[cvq3842]

Sad but true. I throw up my hands in disgust. Seems like Western Civilization is under assault, demographically and otherwise, both here and in Europe. I hope I'm being unreasonably pessimistic. I'd rather be thought a fool than right on this point.

[2banana]

Remarkably, Mr. Sarcozy seems sanguine about the failure of the French state to pacify its Muslim population, the largest in Europe. Indeed, Mr. Sarcozy reminds me of Marshal Foch, hero of the "Miracle of the Marne" in 1914, whose battlefield dispatch read: "My centre is giving way, my right is retreating, situation excellent, I am attacking." Come to think of it, that wouldn't be bad advice for Europe in general.

This is from the NY Sun? I may need to send heaters to the place that is just starting to make snowballs...

[SelectiveJNJ]

Great article...better newspaper. I read it on the train today. The NY Sun is one of the best new newspapers in the country.

Support The NY Sun and the Washington Times!!!

[Cicero]

I hate to say it, but Nicolas Sarcozy is just as bad as the rest of them. If you actually read his statements during the Muslim riots in France, you will find him saying that the youts need more welfare benefits and education.

As for Chirac, he is a so-called conservative. De Gaulle was a so-called French conservative, too, and he is the guy who first laid out France's long-term policy: break up NATO, oppose America in every way possible, and cozy up to the Arabs.

Not much hope in the European political and intellectual classes that I can see. Not much hope in Europe, apparently.

[untenured]

I wonder in various countries in the West what percentage of people under 30 believe in "The West" as a distinct, valuable civilization worth defending, with arms if necessary.

[fragrant abuse]

You know, maybe this isn't a vote about Iraq at all.

Just because it's the only issue we care about in the Italian election doesn't mean that it's all that the Italians care about.

[LK44-40]

I suspect that a major factor -- perhaps ~the~ major factor -- in the "softening," of Europe, particularly France and Germany, has been the slaughter in two world wars of so many men.

We Americans often look casually at these events and tend to equate our participation in these wars with the participation of the Europeans. We may have been heroic and we may have been decisive, but our losses were trivial compared to the decimation of European manhood. (Yes, I know that France did not lose as many men as it should have in WWII, but it lost a devastating number in WWI.)

Happily, it takes only the arrival of the next generation for men and women to return to parity in the population. BUT, the devastation of the male population of fathering age, necessarily leaves to women, in an unbalanced proportion, the responsibility of raising the next generation. The effect on culture and national character will persist into future generations, even though the biological parity will immediately return.

These remarks are not intended as some silly insult to women. I believe that a healthy society needs both its male and female components. The fact that women tend to be a bit softer, less rigid, more moved by immediate human concerns than larger principles works well balanced by the more male tendencies. But take those male impulses out of the culture for a couple of generations and you have a different culture. In my opinion, it is a too-soft culture.