“ANS – Some Amercians have that view and Mary has pointed out on a number of replies that the USA joined the war after 2 years when attacked by Japan. Its a simplistic view and annoying, but without lend lease and especially those 50 destroyers we would have been toast.”
Yes, and we are grateful but was the price of that help that we must agree with everything the US does for ever more? If it was then it was not an act of friendship.
“ANS – on current demographics Europe will be majority Muslim long before the end of this century, in 2015 25% of young adults in France will be Muslims. Crime is skyrocketing, rape is up hugely especially in high immigrant areas and radical areas where Muslims act as colonizers are all over the place, I had some friends in Ilford who were forced out of the Muslim area. Public services are not collapsing but the high levels of expenditure on a weakening economic performance can not be sustained, let alone with a growing dependent population. Jobs in manufacturing are declining, same is happening in the USA, even in Germany.”
On a simplistic extrapolation of current birthrates then yes, maybe that would be the case but if you look at trends in fertility rates then it is probably not the case. The fertility rate of Tunisian women in France has fallen every year since 1980, third generation bangladeshi women in the UK have a fertility rate 60% lower than first generation bangladeshis and immigration from majority muslim countries is a fraction of what it was in the 60s and 70s.
As for crime, some is raising, some is falling, some parts of europe are better than others but the overall trend is down. Murder rates in Europe remain some of the lowest in the world and for other violent crimes many parts of Europe are also among the safest in the world. Property crime is down almost everywhere as is the case in the US
From the latest International Crime Victimisation Survey:
“Among all countries participating in the ICVS since 1989,
there are 15 developed countries about which information is available
from at least four different sweeps, enabling an analysis of trends in crime
over the last 10 or 15 years. The average for the 15 countries shows that the
level of victimisation has peaked halfway the 1990s and has since shown a
slow but steady decline. Victimisation rates of nearly all individual countries
show the same curve-linear curve over the past 15 years. The drops
are most pronounced in property crimes such as vehicle-related crimes
(bicycle theft, thefts from cars and joyriding) and burglary. In most countries,
crime levels in 2004 are back at the level of the late 1980’s. The USA
has acted as trend setter with levels of victimisation already declining in
the second sweep of the ICVS in 1992.”
Economically GDP per capita in Europe has increased at roughly the same rate as the USA over the past decade and a half after several decades where Europe rapidly caught up with America. Some countries have done better than others of course but overall there is no great decline vs the US on this measure. Unemployment has been falling rapidly until recently, the EU rate is now not very much higher than the US rate, inflation is under control across the continent and don’t forget that democracy is now firmly entrenched in many countries which two or three decades ago were authoritarian dictatorships from Lisbon to Athens to Warsaw.
As for manufacturing jobs, yes, much has been outsourced and this is not wise but that’s no reason to hate on Europe, the US and other developed western countries have done exactly the same, indeed some European countries like Germany have done a better job of growing their manufacturing and export sectors than most.
“The view that all Europeans are anti-Semites really annoys me, its not true.”
No, it’s not true but it doesn’t stop the accusation being constantly repeated.
“ANS – I really think that there is a feeling that the Europeans have lost their way, but the USA is following in their footsteps, we have lost our way, I see national institutions like the Police now a laughing matter, a Parliment that is a rubber stamp factory to laws made elsewhere, of course they can see the decline.”
There is certainly less deference to institutions like the police or parliament and people are much more ready to criticise but I wonder how much of that is really due to declining performance of those institutions and how much is just due to cultural change. As I said, Europe like everywhere has issues and challenges to face but they are surmountable and solvable.
“ANS – like calling Americans thick and rednecks, its rubbish, the best most sophisticated blogs are written by Americans, and a lot of rubbish ones too. And the stupidity of people to not even realise that Bush tried to prevent a world war by showing the Muslim world what freedom and democracy is and taught them a lesson about Al Queda and their approach and methods, this will take some time to come through, if at all, but I certainly understand the deep strategy in trying to break the log jam as compared to the European Status quo that would continue to get worse until breaking point is reached.”
Well, I’m not sure that this strategy will work but then we can just disagree on that. There is certainly no need to insult Americans as some Europeans do but I see just as much insult flying the other way.
“ANS – We are not improving, we are getting worse, economically, wealth, education, crime and basic morals, if you think that the EU is going to improve things then of course you will be disappointed how can only one respect such a fundementally anti-democratic system as that that has not had its accounts signed off on for years is beyond me.”
I would say that in many ways we are improving, in some ways we are not but that is the nature of progress, three steps forward and two back.
As for the EU, it sure has its faults but it’s not as totalitarian and undemocratic as its critics like to paint and to put the accounts thing in perspective, the UK Department of Work and Pensions has also had its accounts qualified for years on end and it spends about 20 times as much UK taxpayers money as the EU does. The criticisms the auditors make of the EU usually revolve around the national institutions spending the money the EU doles out to them rather than fraud at the EU itself.
“But this simplistic Europe deserves what they are going to get annoys me, some Europeans deserve what they are going to get, but not all of them, the same could be said of some Americans, people like Pelosi and her ilk.”
Exactly, when I see inane and emotive comments like ‘Europeans invited the snake into their heart and now they deserve to perish’ when talking about muslims for example it is ludicrous.
It’s not as if the wise USA foresaw problems with Islamism in the 50s and 60s and so decided not to have as many muslim immigrants as stoopid Europe. It is just that they had a much closer and more convenient source of cheap labour in Latin America and the Carribean.
In any case, the US has and does invite immigration from the muslim world just like Europe does. Low end estimates put the US muslim population at 0.5% of the population (similar to somewhere like Portugal) while upper end estimates like the ones they always use when talking about Europe, put the US muslim population at around 2.5% (similar to the UK or Germany). So even if you believe that all muslims are seditious threats to society (which I don’t), there is no room for Americans to wallow in Schadenfreude.
