One thing that I’ve often heard in a half decade or so living and working in Europe is that Americans have no sense of place. Sometimes the idea is asserted that crudely, sometimes equally crudely in a different form: America is too young to have real history, thus Americans have no sense of history and are lacking the deep rootedness of many Europeans. Sometimes it’s a bit more subtle: A great many Americans are visibly more mobile throughout their lives than a great many Europeans. People move away for jobs, for family, for love, and often enough just for want of a change. They’re clearly not making lifelong attachments, and thus not as attached to a place.
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Author Archives: Doug Merrill
The Kettle Called Conrad Black
Slate has a delightful piece on the board of Black’s company, Hollinger International. It seems the directors, such as Henry Kissinger and Richard Perle, had little serious business experience and basically rubber-stamped Black’s plans.
Daniel Gross writes, “Most of these more or less honorable folks were basically idle directors. They showed up at meetings, ate lunch, rubber-stamped corporate plans, and cashed their checks.”
And the business types weren’t necessarily top notch either: “But Black seemed to have a genius for recruiting CEOs with legal issues, as Steven Pearlstein noted in Wednesday’s Washington Post. A. Alfred Taubman, the former CEO of Sotheby’s, remained on Hollinger’s board even after he had been convicted of violating antitrust laws. Dwayne Andreas, the paterfamilias of Archer Daniels Midland, the agri-business giant that in 1996 pleaded guilty to price-fixing, was also a longtime board director.”
“Given this cast of characters, it should come as no surprise that over the years the stock of Hollinger International has failed to keep pace with the broad market indexes and many of its peer media companies. After all, putting a bunch of right-wingers with occasionally dubious foreign policy credentials in the position of directing a profit-making business seems almost as illogical as putting a bunch of right-wingers with occasionally dubious business credentials in charge of foreign policy.”
Zing!
Istanbul, again
More bombers struck in Istanbul, killing the British Consul General and, at present reports, 25 others, with more than 450 injured.
Will there be more bombings in Istanbul?
Turkey already withstood suicide attacks by the PKK during that group’s campaign for Kurdish independence, and later after the capture of PKK leader Ocalan. Political and criminal bombings are also all too common in the country’s recent history.
Still, Istanbul is a vulnerable hinge between east and west. Turkey’s borders with the heartlands of jihad are porous. Home-grown Islamists may be more likely to take up arms, now that a government with Islamist roots is energetically pursuing Turkey’s European vocation.
Turkey is a living refutation of the fundamentalists’ belief that the only Islam is a medieval vision of Islam. Every step that Turkey takes along the path of modernity, democracy and liberality is a step away from superstition, fanatacism and mayhem.
Though the hardest work will have to be done by the Turks themselves, Europe should do all it can to help. Now more than ever.
A Fistful of Results
Not long ago, I asked Where’s Publius?
Today’s Frankfurter Allgemenine reports:
The European Convention Talks Back
Appeal to the Intergovernmental Conference
Modeled on the “Federalist Papers”
Call by 63 Parliament Members
Brussels, Nov 13. Four months after the end of the EU Reform Convention, members of the body that was entrusted with working out a draft constitution are attempting to exercise greater influence on the work of the intergovernmental conference (IGC). Herald of probably increasing common efforts is an appeal to the Italian presidency presented on Thursday by 63 parliamentarians from various EU countries and parties. In addition, MEPs reported on Thursday that MPs from member states and MEPs are planning an appeal for retaining as much of the Convention’s draft as possible. The effort is planned for the week preceding December 12-13, dates expected to bring a compromise in the IGC’s work at a summit in Brussels. Part of the push has been undertaken by Convention president Val?ry Giscard d’Estaing and his deputies Jean-Luc Dehaene and Giuliano Amato. It will have the title “The Papers of the European Convention” and take as its model the Federalist Papers of 1788. At that time, the “father or the American constitution,” James Madison wrote essays together with Alexander Hamilton and John Jay in an effort to influence the debate over the draft constitution that had been presented in Philadelphia the year before.
Not a bad idea.
Where Has He Been?
File this one under People Who Ought to Know Better. Odder than the fact of the argument is the frequency with which I see it.
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What Does Europe Stand For?
Twelve golden stars on a deep blue field. Soon to fly alongside the national emblems in twenty-five states, with more than a dozen more conceivable in the medium term. Why should hundreds of millions of citizens want to join their futures to this project?
Are Europe, and its Union, just shorthand for peace and prosperity? Normality? Is that enough? What did the dissidents of the East want, when they wrote that they yearned for the return to Europe? High taxes and state day care? Is that all?
What hopes and dreams are bound up in that simple band of stars?
Is It Smart?
The reluctance of EU countries, particularly France and Germany, to contribute to rebuilding Iraq certainly reflects their governments’ policies and their publics’ preferences. The Washington Post reported that the EU will contribute $256 million, and that US contributions will be roughly $20 billion. That’s more than 78 time as much. While the final figures may change some, the massive disparity will not.
If we presume that EU governments want to exercise influence in postwar Iraq, is this a smart policy? Do they believe that they will be influential regardless? Is this a continued fit of pique? Are they eschewing influence based on the wishes of the population?
I’ll admit, I’m puzzled.
Dar = Gift
1978
Pierre Trudeau
Val?ry Giscard d’Estaing
Helmut Schmidt
Giulio Andreotti
Takeo Fukuda
James Callaghan
Jimmy Carter
Leonid Brezhnev
John Paul II
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Where’s Publius?
“When the proposed Constitution issued from the Constitutional Convention at Philadelphia on September 17, 1787, Alexander Hamilton foresaw that opposition to it would be great, and though he thought the document would probably be adopted he couldn’t be sure. Three members of the Convention, all of them prominent, had refused to sign it, and others, including Hamilton’s two fellow delegates from New York, had left before the end of its deliberations. Indeed, the form in which the Constitution was approved gave it the appearance of unanimity: the delegates subscribed to it in the name of their states. This covered over defections and absences; for example, Hamilton alone signed for New York, and at least one delegate would have been unwilling to subscribe in his own name.”
So begins my edition of The Federalist, the collection of 85 essays written by Hamilton, James Madison and John Jay under the name Publius. (The authors went on to become the new nation’s first Secretary of the Treasury, fourth President and first Chief Justice, respectively.) The essays were written at a speed that would put many bloggers to shame and distributed by the most advanced technology of the time. They address the toughest criticisms leveled at the proposed Constitution, from the charges that a unitary government would trample citizens’ rights and well-established prerogatives to the supremacy of federal law to the separation and blending of powers.
The title of the final essay sums up the argument: “Not perfect but good. Should adopt and seek to amend.”
Europe has had its Convention, and Europe’s governments are now having their Conference. Soon, there will be referenda, with high stakes and uncertain outcomes.
Where’s Publius?
Germans Win First World Cup
As told by the Associated Press:
CARSON, Calif. — Germany won the Women’s World Cup 2-1 over Sweden on Nia Kuenzer’s header in the eighth minute of overtime Sunday.
A substitute who came on 10 minutes earlier, Kuenzer soared high to deflect Renate Lingor’s long free kick over the outstretched arm of goalkeeper Caroline Joensson, who was brilliant all day.
The German players mobbed her and rolled together on the ground, while Sweden’s beaten players were motionless and stunned. Much of the crowd, which was decidedly pro-Sweden, cheered the Swedes even as the entire German team stood on a podium, jumping up and down as they received their championship medals.
Germany’s first women’s world title came in the same fashion as it beat Sweden in the 2001 European Championship final – on an overtime goal. …
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