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.
Poor you!
In many ways, it has been a blessing as I enjoy being my own boss.
You got to be one of THE most ignorant of American history people I've heard in a long time. But then if ignorance is bliss, you must be ecstatic. Why did the north go to war? To forcibly keep the South in the Union, I believe the Yankee battle cry was "Preserve the Union." So your theory about it being over slavery is a bucket load of HORSE SH*T!
lincoln, the TYRANT, CHOSE to make WAR rather than PEACE.
had he chosen PEACE, a MILLION Americans would not have NEEDLESSLY died in an UN-necessary war.
let me make it simple for you. the time is NOW & YOU are POTUS.
AZ,CA,CO,NM,NV,OR & WA decide to secede from the USA & form Los Estados Unidos de Azatlan (this WILL happen within 20 years, i predict).
how many MILLION people (about 1/2 of them innocent, unarmed civilians, if the WBTS is any example)will you be willing to KILL to keep the states from leaving the Union????
lincoln, the TYRANT, was evidently willing to kill EVERYBODY, to assure that the CSA was beaten.
will YOU do the same, Mr President????
free dixie,sw
obviously, you are another "victum uv duh gubmint apruvd pubic screwl kurriculum" & have swallowed that SELF-righteous , knowing LIE, whole. PITY!
free dixie,sw
You are quite correct. However, the Europeans had the unfortunate experience of winning all these colonial wars during the 19th century, using breech-loading rifles and machine guns against natives armed with swords, spears and bows.
Each nation decided that their ability to defeat native armies that outnumbered them dramatically was a consequence of their own magnificent military capability. They each then tried to do the same in 1914 up against other Europeans armed and trained in the same way. Didn't work.
BTW, the Europeans could have learned not only from our Civil War, but also from the various Italian and German wars of unification. But those wars were generally too short for anybody to draw the obvious conclusions. The Brits also got their tail in a crack against the Boers, but nobody applied the lesson.
To be perfectly fair, the defensive grew more and more powerful up to 1917. Only the development of tanks, and of German storm tactics, were finally able to restart effective offensives.
We can criticize the generals of 1915 and 16 all we want, but there was no real solution to their dilemma at the time. Not attacking just left their troops in the trenches, gradually being destroyed by artillery. Any general who refused to attack would just be removed by politicians and replaced by a general who told the politicos what they wanted to hear, that he could win the war.
The north won and the south lost and that was 150 years ago.
Get over it.
I laugh at the democrats still moaning about "the stolen 2000 election".
I don't want to laugh at you, but you are making it hard.
i note you didn't have the "intestinal fortitude" to answer my question, Mr President.
lol AT you. are you auditioning to be "the new class clown", since "m.eSPINola's" demise???
btw, how many INNOCENT, UNarmed elderly men, women & children in YOUR family were raped/robbed/tortured/assaulted/MURDERED by the "filth that flowed down from the north", just because they were POOR, defenseless & "not white persons"???? (the score for MY family was at least 92 dead. it's really HARD to forgive/forget such a massacre, no matter how long ago it happened!)
free dixie,sw
Better watch out for the Southern partisans on this board. For them, the smoke never clears.
lol AT him/her and all other FOOLS who agree with him/her.
anybody who doesn't understand the reasons that his/her posts are false & IGNORANT, really should turn OFF their PC & head for the nearest public library for some serious reading time.
free dixie,sw
otoh, i ridicule them for their willful blindness to the documented facts about TWBTS. (ridicule is a WONDERFUL weapon against IGNORANCE & unthinking PREJUDICE!)
free dixie,sw
evidently, "staytrue" is as clueLESS as "m.eSPINola" (who has "mysteriously disappeared" from FR! could it be that the "mods" finally got embarrassed by his presence???).
free dixie,sw
this will be FUN!
free dixie,sw
Indeed, sir! Two of the Confederacy's twenty-two senators were Jewish (approx. 9%). I don't believe there were any Jews in the U.S. Senate at the time, but I'd have to check.
Furthermore, the only exclusively Jewish cemetery in the world outside the state of Israel is in Richmond; Shockoe Hill commemorates Jewish Confederate veterans. Its establishment was a collaborative effort between the Hebrew Ladies Memorial Association of Richmond and the United Confederate Veterans, who assisted in fundraising.
At any rate, any comparison between the Confederate States and Nazi Germany is patently ridiculous.
Go study your history. Just because the North won doesn't mean that they were fighting for what was right. Talk about nob-headed - geez! Like I said before, you ARE ignorant of American history, and haven't a clue as to what was lost in 1865.
About 680,000 soldiers died in the WBTS, on both sides.
Civilian deaths totals are difficult to come by, but the best estimates I have seen are around 50,000, again on both sides but concentrated in the South for the obvious reason that the war was mostly fought there.
If you have anything resembling evidence for your assertion that more that 500,000 civilians died in the war, I'd sure like to see it.
I wouldn't say that.
Any state specifically based on the doctrine that one "race" of humans is ordained by God to forever rule over another "race" has definite Nazi overtones to it.
That this applies to the Confederacy can be easily seen in the rapturous response throughout the South to the famous Cornerstone Speech, in which the VP of the Confederacy specifically repudiates the assertion of the Declaration of Independence that all men are created equal. The Founders were just mistaken, in that regard, you see.
I am aware that there is no official version of this speech, but I am also aware that the relevant facts are that its doctrine was applauded throughout the South, and that Mr. Stephens never repudiated its sentiments.
The biggest reason the Confederacy was not more Nazi-like was its strong Christianity, which conflicts directly with the "master race" theory. Which theory would have won out in the long run had the Confederacy survived is an interesting question.
Well, gosh, why stop with the Vice President of the Confederate States? Here's Mr. Lincoln himself on the subject of race in his fourth debate with Stephen Douglas at Charleston, Illinois, September 18, 1858:
"I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been in favor of bringing about in anyway the social and political equality of the white and black races - that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race.
I have no way of knowing whether this statement produced a "rapturous" response among his audience or not. I expect it was calculated to do so, Mr. Lincoln being the consummate politician. Nevertheless, the statement shows about as much respect for the Declaration's "equality" assertion as Alexander Stephen's.
The difference being that Mr. Lincoln believed every man had the unalienable right of owning himself, and Mr. Stephens believed every white man had the unalienable right to own black men.
Looking at all the public pronouncements of both men makes it perfectly clear that there was an enormous difference between them on the issue. Cherry-picking particular statements can obscure this, if your goal is to do so.
A great many men who were opposed to slavery in the 1850s had great doubts as to whether blacks could ever be succesfully incorporated into American society. Since we are still struggling with the issue 150 years later, their doubts are quite understandable.
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