“The American veterans who have returned 60 years later to the battle site represent those who gave their lives on our soil so that today we can live free,” Bastogne Mayor Philippe Collard said in French at a memorial honoring U.S. General George S. Patton.
He added in English: “We will never forget. You are home here.”
I fervently hope that, to the degree that they do so now, the French can continue to live free, in the face of the new totalitarian threat in their midst to which they are only now awakening. They, and much of western Europe, are now on one of the front lines of the new war, whether they realize it or not.
War on Terror (or rather, Islamic fundamentalism), or War on Drugs. Andrew Stuttaford is right–we can’t have both, and the attempt to do so is one of the many reasons I wish that we’d had a better choice last month. Some things the administration does simply boggle the mind.
Andrew Napolitano has an article at Cato about how the US government is exempt from its own laws (it’s a PDF). He includes a story about Janet Reno of which few are aware (though anyone could have known about it at the time, had they wanted to do the research).
If I gave a damn what John McCain thinks. I’m as mystified at the press’ worship of Senator McCain as I am by worship of Bill Clinton. I really don’t get it.
But he also points out this strange rewriting (or miswriting) of history:
…Daschle and Lott believed that conservative House Republicans had gone too far by impeaching the president for essentially lying about his affair in a civil proceeding, and they worked successfully behind the scenes to avert a conviction.
Ramesh notes that there was never a chance of a conviction, but I think that’s wrong. The real point is that the reporter fails to point out how Daschle conspired with Lott–they worked behind the scenes to make sure that there was no real trial. They allowed no witnesses, with only videotaped testimony of key players. If all of the evidence that the House members had seen (resulting in the impeachment vote) had been shown to the public, it’s actually quite unlikely that Clinton would have remained from office.
In addition, Clinton wasn’t just accused of “essentially lying about his affair in a civil proceeding.” There was witness tampering and witness intimidation as well. These are serious federal felonies–the stuff of mafiosi, regardless of the subject matter.
Ignorant Europeans are unhappy about the results of the election.
Especially inclined to have an unfavorable opinion of Bush in those countries were people between ages 18 and 24.
Well, there’s an informed and thoughtful demographic.
The polls suggest an increasing lack of understanding about Americans in Europe, rather than a surge of anti-Americanism, said Corman, who studies public opinion trends in Europe.
Yup. You don’t even have to look very hard to see it here in my comments section.
There’s a story over at The Hill that there were some Swift Boat ads that Fox refused to run during the campaign, because they were “too negative.” Amusingly, CNN had no problem with them. Of course, they’re probably much more desperate for ad revenue over there these days…
But the part of the story that broke my irony meter was the very last bit:
Kerry adviser Mike McCurry, however, characterized the Swift boat campaign as neither fun nor moving, calling it the