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Brits to America: You're Idiots!
Slate ^

Posted on 11/04/2004 5:44:29 PM PST by GulliverSwift

Brits to America: You're Idiots!
Well, 51 percent of you, anyway.

Americans who think post-election anti-red-state recrimination is a U.S.-only phenomenon should check out the cover of Thursday's Daily Mirror: Over a picture of President George W. Bush, the paper asked, "How can 59,054,087 people be so DUMB?" Inside, the left-leaning British tabloid headlined its editorial, "WAR MORE YEARS." In a clear demonstration of the trans-Atlantic culture gap, the paper's description of the president's beliefs—clearly intended to strike Mirror readers as a radical agenda—is simply an accurate, if crude, précis of his platform: "Mr Bush opposes abortion and gay marriage, doesn't give a stuff about the environment, is against gun control and believes troops should stay in Iraq for as long as it takes."

The Mirror wasn't the only British paper with a striking cover. The Guardian's "G2" section was fronted by a page of solid black containing just two small words: "Oh, God." Meanwhile, the Independent ran the headline "Four More Years" along with iconic images from the first Bush term: kneeling prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, tortured prisoners at Abu Ghraib, soldiers fighting in Iraq, oil-drilling machinery, sign-wielding religious extremists, and a smirking Dubya. In France, Libération ran a picture of the president under the headline, "L'Empire empire"—"The empire declines."

Many of the British commentaries followed a consistent formula: We wish the other guy had won, but Bush scored a convincing mandate this time around, so we have to live with it. As the Guardian put it: "We may not like it. In fact … we don't like it one bit. But if it isn't a mandate, then the word has no meaning. Mr. Bush has won fair … and square. He and his country—and the rest of the world—now have to deal with it." In a fit of double-negativity, the Independent's editorial added: "This does not mean, however, that we do not contemplate the second Bush term with considerable trepidation. Another four years of a president in thrall to the religious right and the neo-conservatives is another four years in which the United States risks sliding back into an earlier age of bigotry and social injustice." Writing in the Times of London, Simon Jenkins' condescending sigh of disappointment typified the genre:

Mr Bush's election will give the rest of the world a collective heart attack. It expected a Kerry win. At the very least it expected Americans to somehow rein in a man it sees as naïve and dangerously belligerent. … Americans declined to rein him in. They legitimised him. The rest of the world has been roundly snubbed.

An op-ed in the Guardian went to great lengths to describe negative stereotypes of the American electorate, then rejected them much less convincingly: "Americans are seen as unsophisticated, wilfully ignorant, obsessed with such issues as abortion, guns and gay marriage, and wedded to a device which seems calculated to impede the wishes of the majority—the electoral college. … Americans are far more complicated and unpredictable than we understand them to be."

The conservative press cheered Bush's victory. Rupert Murdoch's Sun said: "The world is a safer place today with George W Bush back in the Oval Office. His re-election is bad news for terrorists everywhere." The Daily Telegraph agreed: "The triumph of his Churchillian conservatism will … strike fear into all enemies of America and the west." The Telegraph's version of the "get used to it" theme was more positive: "[America] is diverging from Europe: it is younger, more self-confident, more prosperous, more devout, more diligent, more democratic and, in short, more conservative. Europe must come to terms, not only with Mr Bush, but with the nation that has elected him." The Times encouraged Bush to let recalcitrant foreigners woo him: "The President should not waste time trying to appease or win over those who have no time for him. There is the chance, perhaps, that with the passage of time the qualities which Americans see in this politician will become more obvious to others."

In Spain, leftist El País urged Prime Minister José Luis Zapatero to "accommodate the new reality, even though the result isn't what he hoped for" and fix the country's strained relationship with the United States. "This doesn't mean turning the page or starting over from the beginning, but leaving behind the unfortunate declarative politics on both sides." Conservative ABC—in what may have been a subtle dig at the Spanish voters who elected the Socialist Party, which had pledged to withdraw troops from Iraq, after the March 11 attacks—praised Americans for their steadfastness: "[Bush is] a president firm in his convictions and ready to fight to the end, until victory, against the threats that hang over America (and over all of us, even if we don't want to see it)."

Elsewhere in Europe, France's leftist Libération got with the program: "A new reactionary majority … has cemented its hold on American democracy. The rest of the world may deplore it, but it will have to adapt to this reality." Turkey's Hurriyet also echoed the familiar grin-and-bear-it theme: "American voters have once more brought someone they deserved to the presidency. In this case, what is left for us is to bear it and to protect our own interests with maximum sensitivity." But Sovietskaya Rossiya defaulted to quaintly archaic Cold War rhetoric: "Bearing in mind that Bush's policies are prompting increasingly powerful rejection in the entire world, mankind will inevitably unite against the common evil—American imperialism."


TOPICS: Editorial
KEYWORDS: eurotrash; eurotwitsforkerry; wankersthemirror
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To: GulliverSwift

121 posted on 11/04/2004 6:52:13 PM PST by reagan_fanatic (America's shining sun is Conservatism)
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To: GulliverSwift
An American Responds To Brits:
Hey! Buttheads! We Kicked your sorry asses in the revolution, remember? We didn't care about your opinion of America back then! We Still Don't!

(Of course, there is that little matter of US saving your sorry asses back in WWII. You still owe US! Pay Up!)
Oh! So sorry. I almost forgot. STFU!

122 posted on 11/04/2004 6:53:12 PM PST by Fiddlstix (This Tagline for sale. (Presented by TagLines R US))
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To: Flashman_at_the_charge
Far too much Brit bashing going on here lately. This is a left-wing rag so don't lump all of Britain in with their opinions.

Strongly agreed. Do you folks realize that this is the single, strongest ally we have in the world? Tony Blair -- kind of crossing party lines in a way -- is surely walking a tightrope over there trying to help us. Don't trash our friends.

123 posted on 11/04/2004 6:55:06 PM PST by Meglos (Busy gloating, please come back later...)
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To: GulliverSwift

I reely get pissed off when I am called stoopid...


124 posted on 11/04/2004 6:55:31 PM PST by antaresequity
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To: CrazyIvan

>>From the people who gave the world Lucas electrics.<<

And now you are gonna COME OVER HERE AND CLEAN UP THE TEA I SPEWED ALL OVER MY KEYBOARD!!!


125 posted on 11/04/2004 6:55:40 PM PST by RobRoy
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To: GulliverSwift

Lets see....would I rather be a Brit or an American idiot? Today I'll take being the American idiot.


126 posted on 11/04/2004 6:55:53 PM PST by emcj111
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To: GulliverSwift

If they're so smart, then how come we're Americans and they're not?


127 posted on 11/04/2004 7:00:57 PM PST by rightwingcrazy
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To: CrazyIvan
From the people who gave the world Lucas electrics.

From a car guy, :-)

To be fair, '90 Porsche isn't a whole hell of a lot better...

[Click the photo to see what I'm faced with maintaining!]

128 posted on 11/04/2004 7:04:28 PM PST by Meglos (Busy gloating, please come back later...)
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To: glennherman

Heheh, EUROPUSSYMEN! I LIKE that one!


129 posted on 11/04/2004 7:04:46 PM PST by rlmorel
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To: emcj111

Sounds like I'm not the only guy around here who has pushed a Triumph home!


130 posted on 11/04/2004 7:06:31 PM PST by CrazyIvan (What's the difference between Joseph Goebbels and Michael Moore? About 150 pounds.)
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about as important as a pimple on a duck's butt


131 posted on 11/04/2004 7:08:01 PM PST by RecallMoran (The left would RATHER lie)
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To: Meglos

That's from a 924, right?


132 posted on 11/04/2004 7:14:14 PM PST by CrazyIvan (What's the difference between Joseph Goebbels and Michael Moore? About 150 pounds.)
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To: CrazyIvan
From the people who gave the world Lucas electrics.

And, because of those Lucas electronics, cars that burst into flames for no apparent reason.

133 posted on 11/04/2004 7:14:36 PM PST by lesser_satan
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To: GulliverSwift
Let's see, we are stupid because we saw through the blatant bias of the msm. We knew enough to discern that Oil for Food had nothing to do with the fat in which you cook your fish and chips. We realized that the war in Iraq was made necessary because of the corruption of the u.n. That the blood of our soldiers is on the hands of koffi annan and the true coalition of the coerced and bribed. We saw what saddam was up to and that threat of radical islam must be dealt with now. That the marriage between one man and one woman is the foundation of our society and must be protected. That infanticide just might be wrong.
This awareness comes from a consciousness expanding drug administered by dentists. Try it sometime.
The lefties here and the eurotrash still haven't come to the realization that it's not a bad dream from which they will awaken.
As GW said "America has spoken".
134 posted on 11/04/2004 7:15:05 PM PST by Eagles6 (Dig deeper, more ammo.)
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To: Northern Yankee

The continue to be exposed as the whining crybabies they are. Liberals have the maturity of my granddaughter's stuffed animals.


135 posted on 11/04/2004 7:18:52 PM PST by sarasota
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To: GulliverSwift
While the citizens of Great Britain are safe in their beds, the United States bears the main burden of the War on Terror.

But God Bless Tony Blair.

136 posted on 11/04/2004 7:18:58 PM PST by agincourt1415 (OK, Democrats ITS OVER, GET OVER IT!)
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To: philosofy123

That's exactly what they are. On equal ground with our own liberal press. Mental midgets.


137 posted on 11/04/2004 7:19:56 PM PST by sarasota
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To: CrazyIvan
Sorry. '90 928S4 The car that turned me from a "a car is just a tool to get from Point A to Point B" to a "car guy"!
138 posted on 11/04/2004 7:20:51 PM PST by Meglos (Busy gloating, please come back later...)
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To: scottybk
Americans are uneducated, fat, ugly, badly dressed, blue jeans-wearing, flag wavers
139 posted on 11/04/2004 7:31:09 PM PST by Oztrich Boy (They have a saying in Chicago Mr Bond once happenstance, twice coincidence, three times enemy action)
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To: GulliverSwift
American Idiots?


140 posted on 11/04/2004 7:32:23 PM PST by Libloather (Effin' Kerry didn't pass the American Election Test...)
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