(Swedish girl who converted to islam)
Posted on 03/22/2009 4:16:34 PM PDT by neverdem
Do we want the United States to be like Europe?
The European model has worked in many ways. I am delighted whenever I get a chance to go to Stockholm or Amsterdam, not to mention Rome or Paris. There's a lot to like -- a lot to love -- about day-to-day life in Europe. But I argue that the answer to this question is "no." Not for economic reasons. I want to focus on another problem with the European model: namely, that it drains too much of the life from life.
The stuff of life -- the elemental events surrounding birth, death, raising children, fulfilling one's personal potential, dealing with adversity, intimate relationships -- occurs within just four institutions: family, community, vocation and faith. Seen in this light, the goal of social policy is to ensure that those institutions are robust and vital. The European model doesn't do that. It enfeebles every single one of them.
Drive through rural Sweden, as I did a few years ago. In every town was a beautiful Lutheran church, freshly painted, on meticulously tended grounds, all subsidized by the Swedish government. And the churches are empty. Including on Sundays. The nations of Scandinavia and Western Europe pride themselves on their "child-friendly" policies, providing generous child allowances, free day-care centers and long maternity leaves. Those same countries have fertility rates far below replacement and plunging marriage rates. They are countries where jobs are most carefully protected by government regulation and mandated benefits are most lavish. And with only a few exceptions, they are countries where work is most often seen as a necessary evil, and where the proportions of people who say they love their jobs are the lowest.
Call it the Europe Syndrome. Last April I had occasion to speak in Zurich, where I...
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Living like Europeans means living in the evil of socialism and having lower standards of living. It means we need to get paid less, be taxed more, drive very small cars, live in smaller homes, eat out a lot less, cannot afford to buy as much as we do because everything will be much more expensive, have a bad socialist medicine, have a weak military, and appear all our enemies. No thanks we do not want to become Europeans. The current socialist administration in Congress are trying hard to make us be like the EU socialists but at the end we are going to defeat socialism and keep our American way of life.
appear = appease
We may have one at the top.
I dunno. he sure loves his pork.
Yup.
I don’t think so. She looks too pleased with herself. Like the kids at obama rallies with the ‘Buck Fush’ t-shirts. She’s a great illustration of the author’s point, though.
we’re heading in that direction pretty damned rapidly. BHO is well to the left of most current European heads of state.
We’ll get there. Democracy has ruined America. Give me back the republic!
When a society discards religion, and settles for comfort, it soon believes in nothing....and yet becomes susceptible to believe anything that proves to be an “escape”.
you’re darn right.
Murray et al. mentioned many problems with Europe, but not one of the most serious — the inability to muster up much more than a couple platoons to fight in Afghanistan. The European militaries are a joke. They have no money. Most of the taxes go to entitlements. Even the once-Great Britain eventually chickened out of Iraq.
you’re darn right.
Murray et al. mentioned many problems with Europe, but not one of the most serious — the inability to muster up much more than a couple platoons to fight in Afghanistan. The European militaries are a joke. They have no money. Most of the taxes go to entitlements. Even the once-Great Britain eventually chickened out of Iraq.
you’re darn right.
Murray et al. mentioned many problems with Europe, but not one of the most serious — the inability to muster up much more than a couple platoons to fight in Afghanistan. The European militaries are a joke. They have no money. Most of the taxes go to entitlements. Even the once-Great Britain eventually chickened out of Iraq.
Vacuums don't exist in nature. Even space isn't quite a vacuum. Whatever is out there is distributed throughout 'there.'
Where Christianity dissipates something else will fill that void. In this case, islam.
I’m with you.
Duck Femocracy!
Gimme back my Republic!
Obama wants you to pledge loyalty to him tomorrow Has anyone been asked to make this pledge?
Man's contribution to climate change is negligible in geologic time
Global Cooling is Here We can't post from Global Research, but Easterbrook's graphs are at this webpage. It was posted on a blog without the graphs.
Some noteworthy articles about politics, foreign or military affairs, IMHO, FReepmail me if you want on or off my list.
People work for a living; the state doesn’t.
ping
Thanks for the ping!
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