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| Britain |
| Britain is turning on the U.S. — at its own peril |
| 2006-10-25 |
| So... them brits are european, after all. By Melanie Phillips Anti-Americanism and anti-Semitism have poisoned British politics. In a world of terrorism, the timing couldn't be worse Everyone knows that Europe is a continent stuffed with craven, terror-appeasing fromages who loathe America. Britain, by contrast, led by the lion-hearted Tony Blair, is full of stalwarts who stand shoulder to shoulder with the United States in the defense of the West. Right? Wrong. Fury at Prime Minister Blair for being President Bush's "poodle" has reached such a pitch that the most successful Labor prime minister in memory is being forced out of office because of his support for U.S. policy in Iraq and Israel. Labor's members of Parliament say his refusal to break with America by calling for an earlier cease-fire in Lebanon was the last straw. The disturbing fact is that Britain is consumed by a rampant anti-Americanism and an allied hostility toward Israel, which are driving public debate into irrationality, prejudice and appeasement. |
| Posted by:anonymous5089 |
| #16 --Americans are very insular and over 75% dont have passports ffs!!!!.-- -more likely 75% of Americans can't get 30 days off to go fuck off on holiday - yes, we actually bust our ass and go to work, or 75% of Americans don't want to shell out the money it would cost to see Europe/Asia etc. /OR/ more likely as lotp mentioned, there's so much of our own country we've not even seen yet that getting a passport is the least of our priorities. BTW - I remember a french guy lecturing me on how so many Americans are not bi-lingual - I said most Americans don't see the point. Unless each state had it's own particular language or dialect like in europe, why would we need to learn another language? Get over yourselves europe, by proximity and geography europeans are forced to learn other languages - that doesn't impress me. Being from Detroit, if Ohioan's spoke some other language I'd prolly have to learn it as well - not a big f*ck'n deal. If most Americans do not care to really travel abroad to non-speaking english countries then why would they really need to become multi-lingual? BTW - europe seems to be dying a slow death. The socialist state is a failure and it seems most europeans have no spine. I'm afraid we'll be back there in 50 yrs to un-f*ck their mess again because they lack the balls to do it now. P.C. pussies. |
| Posted by: Broadhead6 2006-10-25 23:16 |
| #15 Scottish independence solves this problem. time to dissolve the Act of Union. Let the Scots jump back in bed with the French and the alliance with England be strengthened. |
| Posted by: Nimble Spemble 2006-10-25 15:45 |
| #14 Poor John Bull lies a-molderin' in his grave |
| Posted by: mojo 2006-10-25 15:19 |
| #13 --Americans are very insular and over 75% dont have passports ffs!!!!.-- we didn't need them to travel to Mexico and Canada, or Bermuda, IIRC and other places close to us until now, can anyone argue they're like the US? I spent 1 summer traveling in Europe, my papers were stamped. |
| Posted by: anonymous2u 2006-10-25 14:27 |
| #12 Last weekend I watched the new movie "Queen," which depicts the relationship between Queen Elizabeth and Prime Minister Tony Blair during the first two months following the death of Princess Diana. This was a period when the Queen's popularity sank into an abyss while Blair's popularity (he had just been elected) soared. The entire movie is excellent but the last scene is especially thought-provoking. The Queen and Prime Minister meet privately for a meeting to formalize Blair's official assumption of power, but most of the conversation is a frank discussion of the Queen's attitude and action during the week following Diana's death. The Queen admits that she recognizes that much of the population has come to hate the monarchy in general and her personally. Blair assures her that the popular hostility of that one week eventually will be forgotten when people look back at the much larger perspective of her entire, long reign. This thought cheers the Queen, but she remarks basically that the experience has been a bitter pill to swallow but that such experiences happen in many famous people's lives. Then she remarks something like, "You know, Mr. Prime Minister, one day they will hate you too." |
| Posted by: Mike Sylwester 2006-10-25 14:27 |
| #11 It's funny that someone thinks that the BBC is actually informative. The BBC's institutional socialism causes it to rail against the west. I blame it most for any harm that befalls the U.K. I showed the amazingly lie-filled and lefty-paranoid "The Power of Nightmares" before 52 people where murdered by Koran motivated terrorism. Slowly the blogs are having an effect. It's slow work and one person at a time. But people NEVER trust the MSM after. |
| Posted by: Bright Pebbles in Blairistan 2006-10-25 13:14 |
| #10 The British elites turned on the US long ago. The elites control information so it should be no surprise that slowly their message has slipped in. If the US is wrong about the global war on terror its no loss. If the US is right it is a matter of time before the Britts see the error of this turning. I'm saddened at the anti-Americanism (and the anti-semetism/anti-Westernism that usually go with it) but will gladly welcome them back to the fold when and if they are ready. |
| Posted by: rjschwarz 2006-10-25 13:08 |
| #9 i am aware by BBC etc what goes on in the rest of the world He/she is AWARE. Via BBC. Good grief! Melanie pegged you just right. You seem to be a tad more than a "little" snobbish. Butlers notwithstanding. |
| Posted by: twobyfour 2006-10-25 13:07 |
| #8 Oh, my. Where to begin? Let's see. We have a number of retired military among the regulars here at Rantburg. They've served in places many Europeans cannot even spell. TW's husband is a corporate executive whose work has taken the family to live in a variety of locations, including on the continent. .com worked in the oil business in Saudi Arabia. Our esteemed host Fred, regulars Old Spook and Old Patriot all have had ... interesting international experiences which they don't/can't talk about much. I've not lived abroad for extended time, having travelled both for pleasure and on business instead. I do speak and/or read several languages besides English, though, including Spanish, French and a little Arabic. I've worked with British, French and German colleagues, have done business in Japan, Latin America, Canada and several countries in the Middle East .... And now I work with our military and some members of allied country militaries as well. As far as the passport issue goes, my experience is that most Brits and Europeans simply do not really realize just how big and diverse the US is all by itself. I've driven all over Britain in a couple days. From Thurso to Cornwall is a couple hundred miles. From New York to San Francisco is over 3000 miles. North to south, the US averages 1500 miles. But it's not just the physical size, it's the great diversity of geography, history and culture that is striking. Even the small town in which I grew up had families that were bilingual in English and the language of their parents or grandparents: German, Polish, Russian/Ukrainian, Italian, Spanish, some French, some Japanese. I meet americans who think we all speak like the Queen and have Butlers!!!! Well, there are ill-informed people everywhere. I've met more than a few in the British Isles. It's a bit sad to realize how *provincial* many Europeans and Brits are and how naively they assume that what is shown on TV is all or most of what the US is all about. |
| Posted by: lotp 2006-10-25 12:52 |
| #7 Most Brits support America over the Muzzies.Only the left wingers are antiAmerican.John Smith on the Street hates any immigrants who dosent accept the British way of life and do not integrate fully ie Muzzies. The only thing that gets up our nose is the lack of understanding/respect Americans have for other countries. Check your news and see if anything is shown that is not National news or Iraq????I meet americans who think we all speak like the Queen and have Butlers!!!!Americans are very insular and over 75% dont have passports ffs!!!!. Being in Britain i am aware by BBC etc what goes on in the rest of the world.Are Americans???How many Americanc bar Rantburgers have a clue what goes on in Europe,Afica,Asia etc?????? Bottom line there is a big world outside USA!!! |
| Posted by: Cheregum Crelet7867 2006-10-25 12:39 |
| #6 OK boys, you can go it alone. |
| Posted by: Cheaper Crase9246 2006-10-25 12:37 |
| #5 As though it were yeasterday I recall watching the evening news just a few days after 9/11. I vividly recall watching (and hearing) the news that the Coldsteam Guard had been ordered to play the Star Spangled Banner during the changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace. I believe (though I might be mistaken) that this was on the same day that Article 5 of NATO had been invoked, and that the West would go to war united. I recall reading her Majesty the Queen stood in St. Paul's Cathedral and for the first time in the recorded history of the British Empire an English monarch sang the National Anthem of a foreign country. A subperb irony given that that anthem was written some 187 years earlier when the eastern seaboard of the USA was under sustained attack by one of the Queen's forefathers. I had tears in my eyes. In part due to sadness, but in part due to anger. And I smiled thinking: You f**kin'stupid muslims don't yet understand what you have unleashed. I felt proud to be American. I felt proud to be Western. That same day ( a Friday as I recall) the CIC spoke at the National Cathedral and when he finished they sang The Battle Hymn of the Republic. And I thought: Now to war. The West united. But I was wrong. The West did not stand united. Had we (the West) done so, five years on, I think so much would have been...could have been accomplished. The barbarians at the gates could have been crushed for generations. We have many friends and allies in England. I implore our friends there to make arrangements to get out while you still can. Perhaps the day will come when your children or children's children will return to reclaim your Island. I surmise you have less then 10 years to decide if you will stay, stand and fight (I don't blame you if you do) or leave with a view to return to fight another day. Those of you who wish to fight know that we will stand with you. (While you decide your course of action may I make one small request? May we have your nukes? Now. Today. The sooner the better. Just in case...) |
| Posted by: Mark Z 2006-10-25 12:36 |
| #4 We weren't allies, we were at war for the first 50-odd years, then they ignored us. At least they stayed out of The Civil War. They've chosen the gigolo and the oven maker, so be it. |
| Posted by: anonymous2u 2006-10-25 11:42 |
| #3 That's okay. The UK isn't long for this world. Scotland will be independent within 2 years, after that how long will Wales last? England will be left alone and be subsumed into the EU lock stock and barrel (the only exception will be their "separate" UN seat on the SC). America needs to remove from all multilateral organizations such as the UN & Nato and build a separate set of bilateral agreements with the likes of Japan, Taiwan, India, Israel and Austrailia. If anyone wants to speak with us, fine. Just don't expect us to put up with anti-American BS. |
| Posted by: AlanC 2006-10-25 11:34 |
| #2 Tony Blair played Cassandra in his "going away" speech to Labour and the British people: But understand this reality. Little of it will happen except in alliance with the United States of America. And here am I, told by the pro-Europeans to give up on America and the Atlanticists to forget about Europe. And yet I know Britain must be at the centre of a Europe now 25 nations reunited after centuries of conflict the biggest economic market and most powerful political union in the world and I know that to retreat from its counsels would be utter self-defeating folly. And I know to cast out the transatlantic alliance would be disastrous for Britain. And I believe so strongly that if Europe and America could only put aside their differences and united around a common cause, the future could be different and better. So the decisions I've been called on to make are stark. When I hear people say: "I want the old Tony Blair back, the one who cares", I tell you something. I don't think as a human being, as a family man, I've changed at all. But I have changed as a leader. I have come to realise that caring in politics isn't really about "caring". It's about doing what you think is right and sticking to it. So I do not minimise whatever differences some of you have with me over Iraq and the only healing can come from understanding that the decision, whether agreed with or not, was taken because I believe, genuinely, Britain's future security depends on it. Yhere has been no third way, this time. Believe me, I've looked for it. |
| Posted by: RWV 2006-10-25 11:09 |
| #1 Its not the first time that Brits are digging their own graves. Many Brits are outright anti-semitic and many others are just plain Pro-arabic (Arabophils, as in Lawrence of Arabia). They will eventually get burned by their own Islamic hoards festering in Londonistan Manchesteristan and other English cities. The only question is: will a new Churchill arise in time to save them from themselves or will the free world have to invade the smoking ruins of the former great empire after its too late ? |
| Posted by: Elder of Zion 2006-10-25 11:00 |