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Europe is Finished, Predicts Mark Steyn
by Daniel PipesMark Steyn, political columnist and cultural critic, has written a remarkable book, America Alone: The End of the World as We Know It (Regnery). He combines several virtues uncommonly found together humor, accurate reportage, and deep thinking then applies these to what is arguably the most consequential issue of our time: the Islamist threat to the West. Mr. Steyn offers a devastating thesis but presents it in bits and pieces, so I shall pull it together here. He begins with the legacy of two totalitarianisms. Traumatized by the electoral appeal of fascism, post-World War II European states were constructed in a top-down manner "so as to insulate almost entirely the political class from populist pressures." As a result, the establishment has "come to regard the electorate as children." Second, the Soviet menace during the cold war prompted American leaders, impatient with Europe's (and Canada's) weak responses, effectively to take over their defense. This benign and far-sighted policy led to victory by 1991, but it also had the unintended and less salutary side-effect of freeing up Europe's funds to build a welfare state. This welfare state had several malign implications. Posted by: anonymous5089 2006-11-17 |
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