Or are getting kicked out of their homes or are watching their life’s savings and retirement plans go down the toilet?

Doesn’t matter the “reasons” for any of this. The fact is it happens.”

Overall, your criticism of VDH’s article is not unreasonable (though I don’t necessarily agree with you). I do take exception to the above statement. No one believes there is “nothing wrong” with our system, especially given the recent implosion of U.S. financial institutions and the effect that has had on the rest of the economy. Yes, many people lost their jobs, so we are now approaching typical European unemployment rates. And many people lost their homes, many who would never have had the chance to own a home in Europe. But the reasons for why this happened here do matter. They may be the crux of the whole debate actually: Free market insanity or too much government interference in the markets.

May 23, 2009 - 7:39 pm 64. Former Anglo-Canuck now in USA:

I am fortunate to have the requsite permissions to reside and work anywhere in the European Community, the UK, Canada and the USA.

I have chosen the USA — fleeing a lifetime of statism in other places — for the last third of my life.

Most of the reasons are articulated in this excellent article. I pray that American exceptionalism survives the mentality of dependency so alluring to those persons easily attracted by confidence tricksters.

May 23, 2009 - 7:52 pm 65. fred:

Chip,

I’m 54 years old, married, and the father of two daughters. I married late because I detoured out of college into the Jesuit seminary. My three years spent in the Society of Jesus entailed living in cities. I grew up in the suburbs north of Boston, and in my childhood I could roam fields and woods and enjoyed that experience a lot. Later, housing developments displaced the fields and wood lots. In the Army I was posted stateside to places that were mainly rural, except for one Army post. In college, I attended two school that were in rural locations. I reconnected with my love for the woods and open fields. In the Jesuits I came to hate cities. The noise, the crowding, the crime, the grime, and the tense, aggressive atmosphere/culture of their human inhabitants. I cannot sleep well in cities because of the noise. I don’t thrive in that kind of environment. I’m happier and healthier living in the semi-rural area of South-Central New Hampshire where my home is.

I suspect a lot of Americans are like me. If I could do it and if there were jobs there I would move further north to even more remote places. I’m an introvert, but I’ve learned how to balance who I am with the demands of my job and social situations. Introverts get their energy from solitude – and thus recharged can thence go back into the human fracas and function well. My wife is an introvert too, as are my daughters.

It is my view that cities are not healthy places to live. I don’t live “in the burbs” for status reasons. It is for health and sanity. I suspect that many people feel the same way. I just could not tolerate living in a crowded, noisy environment where people selfishly blast their music, make a ruckus with their parties, and subject each other to the many forms of inconsideration that I need not enumerate.

Fuel has become expensive because the environmentalists will not allow us to exploit the incredible reserves of fossil fuels we have in this country. For the record, I am in favor of trying to obtain more efficiencies in our autos, using trains when and where possible, as well as other ways of maximizing what we get out of fuel. Unlike the environmentalists I am not sold on the anthropogenic global warming hypothesis, since I am literate enough to critically appraise the “evidence” put forward by the adherents of that unproven hypothesis. CO2 is not a pollutant. As for the true pollutants, I am in favor of managing these things as effectively as possible.

But my politics and my view of things is different from one who lives in SoCal. And that’s one place I would rather not live in or around. I’ve been out there on business a few times. I would rather deal with our winters and snow than live in that ugly, asphalt pit called SoCal.

May 23, 2009 - 7:54 pm 66. Former Anglo-Canuck now in USA:

ChipD: As someone with a lifetime in the real estate and property businesses, I can tell you that increasing density — socalled Smart Growth — is very attractive to politicians (increasing capacity for social control); developers (lots of money to be made) and urban enviromentalists (increasing capacity for group think and social control). It is fatal for quality of life when kids grow up without private play areas in which to hit a ball, bathe in a garden wading pool or climb a tree and make a fort. Its a disaster when musicians cannot practice because of noise transmitted to neighbors behind a 4 inch wall in a townhouse, hobbyists cannot work in wood & metal because of noise transmitted to neighbors and the fear that the diligent authorities will confuse their use of electricity for lathes and saws with a grow house operation for illegal plants. Its a disaster when a simple discussion with a slightly raised voice to a spouse or errant teenager translates into an investigation by police or child authorities because a noisy neighbor filed a complaint about something which is none of their business. My wife spent 15 years in Hong Kong, high density living without a car. She wouldn’t trade her American bunglow on 3/4ths of an acre without a fight, let me tell you.

May 23, 2009 - 8:11 pm 67. Ron Kean:

63. TLM

Decent response to Viking.

Roosevelt and Truman ran against the Republicans saying they would work to end the boom-bust cycle and they won on that.

My thoughts, and I’ve said this before, are that somebody or a group sucker-punched the US economy and capitalism in mid-September last year, days after McCain and Palin took the lead in the polls. Unknowns sold off hundreds of billions of dollars in 2 days much like George Soros did in Britan, France, and the pacific rim years ago.

Obama used the crash and same with Viking. Now the government is throwing out the baby with the bath water.

May 23, 2009 - 9:49 pm 68. Bilgeman:

#58 ChipD:
“Whether VDH likes it or not, our future is one of urban density, mass transit mixed with more energy efficient vehicles.”

No buddy, that may be YOUR future, and you are quite welcome to it, but I’ll choose for myelf what future I provide with my money for myself and my family.

A concrete box in the sky with a view of the canyon to the next set of concrete boxes in the sky ain’t it.

May 23, 2009 - 9:56 pm 69. Sgt Hulka:

Sebastian Shaw

“Tomorrow, America will like Cuba.”

Well, congratulations today America is like Cuba. Like Cubans, you seem to not be fluent in English.

May 23, 2009 - 10:53 pm 70. Sgt Hulka:

“Would this be the “style” that causes Europeans, Asians and others around the globe to adopt American fashions such as the ubiquitous blue jeans?”

Or is it the style that makes 90% of American films centered around Asian martial arts. You must want to be Asian.

May 23, 2009 - 10:55 pm 71. J Milam:

“If socialist health care is so preferable, with the power of the state to mandate preventative health care, why do Europeans smoke far more than Americans? On cultural issues, such as politely forming lines, or not defacing monuments with graffiti, or yielding to pedestrians, or driving with concern for others, I think supposedly selfish Americans are light years ahead.”

I made my first trip to Europe this past summer and found the above in abundance. It shocked me to find that the very people who had in the past dubbed us “The Ugly Americans” were infinitely more rude than most any American I had encountered in all my travels across my own country. I saw this in varying degrees in Europe as I visited 5 countries over several weeks. The most friendly were the Brits. The worst were the Italians. I was shocked as my husband is from Italy and did not prepare me at all for what I was about to encounter.

And it seemed everybody smoked.

The graffiti was EVERYWHERE. The beautiful buildings with centuries of history behind them were absolutely covered in it. Not one street in any city we visited in Italy (where we spent most of our trip) or Paris was free of it.

And allow me to warn anyone who visits Europe for their first time – do NOT ask for ice for your drink unless you’re prepared for a serious tongue lashing you won’t forget.

May 24, 2009 - 5:26 am 72. R A Wilson:

It’s the Strait of Hormuz (or Hormoz), not the Straits. I lived in Iran for two years, drilling for
oil in the Strait back in the ’70s.

And by the way, the country in South America is
Colombia, not Columbia.

May 24, 2009 - 6:16 am 73. Sebastian Shaw:

I live in the suburbs to keep my sanity as well; it is quiet & peaceful for the most part. Heck, I rarely even hear airplanes flying overhead than in my previous residence. I have plenty of room for my dogs, my garden, & my plants on my porch. For these reasons, I could not live in the city with all the noise & pollution, although the group think Democrats wants us all on the dole & be dependent on them, using subways instead of cars.

The Democrats just want more power & more control over the people. This is never a good thing. Americans expect freedom in all of its forms.

May 24, 2009 - 7:20 am 74. Libertyship46:

It is easy for the Europeans to expect to “have it all” when they spend next to nothing on national defense. The United States has spent way too much time, effort, AND MONEY staying in Europe after the fall of the Berlin Wall. There is no Soviet Union anymore, there is no Warsaw Pact anymore, and Russia is only a shell of its former self. When are we going to just leave Europe to the Europeans and let them pay for their own defense? If you want to keep NATO in place, fine, but it doesn’t mean the United States still after 60 years has to be the leading member. The United States can use European bases during training exercises, but we don’t have to STAY there permanently. Let’s force the Europeans to take their own national defense seriously for once in their miserable lives and then lets see how great their social welfare states are.

May 24, 2009 - 8:24 am 75. Viking:

RUNNING WATER, RUNNING MOUTH
—————————

To: Some Commentators

Oh, look. If it’s running water you have to have….if that’s what determines your level of contentment, if that’s your sine qua non (that’s Latin), then I can’t argue with you. The level of service for utilities and such found in the US of A is unmatched anywhere else.

But that’s not what I’m talking about. What then am I talking about?

Well, let’s take women, for example. Now tell me the truth….when was the last time you’ve seen a well-dressed American woman? You know, someone who walks with grace and that has a certain elegance to her demeanor, to her attire, who isn’t ashamed of and is not cursing her luck for having been born female? Someone who comports herself with what the French call a certain “je ne sais quoi”?

I’ll wager it’s been quite a while.

In some ways, I dread going back to the US this summer. (Ok, I currently live and work overseas).

Been to a WalMart lately? Talk about a freak show (both m and f).

Buying groceries at the local Piggly Wiggly or Safeway is for me, physically traumatic. I can’t look at the faces in these places. I go around getting my stuff with my eyes glued to the floor because whenever I look up, almost invariably I’m confronted with a monster of one sort or another. Doing the simplest of things involving my “interacting” with the public is an exercise in “grotesquerie”.

Or take two of the most prominent ladies in our political horizon: Tupperware Clinton and Pelosi the Unfulfilled. Look at the cheap way they dress, for Xrist’s sake. They look like two mannequins at your local JC Penney “fashion” boutique.

I’m also dreading the “legs” that I’ll be practically shoved in my face and I’ll be confronted with this summer. It’s getting worse and worse every year.

These pathetic females with those super short shorts exposing every varicose vein and mounds of cellulite or cellulose or whatever it is, all wearing these ludicrous “tennis shoes” and so on. I look at them and say to myself: How can anybody want to go to bed with these freaks? Ugh.

You never see any of this revolting carnal carnival in Europe.

Well, I’m getting tired so I’m quitting. I’d need to write a book to fully explain what I mean. But you get my point.

Sexist? Ok, if that’s what you want to call it. So you know what? Deal with it.

Have a nice Memorial Day.

May 24, 2009 - 9:13 am 76. TLM:

J.E. Dyer:

“…and maybe, if we are American enough, Europe will survive as “European.”

A truth Europeans always hate to acknowledge. I suspect you are referring in part to what Libertyship46 elaborates on. America’s defense of western Europe post WWII allowed her various nations the breathing space to develop into the current full spectrum of statist entities, now to be subsumed (supposedly) under the mothership of the EU. But, to whatever degree the EU statists manage to unite Europeans (even with the post USSR countries thrown into the mix),at least they are not a threat to Europa remaining European.

As you imply, however, there is an existential threat to Europa, which calls into question whether she will survive as “European” in nature. That threat is not specifically political/economic, religious or military in nature — it’s all of the above. And if Europa’s peoples wish to remain EUROPEAN they better hope and pray we remain “American enough” to once again help them survive.

May 24, 2009 - 12:36 pm 77. Marie Claude:

74, umm, we assume our defense, the Brits too, don’t worry for us, but it was the american policy to leave the Europeans weak, and relying on the Americans for their defense, er hmmm, for buying american arms and planes !

most of the people across the pond think we are socialists, that’s make me laugh ! we have some strong state infrastructures, but we are free not to live within and under their umbrella.

“What Europe is about, and Obama pursues, is the absolute destruction of individuality.”

a guess, you don’t know what that means !

May 24, 2009 - 2:20 pm 78. Glen:

This is not the first time that Europeans tried to turn Americans into Europeans “for their own good” They tried it about 230 years ago. Hopefully, our home grown Europeans will have no better luck.

May 24, 2009 - 2:43 pm 79. Daniel:

Europe has survived for thousands of years.

It will continue to survive.

Don’t worry about it.

May 24, 2009 - 2:50 pm 80. Daniel:

Also it is kind of embarrassing reading a lot of the comments.

Europe is bad. America is good.

How about we get off our American high horse and realize both places have good and bad?

May 24, 2009 - 3:04 pm 81. Sebastian Shaw:

Daniel, you misunderstand, I want America to remain America or keep its own separate, unique identity. Being like Europe undermines America’s national identity.

May 24, 2009 - 4:44 pm 82. Blackwell:

56: Herman

I don’t deny adantages to a dense city and many enjoy their time there, assuming they live in some clean part of town or in the Trump Tower, SoHo etc. Nonetheless, given the option, most would scurry to a suburb if they could.

There are no large populations of city workers there that attract a union: most people have cars so unionized trains, subways and busses are not a problem; the only large scale populations in the suburbs are stay at home moms and maids. Hospitals and schools are usually cleaner and less crowded; there are fewer gathering places for homeless people and a more localized opposition from the stay at home moms and families with their own green grass to protect. Compton by the way, is a city inside the county of los Angeles. Its not a burb as I understand that term.

Of course there is always some munucipal corruption in the burbs, but it tends to be so much smaller: a one parcel deal as opposed to a subway line or massive port redevelopment. And its harder to do there. There are certainly fewer groups of welfare people crowding the trauma wards with knife fight injuries and lurking on the sidewalks. Parking spaces are wider. Stores cleaner. Kids can actually walk to school and home. You can have a pool, even a communal one that stays clean and is easy to use

yes there are downsides: no restaraunt is great; the “paint drying” pace is grating if you’re younger. But all in all, most people jump at the chance.

And most people do not want a drycleaners, market etc near them. It would be nice as a convenience but we all know what it measn to have a commercial zone encroach on your living space. Loading trucks; customers cars on your street; homeless people; commercial burgaluries. Not worth it.

May 24, 2009 - 4:50 pm 83. TLM:

Daniel:

“Europe is bad. America is good.

How about we get off our American high horse and realize both places have good and bad?”

This is a bit simplistic and off target. Outside of their defense posture, or lack thereof, I usually refrain from commenting on contemporary European politics. Unless it affects our own, that is. We now have a president and a large contingent of Americans — especially in the media — who seem to believe we should re-model our “bad” form of government along the lines of European democracies, reject our “bad” and intrinsically unfair economic policies and adopt those of Europe, and re-make our national character to promote a more palatable image to Europe and the third World. I’ll get off my high horse when people whose motivations I distrust stop telling me how “bad” America is and how we should emulate the “good” nations of Europe.

May 24, 2009 - 6:08 pm 84. shaui-jan:

viking. screed?……best part”You never see any of this revolting carnal carnival in Europe.”

been to paris and amsterdam a few times.and i also live in florida and see the tourists fom your countries at the beach with most of their clothes off.so……nice try.but over all…european women dress better,ill give you that.except in NYC….

May 24, 2009 - 7:32 pm 85. wickerbasket:

I agree with Daniel, America and Europe do have large differences, but they are not to the extent that we do not see things largely the same when presented with the facts. I agree that the new view of Israelis and other situations in Europe is all very saddening, but I believe that if the statism were to disappear then there would be a good hope that people would not want to be spoonfed everything they hear. They would instead believe that sometimes one has to work hard and other people are going to insult you, but the thing that matters is that you did what was right.

The problem with all this postmodern stuff is that it believes that the international community actally listens to each other. Bear with me. If the statism were to disappear people would no longer feel that their well-being was only in order to contribute to the happiness of the state. There would be no more giving to the poor because its your duty to the state, but more so because it is your duty to God. Then people would not feel that their duty to the state was to make others feel good about themselves, because your well-being only has to be considered in the way that one thinks of his dog supplying him with happiness. Not that I don’t love dogs.

If we no longer think that it is so important to please others and we let them have a really fulfilling life by working their way through life while serving their Maker then people would be more likely to see that people should be allowed to defend themselves without the fear of the “state” intervening and telling all their constituents how horibble it is that someone would want to defend themselves. I understand that the Europeans have qualms with certain things, but I also think that this is all coming from the postmodern socialism that wants to tell everyone that everything will be okay no matter what, and the only thing that can stop that is people in your own kind of democratic world or your ouwn country who go against that. That is who they see as the enemy because of the desire of the state to give them what is seen as a human right which is a fulfilling life. We let our own people decide what is fulfilling, they sometimes see us as the enemy because they let the state tell them what is fulfilling. It is all very sad.

So I agree the statism doesn;t let us be who we are, but binds us to our neighbor in unnatural ways that are imposed. The people should be allowed to choose what is right, and hopefully with the right guidance they will all find the way.

May 24, 2009 - 7:37 pm 86. J.E. Dyer:

TLM #76 — you accurately deduced the implication in the final sentences of my previous post. I am actually more bullish on Europe than comes across when I respond to queasy souls like Viking, but the continent’s ability to fend off the existential threat facing it is still, indeed, tied up in America remaining “American.”

I do note that it is becoming hourly easier to brave our Viking’s disdain. I don’t know if he didn’t understand that my point was the societal organization and standards of excellence that produce high-performing public water service, or if he chose to ignore that and go for the cheap shot, but neither possibility speaks well for his orientation to the issue.

The rather peculiar emphasis on nausea experienced at WalMart is informative. But this interlude with Viking, qui abutit patientia nostra, dum nos eludet furor iste suus, has gone on too long already. Regarding Europe’s fate, Juvenal wrote on Rome, some 1900 years ago, a better epigram than I ever could:

Nunc patimur longae pacis mala, saevior armis luxuria incubuit uictumque ulciscitur orbem…

…and so I end with it, and wish everyone a good Memorial Day. (That, Viking, was Latin.)

May 25, 2009 - 12:43 am 87. Paul Rhoads:

It is important, therefore, to take an interest in art, in true art, not the introverted absurdities of so called “Contemporary Art”. A good place to start is Jack Vance.
http://www.aftonhousebooks.com/

May 25, 2009 - 1:35 am 88. Marie Claude:

78, Glen, Ok, you would make the bear dance and chamanism then !

May 25, 2009 - 2:23 am 89. justice1:

“I could go on. How can anyone compare living in, say, Italy with living in the US? You can’t. There’s a depth to life, a refinement in manners and so on that are commonplace in Italy but are totally unknown in the US.”
Viking is obviously one of those people who frequents Italy in the tourist areas. I have lived in Italy with my Italian husband for the past two years, so let me give you some insight on “refinement and depth to life.”
For one, I don’t see anyone who prides themselves on living well beyond their means as deep. Walking around in tourist areas with an $800 purse when your average monthly income is $800 is ridiculous. Driving a BMW and living in a home the size of a rat trap, with 80 year old furniture is not deep. It is superficial and vain. That sir is the way the majority of average Italians live.
Refinement? pushing, shoving, not forming lines….Staring, glaring, prostitutes to pass the time….loud music after 12;00, billboard nudity, because sex sells… panties and socks hanging hanging out of the windows to dry, WHATEVER!!!!!!!
Viking needs to get out of the tourist caravan and shmaltz fest with Italy, if he dares to look down his nose at Americans.

May 25, 2009 - 3:04 am 90. BettyBlue:

Pace, peoples lives are endangered in the midwest because they won’t eat corn dogs????

Well, I confess, I do kind’ve like having plenty of clean drinking water, A., because water is necessary for life, and, B., because I don’t want to suffer dysentery every time I take a drink of it. Call me brutish, call me materialistic, but that’s the way I am. Deal with it.

And, as as well known, there are no attractive, beddable females in the United States. Just check out Beverly Hills, Malibu, Santa Barabara, where you will most certainly NOT see tanned, healthy, fit, gorgeous women (and men); no, you AREN”T seeing them! Viking says they aren’t there, so they aren’t!

As if being fashionable, and well-dressed, is the sole criteria of a decent civilization, anyway; as if an expensive, “fashionable” wardrobe (fashion changes by the minute) is the basis on which we judge a person, or a society. (I kinda suspect Viking got turned down by more than one American beauty, hence his bitterness. Go back to Europe, Viking, where more and more women are now clad in stylish burkhas, where you don’t have to look at their icky, varicose veins—or anything else about them, for that matter!)

As for shopping, I myself, always find Wal-mart, with its good lighting, cheap prices and vast array of goods a horrifying, brutalizing, dreadful experience, akin to a Roman circus! Traumatizing! I prefer to do all my shopping in posh little stores in remote, European locations, filled with old-world glamor, where the help is rude and I can’t afford anything, but that doesn’t matter because there really isn’t much to buy, such as food, inexpensive clothing, toys for my kid—you know, all those worthless, cheap things we brutish Americans claim to need.

(Okay, that was sarc. Seriously, Viking, if you find Wal-marts traumatizing, you really need to grow a thicker skin!)

May 25, 2009 - 9:11 am 91. BettyBlue:

Europe has survived for thousands of years.

At the moment, its Moslem population is growing exponentially; its the only part of its population that does seem to be growing. Its population is aging, and its nanny states may well go bankrupt, trying to support them in the manner to which they’ve become accustomed. Meanwhile, restive Moslem “youths” are burning cars, rape statistics are on the rise and a wave of anti-semetism is sweeping the continent.

Sorry, I’m worried about Europe.

May 25, 2009 - 9:14 am 92. BettyBlue:

Speaking of fashionable European femmes, here’s some of that swell Euro-style for your delictation this morning! http://projects.ajc.com/gallery/view/living/fashion/fashion-head-gear/

May 25, 2009 - 9:19 am 93. BettyBlue:

Frankly, I’d rather meet a monster in Wal-mart (I’m always running into the Wolf Man there—he’s actually pretty nice!) than I would Euro-trash fashionistas!

May 25, 2009 - 9:22 am 94. TLM:

Viking:

“…what the French call a certain “je ne sais quoi”…

“…sine qua non (that’s Latin)…”

You should have stuck with criticizing the article. The quotes above are perhaps the most common French expression and the most common Latin expression used in the English speaking world. That you put both in the same post, along with their language of origin, shows what a stuck-up condescending fool you are. Your personal tastes, or eccentricities rather, are your own business. Spare me the details. And on your return to the alternate world of the USA, I suggest you pursue an alternative life-style. If you don’t already.

May 25, 2009 - 1:08 pm 95. Will:

If we don’t wake up fast,we will be a one world nation,and our freedoms will be lost forever!!!! I don’t like the thoughts of my grandkids never knowing the freedoms I enjoyed.

May 25, 2009 - 3:18 pm 96. BettyBlue:

And JasonS, thanks for the excellent post!

May 25, 2009 - 7:24 pm 97. Melanie:

TLM:

Great observation. They always give the game away by trying too hard. And when someone brings a topic of political/cultural differences down to the level of questions of “style”, they missed the whole thing.

I agree with the point made above that it’s not a matter of what’s better or worse in Europe as opposed to America, it’s a matter of being able to appreciate what we choose about Europe, IN Europe, while remaining American in our own nation. The problem only comes when we expect each other to be the other.

Regarding the city/suburban question-neither, thanks, I love living in the low population rural areas, far from the conveniences but with all the freedom and space I could ask. In this world, freedom is becoming more and more precious to me. So is self-reliance and the ability to feed ourselves.

May 25, 2009 - 8:39 pm 98. Marie Claude:

92 BettyBlue, uh at least we can see her eyes, her arms, probably her legs, may-be a little bit of her a**, hey that’s all that count for men

May 26, 2009 - 4:33 am 99. Former Anglo Canuck now in USA:

From #58 — ChipD:

“However, as an architect, I can discuss the suburbs vs. urban density remarks.

The era of suburban sprawl really was a strange one-time product of post WWII affluence and cheap energy. For all of human history, both land and energy were expensive- energy, because of technology, and land because of the costs of transportation from one place to another.”

The cheap energy theory is one model to explain suburban development 1945-1995, though there are price comparisons showing that gasoline in the USA is cheaper now (2009) than in the late 1950’s. This discussion is not the point of this post.

Another theory concerns the reaction of Western and Soviet planners to aerial photos of their cities following WW II and the explosion of nuclear weapons. Both confronted the question of the survivability of their civilian populations in the face of an offense weapon of great destructive power. They chose the same solution. Western — especially American — cities developed ’suburbia’. Cities in Soviet countries also spread out geographically, using street car lines and miles of low rise apartment blocks.

May 26, 2009 - 5:41 am 100. VIKING:

O Curas Hominum ! O Quantum est in Rebus Inane!
——————————————

I thought……. ………Oh, never mind what I thought. Here are some further comments for your delectation and edification:

#89 Justice 1: I don’t know what circles you consort around with in Italy, but yes, in Italy there are poor people just as there are anywhere. (Ever “visited” someone in South Chicago or South Central L.A. ?)

I’ve been assuming readers of this blog, particularly Dr. Hanson’s section, belong to, or at least aspire to a certain – uh, er, educated class and income level. Maybe I am wrong.

You come across with a certain bitterness, I must say. Could it be that it is your own residence in Italy that you’re describing? If so, that brings me to another point.

American women are such suckers for “foreign” men, particularly of the Latin ( or now, the Arab) strain.

Believe it or not, I used to work for US Immigration. I can’t tell you the times we used to get calls from distressed US female citizens demanding that we find and go after their “husbands” who’ve abandoned them. Invariably the husband was Latino (Spanish, French, Italian) or Arab. I got to the point where I said as contemptuously as possible “You married an Arab?”

#90 BettyBlue: Oh, there are plenty of, as you say, “attractive, beddable females in the United States”. Problem is, they’re not the kind you can really bring home to visit family during daylight hours.

As you also say, “Speaking of fashionable European femmes, here’s some of that swell Euro-style for your delictation this morning!”.

How ‘bout this as a fashionable American femme with hubby? (She’s even a celebrity in certain religious circles).

http://www.vancegreek.com/vance_and_jan_crouch_op_800×619.jpg

By the way, it’s DELECTATION, not DELICTATION. (Delictation doesn’t exist in English).

And finally (though there are others):

#86 J.E. Dyer: You quote Juvenal (…that poison-toad with the eyes of Venus ….– Nietzsche) in an attempt at I don’t know what. Well, tit for tat, I always say:

Here’s my own quote for you to ponder over:

[O mores ! Usque adeone scire tuum nihil est nisi te scire hoc sciat alter?]

That’s Persius , and a most fitting tribute to the dialog we’ve been having. And with that,

EFXARISTO ET ADIO (that’s Greek)

May 26, 2009 - 7:13 am 101. TalkinKamel:

That’s okay, Viking, we really don’t care what you think.

(I don’t believe you ever worked for US immigration, either.)

Now, go hide under your bed, where the nasty Wal-mart can’t find you, and where the narsty American womens can’t laugh at you!

May 26, 2009 - 8:31 am 102. TalkinKamel:

And here are some more lurvely Euro fashions, for your delection, or deliction, or whatever the heck you’d like! What can one say, but “wowzers!” (Honestly, I’d prefer the American lady, religious or not!)

Just remember, having a certain “income and education level”, and being in fashion, are the most important things on the planet! http://www.fashionprojects.org/?p=521

May 26, 2009 - 8:39 am 103. Class Clown:

Having “style” is like having a sense of humor. It is for other people to judge. The moment one points out that they themselves have it, they don’t.

May 26, 2009 - 2:33 pm 104. J.E. Dyer:

There, don’t you feel better now, Viking? Bless your heart. Perhaps if you had actually translated the Juvenal line you would have understood why I used it.

I should take this opportunity to correct a typo in my (alibi alert) late-night excursion into Latin. In transcribing it from my old dog-eared text, I made one of the readability changes from “u” to “v,” but not the other. The quote should read:

Nunc patimur longae pacis mala, saevior armis luxuria incubuit victumque ulciscitur orbem.

If that’s what was holding you back Viking, my apologies.

May 26, 2009 - 5:51 pm 105. Marie Claude:

umm, la femme américaine n’est plus ce qu’on croyait :

the new american woman

May 27, 2009 - 1:45 am 106. TLM:

VIKING:

“Here’s my own quote for you to ponder over [sic]:”

“…don’t know what circles you consort around with…” — WTF does this mean?

“I’ve been assuming…” — odd construction

“I can’t tell you the [number of ?] times we used to get…”

“…distressed US female citizens…” — way overwritten

“…aspire to a certain – uh, er, educated class and income level.” — classic projection. Must be a liberal wannabee intellectual. You’re a fraud VIKING. Assuming English is your native language, learn how to write it before you offer any “further comments for [y]our delectation and edification…”

May 27, 2009 - 5:34 am 107. Sandoval:

VDH speaks the truth yet again. From their ever so lofty vantage point on Mount Olympus Elite liberals in both America and Europe are very concerned about controlling the behavior of “the unwashed masses” and talk a lot of nice talk, but do not walk the talk they talk. I suppose it only natural to find a divide between persona and the person, but once that divide becomes too wide one loses that genuine quality–that quality of the truth. Disparity gives lie to the nice utterances. And Obama? See Clancy in Clear and Present Danger. I consider Obama to be a menace to our unique country and its traditional values. My sincere hope is that his policies will fail. From the domestic to the foreign Obama is making a mockery of our institutions and yes, our reputation abroad (contrary to the media-Obama). Acmedidajob and the Ills (in N.Korea) are bullies and bullies only despise the weak while fleeing at the appearance of the strong. The Ill regime will topple very quickly with the removal of the Ills and his cronies. The impoverished of North Korea will welcome reunification with the South. And the South will welcome them home. But I digress to Asia for the reason that I am an American living in Tokyo and have a crazy man staring me down across the Sea of Japan. Well, back to VDH, Europe, and Obama. I suggest that all illiberals be strapped down on benches and forced to watch the horrible beheadings of innocents committed by the Taliban and its ilk. This would be followed by repeated showings of the film 300. Toothpicks may be inserted to keep eyes open for these are not the Sirens calling, but the truth bell ringing. And power to the truth. And in my case, my dogma attacked my karma and made quite a mess of things. Good boy!

May 29, 2009 - 2:44 am 108. myles:

My wife and I just returned from an “American” cruise and had several conversations about the rudeness of non-Americans aboard the ship.

Jun 4, 2009 - 10:58 am 109. Richard Cancemi:

Forty years ago while in Medical School a Chief Resident Physician told several of us not to try to reason/argue with ancillary hospital personnel. He said we needed to understand that we were living in the age of the “Ascendancy of the Idiot” and that the idiot will always be supported.

Today the Idiot has reached a majority and vote idiotically to elect idiots!. Now we have idiots in Washington, imposing idiot ideas, idiot programs, idiot laws,idiot regulations, idiot policy, and idiot voters who support the idiots and their idiot programs etc.

WE are far beyond the Age of Aquarius”. We are in the “Age of the Idiot”! What next?

Jun 14, 2009 - 4:37 pm

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