au1929 wrote:No defensiveness. In a pinch the Europeans can never be depended on. As far as giving you must have heard of the Marshall plan. Who helped put western Europe back on it's feet? The stupid people of the US. And who was it that started WW2 that killed millions of people?The very smart and enlightened peoples of Europe. And why is the Middle East and Africa in the plight it is in today?Could it be the colonial policies of the benevolent European nations? Who saved the countries of Western Europe from being gobbled up by the Russian Bear? Could it have been the stupid nation called the US? I could go on and on but why bother?
PS I am not defending Bush who I believe has been a disaster for the US.
Au
I've misjudged you. Forgive me.
When I first travelled to Europe in 1972, I was a long haired hippy teenager who had marched in the anti-war demonstrations in Washington D.C. I detested Richard Nixon and all things to the Right of Mao Tse Tung.
My first stop was Gay Paree.
It may be easy to believe now, but, trust me, you would not have believed it at the time, but I actually ended up getting in a fist fight with a bunch of French college students who insisted that all Americans, at heart, are "Baby-Killers." True to my pacifist tendencies, I didn't strike the first blow. That was a french fist, after I suggested to them that we wouldn't be having the debate if the baby-killing Americans hadn't pulled their asses out of two world wars. They may be legendary cowards, but not to the extent that a pugnacious 17 year old could stand them down -- they kicked the hell out of me.
I returned to Europe during the Reagan era as an older, but hardly less liberal man. In England, I steered clear of brawls, but I, amazingly, found myself repeatedly defending Reagan.
I learned that one is never more a patriot than when one is in a foreign country, and so the thought of someone pandering to the numerous anti-American Europeans by joining in the slandering of his country and FAR WORSE, his fellow Americans, turns my stomach.
One can argue all day that Moore is just expressing his personal opinion, but in my considered opinion, that is a crock. He is pandering to an audience whose regard he desperately craves. Give little Afghani children chocolate bars; give the European Left anti-American fodder.
No matter how stupid you may think your family to be, they are your family and you don't trash them in public. You don't trash your country and your fellow citizens on foreign soil---and you certainly don't do it to garner the condescending regard of a bunch of pseudo-intellectual snots.