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Europe’s Two Culture Wars
Commentary Magazine ^ | May 14, 2006 | George Weigel

Posted on 05/14/2006 4:03:29 AM PDT by RWR8189

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To: RWR8189
I love trying to read articles about Europe and my country in particular by Americans.

I guess this chap has covered everything but the kitchen sink is to blame for this that and the other.

In case America freepers have forgotten, there are European countries with troops in both Iraq and Afghanistan, and some of them are members of the EU.

Europe is not one super state but a whole hodge podge of different countries.

Why is it then that Americans seem determine to lump us as one group.

41 posted on 05/15/2006 3:55:43 AM PDT by tonycavanagh (We got plenty of doomsayers where are the truth sayers)
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To: NZerFromHK
re :I'm afraid the response of a majority Europeans and Britons would be "Nothing to see here!

LOL nothing to see here usual yank stuff about Europe, maybe I would take more notice of articles such as this, if it didn't cover all the usual pet peeves that annoy red state Americans and put them into a European context, and then treat Europe as one homogenized state, instead of a wide variety of different cultures.

42 posted on 05/15/2006 4:00:00 AM PDT by tonycavanagh (We got plenty of doomsayers where are the truth sayers)
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To: NZerFromHK
re :I'm afraid the response of a majority Europeans and Britons would be "Nothing to see here!

LOL nothing to see here usual yank stuff about Europe, maybe I would take more notice of articles such as this, if it didn't cover all the usual pet peeves that annoy red state Americans and put them into a European context, and then treat Europe as one homogenized state, instead of a wide variety of different cultures.

43 posted on 05/15/2006 4:00:03 AM PDT by tonycavanagh (We got plenty of doomsayers where are the truth sayers)
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To: Eagle74
re :Europe is in decay for more reasons than stated in this article, and I see no seeds of reform that might turn things around.

LOL but Europe has aways been in decay since America was first formed.

If you look at the history of American relations with Europe, there has never been a time when American commentators have not pointed to European culture and discussed its decay.

That is why Europe is known as the old country old as in decay.

But still Europe thrives and has a habit of bouncing back.

From total devastation in the 40s it took about ten years or so to rebuild Europe

44 posted on 05/15/2006 4:03:56 AM PDT by tonycavanagh (We got plenty of doomsayers where are the truth sayers)
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To: Savage Beast; Shery; Tangaray; Brian Allen

Savage Beast

May I ask why you cannot see that America is just as suicidal as Europe is. We still learning how to do it. Political correctness is making certain of that.

Todays Right is the Left of 30 years ago. The Right that I grew up believing in doesn't exist anymore. (I'm not yet 60)

Did you read the entire article?

We are tromping along in their footsteps, not having learned a thing from their grasp at compassion and appeasement for the Islamics.

The life we are leaving for our children is going to be one that I couldn't live in.


45 posted on 06/20/2006 5:20:30 PM PDT by B4Ranch (Illegal immigration Control and Border Security -The jobs George W. Bush doesn't want to do.)
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To: plenipotentiary

I don't see the problem as only being one of perpetually increasing population but from one of longer lifespans also. 100 years ago when one got sick they either died in much shorter timespans than we see today or became healthy again.


46 posted on 06/20/2006 5:28:43 PM PDT by B4Ranch (Illegal immigration Control and Border Security -The jobs George W. Bush doesn't want to do.)
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To: RWR8189
It's going to take a catastrophe to save Europe. They are too far down the path already.
47 posted on 06/20/2006 6:11:55 PM PDT by John Lenin (The RAT party is still Stuck on Stupid)
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To: tonycavanagh
Britain is a lost cause if you ask me. They make the French look sane in comparison.
48 posted on 06/20/2006 6:15:48 PM PDT by John Lenin (The RAT party is still Stuck on Stupid)
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To: plenipotentiary
For people who advocate perpetually increased population, I would ask what will they say when the whole planet has standing room only only, and the next child has to stand on someones shoulders?

By the time we get to standing room only, we'll start colonizing the moon because we need the space. Necessity is the mother of invention.

Imagine how much ingenuity you lose with a shrinking population.

49 posted on 06/20/2006 6:23:29 PM PDT by NeoCaveman (The Latest on the Ohio gov race http://blackwellvstrickland.blogspot.com)
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To: John Lenin
re :Britain is a lost cause if you ask me.

LOL ok I will ask you, why is Britain a lost cause.

But I must warn you I am very up on current affairs in Britain and also very up on the current thinking in American Christian/Rightwing circles.

LOL a lot of it gleaned from this very site, and on numerous occasions have pointed out to many freepers that there view on a number of situations were in fact wrong due to very sloppy or badly written articles in a number of media.

1) A Bill making it illegal to criticize Islam is a favorite, in fact it was a bill aimed against insulting not criticizing any religion, and it failed, it was chucked out so it never became law.

Another that Britain's are afraid to fly the flag.

LOL MadIvan went to a lot of trouble to disprove this, he went out with a camera and took snap after snap of the flag flying everywhere.

So please tell me why my country is a lost cause with facts.

I.e if its about Islamisation of Britain our Muslim population is about 2.8% at most, and second generation are not breeding the way there fist generation mums and dads did back in the village.

As a Brit Freeper veteran, I am used to this argument and have a number of articles I have kept to refute most points, but I am always willing to learn some new points of attack.

Cheers Tony

50 posted on 06/21/2006 6:06:35 AM PDT by tonycavanagh
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To: RWR8189
Truly excellent article. And he makes an interesting point, namely, that Europe's confusion is rooted in the rejection by its intellectuals of any objective reality or truth claims. We may have laughed at pretentious European literati who sat around cafés deciding that reality didn't actually exist and that everything was process, but they had a profoundly undermining effect on European thought. Now the only thing that is left is power: he who has the power can enforce his truth-claim, and this, for some reason, is something the European intellectuals can respect. And we all know who increasingly has the power in Europe (hint: it's not the Europeans).

The question Europe must face, but which much of Europe seems reluctant to face, is whether the aggressors in Culture War A have not made it exceptionally difficult for the forces of true tolerance and authentic civil society to prevail in Culture War B.

Very well stated. And I thought his use of Spain as a microcosm of this was excellent. The Pope is coming to Valencia later on this month to preside over a large gathering of family-oriented Catholic groups and to discuss family issues. Zapatero carefully went and scheduled a lrage "conference" on "gay and transgendered families" at the University in Valencia, which is to end just a day or so before the Pope's visit and is to include anti-Catholic mass demonstrations outside the Cathedral of Valencia - and is paid for almost entirely with Spanish government funds. All this while the Islamic beast is licking its chops over Spain, and mullahs are writing books on the best techniques for beating wives.

51 posted on 06/21/2006 6:25:00 AM PDT by livius
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To: tonycavanagh

Well said! (as usual)


52 posted on 06/21/2006 8:08:21 AM PDT by Mac1
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