Europe: The Maturing Child

Mike - Thank you for this as well. It represents a very reasoned and sober apologia for European anxieties vis-à-vis the United States. No doubt, Europe is aware of the huge debt it owes to America - and they don't like it. The problem is that any time a debt is owed, the debtor's position of inferiority emerges in stark relief. It highlights a degree of dependency that for most proud people infringes on their dignity. In order to counteract this feeling of inadequacy, the normal human response is often quite the opposite of gratitude.

I doubt that today's modern European looks much to what has happened in the last century for guidance. If they did, they would not be so eager to repeat its mistakes - anti-Semitism and appeasement, for example. No, Europeans live in the here and now - as do Americans. I become suspicious of anyone who is all too ready to display a purely curatorial grasp of history in order to support any given point. Nine times out of ten, it is a distraction from the real issue, which is often obscured by its very dominance in a room full of invisible elephants.

In my view, what is shaping European opinion about the U.S. at this moment is our view of ourselves. The orgy of unbridled Bush (and country) bashing that our media and culture have tolerated - and even encouraged - in recent years has not gone unnoticed in Europe. There it has found a sympathetic chord among those whose natural inclination has been to rebel against America's largess. To European sensibilities (as in America) Obama, represents a break with the past, igniting the hope of starting afresh and on equal footing. By our own actions, we have reinforced - for all who crave the dignity of self-reliance - the notion of an American colossus on the wane and no longer threatening voluntary assumption of equality with a part of the world regarded essentially as inferior. We will always be seen as the midwife of Europe’s rebirth (after the wars). Now we must let go of the maturing child that is intent on exposing the cracks and strains in his parent's relationship for an excuse to rebel and take wing on its own terms.