Free Republic

Daniel Barenboim is a brilliant musician, even if he is too fond of Wagner. His Sun-Times column [Nov. 17] on post-Arafat prospects for Mideast peace employs hopeful musical metaphors. But Barenboim sounds one discordant note: He urges ''Europe must now intervene in the Middle East peace conflict.'' The truth is that Western Europe has disqualified itself from a constructive role by condoning -- if not supporting -- Palestinian terrorism that has killed 1017 Israelis since Arafat started his Intifada. Evidence of European acceptance of terrorism is pervasive. European countries have supported scores of U.N. resolutions which condemn Israel for resisting...

... Europeans casually talk of the Kerry rapprochement to come, as if in their magnanimity they have given us one last chance to return to sobriety. They exude a bold confidence, even to strangers, that the brightened prospects of the Democratic challenger are proof that America has seen the European light and therefore, of course, Mr. Kerry must win. Never has Europe been so emotionally involved in an American election -- and never to their peril have they read us so wrong. ... And few American administrations have proved as controversial in refashioning American foreign policy as have the blunt-speaking...

"Kerry must win, you see, so we can be friends again." You hear things like this these days in Europe. George Bush's campaign staffers may tease about John Kerry's French connections, his Europhile mannerisms, and his unguarded boasts that the Continent is pulling for him, but such caricatures are closer to the truth than even the Republican operatives suspect. Europeans casually talk of the Kerry rapprochement to come, as if in their magnanimity they have given Americans one last chance to return to sobriety. They exude a bold confidence, even to strangers, that the brightened prospects of the Democratic challenger...

Dear Mr Steyn, Thanks for the helpful inscribes in the flyleaf of my copy of Head to Toe.  I wasn't one of those guys that got really pissed when France and Germany obstructed our going into Iraq, and I wasn't surprised by the Spanish electorate buying a moving van, as it were, for Senor Aznar. Doesn't mean I don't get annoyed, now and again, especially (politics and trade being what they are) we'll be doing business on other fronts with these nasty spotted prancers (that's from a Monty Python skit). However, it's very important the great American public know the...

I moved from the U.S. to Europe in 1998, and I’ve been drawing comparisons ever since. Living in turn in the Netherlands, where kids come out of high school able to speak four languages, where gay marriage is a non-issue, and where book-buying levels are the world’s highest, and in Norway, where a staggering percentage of people read three newspapers a day and where respect for learning is reflected even in Oslo place names (“Professor Aschehoug Square”; “Professor Birkeland Road”), I was tempted at one point to write a book lamenting Americans’ anti-intellectualism—their indifference to foreign languages, ignorance of history,...

President Reagan used several deft tactical maneuvers to exploit cracks in the Soviet armor. As president of the United States, Ronald Reagan initiated a sweeping and unprecedented program of covert actions and economic-warfare initiatives that acted to greatly weaken the Soviet economy, its support for "wars of liberation," and its hold on its power in Eastern Europe, former top Reagan administration officials said. The elements of these programs were contained in top-secret national-security directives signed by Reagan in 1982 and 1983, these sources told United Press International. "Any kind of covert-action program had to be expressed in a presidential finding,"...