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The Dixie Chicks may not join in, but three cheers for Germany's patriotism
The Times (U.K.) ^ | 06/23/06 | Gerard Baker

Posted on 06/22/2006 4:29:24 PM PDT by Pokey78

THE SOUND of lusty Germans filling World Cup stadiums with the refrain of what much of the world still thinks of as Deutschland über Alles has provoked mixed reactions. Despite the best efforts of the enforcers of political correctness, it will never be possible for any of the current generations of Englishmen or women (or many other Europeans, for that matter) to dissociate the sound from the nation’s still unpleasantly recent past.

Certainly, it’s not the Horst Wessel Lied, and the anthem’s words (“Bloom, in the glow of happiness, Bloom, German fatherland!”) are almost bathetically bucolic by comparison with the old, troublingly blunter: “Germany, Germany, above everything in the world!” But there’s something about the sight of muscular Aryans and blonde-plaited Fräulein belting out the familiar tune that prompts some to reach instinctively for the tin helmet and the map of Poland.

But to others, me included, the development is a welcome one. It marks another small, symbolic victory in the unending struggle of people everywhere to preserve their national sovereignty. It says much, too, about the enduring nature of national identity. Despite centuries of efforts to extinguish it, the nation remains the unit in which most peoples, especially those in Europe, invest their loyalties. You can read too much into the behaviour of football fans, as we English know only too well. But the guiltless embrace of patriotism by football-loving Germans fits with a general perception in recent years that Germany is close to being a normal nation again.

Nationalism, of course, has long been a dirty word. It is generally deemed to have consigned Europe to almost continuous war between the early 19th century and the mid-20th century. And so it did.

But as with so many attempts to extirpate evil, the desire to crush its baleful consequences overreached. It was not just nationalism, but patriotism that was suppressed. The idea that your country can stand for something benign became unsayable, even with nations whose past fully entitled them to make such a claim.

The conviction took hold, in the governing and opinion-forming classes in the West, that the nation state itself was somehow an abomination, an intrinsic threat to peace and stability. So for half a century, emboldened political leaders in Europe made larger and larger efforts to snuff it out.

But while you can submerge nationhood in a tight web of supranational institutions, you can’t destroy the basic allegiances that animate the hearts of men. You can take the soul out of a country but you can’t take a country out of the soul. And the risk has always been that the more you attempt to suppress the idea of a nation, the more you will foster resentment and the very sort of indignant nationalism that has proved so tragically costly.

The European Union, of course, is not alone. The post-Second World War multilateral settlements designed to promote international co-operation between sovereign nations have become, in the dreams of many, an even larger opportunity to suppress the nation itself. There are political and cultural elites everywhere who regard the nation state as an unhealthy anachronism, who want to bury national pride and identity beneath an avalanche of deracinated, brotherhood-of-man, why-can’t-we-all-just-get-along-together mush. It is a conviction founded on a moral relativism, of course — no one nation is any better than any other — and promulgated by diplomats, business leaders and entertainers who have long since shaken off the irritating shackles of their own nationhood to play on a much larger global stage. To these people the United Nations is the highest achievement of humanity, and they would happily subjugate the will of peoples everywhere to its rule.

What is so striking about this effort to extinguish national identity and the popular will is that it is persistent, and through history repeatedly reveals itself in different ways. Marx regarded the nation as a capitalist construct, another manifestation of false consciousness to distract alienated labour from its true plight. The Soviets certainly did their bit to eliminate national boundaries, but the vigorous and renewed national pride in Eastern Europe is testament to the enduring failure of global communism.

Radical Islam wants the umma to replace national communities — and is willing to eliminate nations by violence. And I suppose, for reasons of absolute fairness, and as a Catholic, that I should also acknowledge that the Church has had a long history of adopting a bluntly political interpretation of its universalist claim, though today it has, fortunately come to happier terms with the nation state.

In some parts of the world, of course, popular allegiance is paid to even smaller units of society — tribes and ethnic groups. Indeed in places like Iraq, we should wish there were a stronger nationalism.

But the principle remains that voluntary loyalty to one’s own group is the most powerful popular coagulant. Belief in the supremacy of national sovereignty is not at all, as its critics claim, an inevitable driver of racism or nationalism. Even if, like the Dixie Chicks, you claim not to be able to understand the very idea of patriotism, you should at least acknowledge that, for most people, the nation is the primary political unit, the one that legitimises the governing of their nation.

Nor is support for the principle of a world of free sovereign nations consonant with economic isolationism. Globalisation has worked (and it has been the greatest antidote to poverty the world has ever seen) because it has been driven by consumer choices, individuals acting freely to promote their own welfare, not by elites.

Indeed, economic integration remains the best way to promote global co-operation and genuine prospects for peace. It gives people a tangible stake in each other’s futures in a way no supranational ideal or multilateral institution ever could.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; Foreign Affairs; Germany; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: germany
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To: ohioman

You sound like a crybaby whine man, or white man.


41 posted on 06/23/2006 9:35:37 AM PDT by staytrue (Moonbat conservatives-those who would rather have the democrats win.)
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To: staytrue

I hope you don't believe that very orthodox argument for affirmative action. It might surprise you to learn that outside the elites, white folks don't get jobs via the "Old Boy network" any more than anyone else does. In fact, the only people who are affected by racist "diversity" programs and the like are the white/asian people who don't get that advantage. The ones who do get that advantage get it regardless of any diversity program, whether in employment or in school or in any other arena.

I know plenty of black men that I'd be very happy to trade circumstances with, by the way. Perhaps you don't know enough of them to get your opinion advanced to the 21st century? There may have been a grain of truth to what you say, had you said it back in 1970.


42 posted on 06/23/2006 10:57:25 AM PDT by thoughtomator (Famous last words: "what does Ibtz mean?")
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To: thoughtomator

frankly, the whiney blacks have more to whine about than the whites and I think the blacks should shut up because they still have plenty of opportunity as do the whining whites.

This is the best time and place ever in history to be the best you can be and you got a huge chip on your shoulder.


43 posted on 06/23/2006 11:26:24 AM PDT by staytrue (Moonbat conservatives-those who would rather have the democrats win.)
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To: staytrue

So in the final analysis, you have no defense for the injustices you claim are "fair", and must resort to name-calling. I expected such, but had hoped perhaps you had something more interesting to say.


44 posted on 06/23/2006 11:38:54 AM PDT by thoughtomator (Famous last words: "what does Ibtz mean?")
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To: thoughtomator

I've got news for you. LIFE IS NOT FAIR.

But any healthy citizen of the USA has got nothing to complain about and that includes white, black, brown, yellow, or other.

The black jesse jackson whiners are disgusting and so is the white whining.

You have it great. Opportunity is everywhere in the USA.


45 posted on 06/23/2006 11:44:58 AM PDT by staytrue (Moonbat conservatives-those who would rather have the democrats win.)
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To: staytrue

So when I get a job and am told that my opportunities for advancement are zero since I have white skin and the company's policy - not only blessed by, but demanded by the government - is to maximize the number of nonwhite employees, that's fair in your book, because others in the past have had it worse?


46 posted on 06/23/2006 12:08:17 PM PDT by thoughtomator (Famous last words: "what does Ibtz mean?")
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To: staytrue

Next time I meet you, I'll remember to bitch slap you for your ignorance and arrogance. Fair enough?


47 posted on 06/23/2006 12:38:42 PM PDT by ABG(anybody but Gore) ("By the time I'm finished with you, you're gonna wish you felt this good again" - Jack Bauer)
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To: thoughtomator

Start your own business. That is what I did.

Frankly it is because I'm asian and I know no way in hell will the white guys ever let me be the boss.

If you look at the biggest 1000 companies, my guess is that except for the companies asians started, zero is headed by an asian.

I'm glad I work for myself. You have to learn all kinds of new stuff and that is good.


48 posted on 06/23/2006 12:42:33 PM PDT by staytrue (Moonbat conservatives-those who would rather have the democrats win.)
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To: staytrue
Moonbat conservatives...

I take it from your comments that a "moonbat conservative" is anyone to the right of John McCain or Lincoln Chaffee.

49 posted on 06/23/2006 1:29:13 PM PDT by Taft in '52
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To: staytrue
Frankly it is because I'm asian and I know no way in hell will the white guys ever let me be the boss.

Are you a victim of white racism?

50 posted on 06/23/2006 1:31:42 PM PDT by Taft in '52
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To: staytrue

I get it. Because you are convinced that people are racist against you (based on no hard evidence, just your own perception), you are indifferent to overt, explicit racism against others... oddly, including such explicit racism against yourself. Don't you see that you are determining your preferred policy on feelings rather than facts - the m.o. of the Left?


51 posted on 06/23/2006 1:44:05 PM PDT by thoughtomator (Famous last words: "what does Ibtz mean?")
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To: staytrue

You still haven't answered my question as to what "sieg heil"--a Nazi greeting--has to do with the Southern cause during the War Between the States. Are you trying to equate the Confederacy with Nazi Germany? This would be quite a stretch. For one thing, Judah Benjamin, the Confederacy's Secretary of State and probably the number two man in the Confederate government, was Jewish. It would be more than a century before the US would appoint a Jewish Secretary of State.


52 posted on 06/23/2006 1:56:21 PM PDT by Fiji Hill
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To: Taft in '52
Are you a victim of white racism?

In the USA today, the only victims are those who inflict it upon themselves by failing to take advantage of the opportunities here. I believe that I am no victim.

53 posted on 06/23/2006 10:30:01 PM PDT by staytrue (Moonbat conservatives-those who would rather have the democrats win.)
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To: Fiji Hill

in the movie apocalypse now there is a famous line "I love the smell of napalm in the morning"

to those who support the confederacy, I love the smell of of one of those supporters burning up in anger.

Sieg Heil will usually get the job done, because there is some elements of truth there and it hurts.


54 posted on 06/23/2006 10:33:25 PM PDT by staytrue (Moonbat conservatives-those who would rather have the democrats win.)
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To: dixie1202; righthand man; TexConfederate1861; chesley; rustbucket; JamesP81; LeoWindhorse; ...
War for Souther IGNORANCE

Hey y'all see #39 - it's one for the FR classics.

55 posted on 06/23/2006 10:38:18 PM PDT by stainlessbanner
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To: stainlessbanner

"3000 sabers and not a dull blade..."


56 posted on 06/23/2006 10:45:25 PM PDT by LeoWindhorse
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To: stainlessbanner

yep, you all come on over

I need a good laugh.


57 posted on 06/23/2006 11:22:42 PM PDT by staytrue (Moonbat conservatives-those who would rather have the democrats win.)
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To: stainlessbanner

Thanks for the ping, SB.


58 posted on 06/24/2006 4:37:41 AM PDT by Tax-chick ("The root of the state is in the family. The root of the family is in the person of its head.")
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To: stainlessbanner

Any chance we'll see an article in a major British or American newspaper which supports the singing of "Dixie" anytime soon?

Yeah, I didn't think so.


59 posted on 06/24/2006 6:52:56 AM PDT by bourbon (cliche' wasted & hate taste tested)
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To: bourbon
Any chance we'll see an article in a major British or American newspaper which supports the singing of "Dixie" anytime soon?

How about:

As long as the Union was faithful to the trust,
Like friends and like brethren, kind were we, and just.
But now, when Northern treachery attempts our rights to mar,
We hoist on high the Bonnie Blue Flag that bears a single star.

Hurrah, hurrah, for Southern rights, hurrah!
Hurrah for the Bonnie Blue Flag that bears a single star!


60 posted on 06/24/2006 7:10:09 AM PDT by Fiji Hill
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