Posted on 11/07/2004 12:00:21 PM PST by quidnunc
London – Europe's gut reaction to President Bush's re-election was clearly displayed on the front page of the Daily Mirror, a London tabloid.
"How can 59,054,087 people be so DUMB?" the headline asked.
It's no secret that most Europeans do not consider Bush to be an intellectual giant, but now it seems they have grave doubts about the rest of us, or at least the 59 million of us who voted for Bush.
Simon Schama, the eminent British historian and writer who now teaches at Columbia University, divides us into two nations.
One America, he explains to the liberal readership of the Guardian newspaper, "is a perimeter, lying on the oceans or athwart the fuzzy boundary with the Canadian lakes, and is necessarily porous and outward-looking."
The other America "is solidly continental and landlocked, its tap roots of obstinate self-belief buried deep beneath the bluegrass and high corn.
"It is time we called these two Americas something other than Republican and Democrat, for their mutual alienation and unforgiving contempt is closer to Sunni and Shia… . How about, then, Godly America and Worldly America?"
In Schama's scheme, Godly America is "mythic, messianic, conversionary, given to acts of public witness, hence the need — in Utah and Montana and a handful of other states — to poll the voters on amendments to their state constitution defining marriage as a union between the opposite sexes."
In other words, kind of unsophisticated.
Worldly America, on the other hand, is a lot more like, ah, Europe.
While Schama writes about the divisions in America, he unconsciously reveals a deeper divide between Americans and Europeans.
-snip-
(Excerpt) Read more at chicagotribune.com ...
Americans are wondering if Europeans are just plain dumb?
I'm curious about their feelings about whats happening in Africa.
You have doubts?
yep. Beat me to it.
If it makes 'em feel better about their irrelevance, let 'em think it.
Exactly, probably not getting alot of press over there.
Ya.. I really hated the fact that when I lived in Florida, I was landlocked.
For example, here in MA over 1,000,000 voters went for Bush.
Oh, I dunno, we invented lightbulbs, airplanes, personal computers, and general relativity.
We're not exactly slouches!
The fact that they still had most of their teeth while mine all fell out or rotted in my head would also be a tad disconcerting.
Uh, pick an area of endeavor, and then compare the collective accomplishments of America versus those of the entire European continent for the past 5 years, 10 years, 20 years, whatever time frame you wish. Case closed.
Most of us aren't thinking about Europeans at all. And that is what is driving them insane.
The Eurotrash elitists need to realize who the Big Dog is. Who is there to defend their sorry asses if someone should challenge their pantywaists to a fight? The Big Dog is. Sooner or later though, you piss off the Big Dog, and the Big Dog finds other causes more worthy than protecting a bunch of ungrateful whiners.
Yeah and how many Apollo missions did New York complete?
let me see, I live in America and they live in Europe...hmm...who is dumb here?
GR because I thought (perhaps mistakenly) that Einstein was a citizen by that point.
Probably wrong. ><
I'm beginning to wonder if the intelligensia all over the world is just dumb....
European stupidity was something I never had wonder about.
It was and is pretty self evident.
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