Europeans Are Not Total Morons, It's Just The Media That Keeps Them In The Dark

More than 50 percent of Britons believe that polygamy is legal in the United States; in fact, it is illegal in all 50 states. Almost one-third of Britons believe that Americans who have not paid their hospital fees or insurance premiums are not entitled to emergency medical care; in fact, such treatment must be provided by law.

Seventy percent of Britons think the United States has done a worse job than the European Union in reducing carbon emissions since 2000; in fact, America’s rate of growth of carbon emissions has decreased by almost ten percent since 2000, while that of the EU has increased by 2.3 percent.

Eighty percent of Britons believe that “from 1973 to 1990, the United States sold Saddam Hussein more than a quarter of his weapons.” In fact, the United States sold just 0.46 percent of Saddam’s arsenal to him; Russia, France, and China supplied 57 percent, 13 percent, and 12 percent, respectively. _PJM

If Americans were unaware of the lobotomising effect of European media on undiscerning Euro-consumers, it would be easy to get the impression that Europeans are hollowed-skulled dolts with chronic heavy metal poisoning. One can be sure that is not the case by simply traveling to a number of European countries, and conversing on any topic other than politics. Doing that, one finds Europeans just as interesting and mentally stimulating as other Earth dwellers. It is only when straying onto political topics that the mentally stultifying effects of the media becomes all too apparent.

Europe’s unaccountable left-wing media spoon-feeds the European masses with a daily diet of sensationalist anti-American propaganda, so much so that ordinary Europeans have developed a thoroughly skewed perception of American reality.

For another thing, statistics show that Europeans are not nearly as well traveled in America as Americans are in Europe. According to the U.S. Department of Commerce, some 11.4 million Europeans visited the United States in 2007, which is roughly 2.5 percent of the European population. (By contrast, a record 13.3 million Americans visited Europe in 2007, or roughly 5 percent of the U.S. population.) The lack of firsthand knowledge of the United States is arguably the biggest reason why ordinary Europeans cannot discern fact from fiction when it comes to America.

Nevertheless, this trend may be changing. Due in large part to the strong euro, the number of European visitors to the United States increased by 16 percent in the first half of 2008 alone. And Britons, Frenchmen, Germans, Italians, Spaniards, and many other Europeans visiting the United States for the first time are beginning to realize that the consistently negative images of America so meticulously constructed by Europe’s left-wing elites do not jibe with reality.

Certainly, a healthy exchange of visitors and ideas--leaving the heavily biased media out of the picture--would go a long way toward extending mutual understanding across both the Atlantic and the Pacific.

Another thing that would help besides simple travel, for more narrow-minded thinkers, is to broaden their range of reading materials beyond what they have become far too comfortable with. Going only so far as to confirm your bias day after day is a poor substitute for broadening horizons.

One of Many Reasons for the Emasculated Nature of the European Union and People

Under the defense umbrella of the US military, NATO and Europe long ago gave up any credible pretense of providing for their own defense. Instead, Europe spent its defense budgets on social programs, and began to pretend that the US--its defender--was the primary enemy that it must fight. Europe's primary weapons against the evil US empire were the concocted words and images of its incredibly biased news media. Generations have been raised under this propaganda campaign--this feint, if you will, distracting the people of Europe from the abject failure of their leaders to provide a credible defense from enemies foreign and domestic.

Understanding the "Catch-22" that their leaders have placed them under, European military forces are increasingly refusing to fight. Even when given direct orders to engage the enemy, European commanders and their troops are refusing to raise their weapons against deadly threats.

Over a decade of shrinking budgets has meant less money for realistic training. There are also equipment shortages. The net result is several layers of leadership that are really not well prepared for a shooting war....several Czech helicopter pilots, when told they were going to Afghanistan, basically said no. Not unless they got more training, and helicopters that could handle that kind of tricky flying. The crew of an Italian helicopter gunship was recently sent home because they refused to fire in combat. No one will say exactly what happened there, but that sort of thing is usually the result of poor preparation, and leadership. And then there's the recent ambush of a French patrol, which resulted in ten French paratroopers killed. Most of the casualties occurred because the troops had not practiced dealing with ambushes, and the way the Taliban operate. Worse, the French troops were trapped under fire for many hours, long past the time when air cover or ground reinforcements should have arrived. Again, this has all the marks of bad leadership and poor training.

... _StrategyPage

It is not just the post-cold war euphoria that led to cutting of defense budgets in Europe. As stated earlier, European governments had already decided to let the US taxpayer carry the load of defending Europe. Europe decided that it had grown beyond the conflict stage of human evolution. Given such a high level of evolution, homo Euro would simply allow a despised ally to take care of the dirty work of dealing with the more unsavoury aspects of existing on this planet.

If a group of people exists for along enough time in this protected limbo state, their sense of reality regarding foreign relations does tend to suffer a bit. The EU, after all, has no divisions. NATO has divisions. But without the US, NATO is a laughing stock. Since the member nations of NATO (other than new members from Eastern Europe) scorn the US as a Neanderthal, and the greatest threat to planet Earth, you can imagine the solidity of the alliance--and part of the reason why Russia has begun a new phase of expansionist neo-imperialism.

Self-emasculated homo Euro. The new androgynous reality of an old, shrinking subcontinent. Let's all hold a group shriek over Abu Ghraib, shall we? Or how about a round of condemnations over Guantanamo. Show those war-monger colonials who the civilised people are, shall we?

Russians Sponsoring Ethnic Cleansing in Georgia: US Media Remains Silent

Russia shows no sign of withdrawing from Georgian territory. Instead, Russian troops are overseeing a murderous round of ethnic cleansing in the Georgian city of Gori and surrounding areas. US media appear to be boycotting much of the Russian misconduct, for curiously unstated reasons. Can any readers think of why the US media would focus on a dud of a tropical storm Fay, rather than cover an ongoing war?

...the Times Online informs us that Russians have been forcing the people of Gori - an extremely important rail and road junction that is the lifeline for the capitol Tblisi - to leave. And they are killing them if they stay:

"We didn't have any guns, so he shot Georgi in front of me without saying a word," she said. "A neighbour helped me to bury him in our garden and then I just fled."

Manana Galigashvili, 53, whose husband Andrei stared vacantly from a bed behind her, said that Ossetian soldiers had returned later and torched the house. They, too, had left after a soldier threatened to slit their throats.

Frightened refugees told similar stories all over the city of Gori yesterday as the Russian army extended its reach deep into Georgian territory despite a ceasefire agreement signed by President Medvedev that requires them to withdraw.

Back in Gori, the forcible depopulation of a city under threat of death represents an escalation in Russian brutality. So where's the American media? All we are getting from the New York Times is story after story that this is our fault, or Georgia's fault, or NATO's fault - anything but face the fact that Russia is raping and pillaging a tiny neighbor. _AT

Russia has suffered significant problems in the course of its barbaric treatment of a non-threatening neighbor:

As hundreds of battered Russian armored vehicles wound through the mountain passes toward Tskhinvali, an AP reporter saw a number of tanks broken down in the road, blocking traffic; or being repaired, with soldiers working underneath them with wrenches; or even being towed by other vehicles....Russia said 74 soldiers died and more than 170 were wounded in fighting, but Georgian officials claimed Russian losses were much higher....While Russia would have to expect to lose some low-flying ground attack jets, former Russian air force chief Anatoly Kornukov said the loss of the heavy bomber - which the military said was on a "reconnaissance mission" - should have been avoided... _PostIntelligencer

A half dozen other Russian planes were shot down, and a handful of Russian boats were sunk by the Georgian navy. Russia's decrepit military could barely handle the feeble defense of tiny Georgia! I wonder how it intends to maintain its hold on Georgia after pressure from the international community led by the US and UK forces them to pull back at least to Ossetia and Abkhazia? Oh, right. They are ethnically cleansing huge swathes of Georgia and arming Ossetian and Abkhazian rebels--using them as cats' paws--as well as leaving Spetnatz commandoes embedded with the terrorist rebels. Very clever, although brutal beyond what Serbia's fascists did in Kosovo. I wonder if the world court will indict Putin?

So why is the US media boycotting coverage of an ongoing ethnic cleansing in a country friendly to the west? Because revealing the true extent of Russian brutality and blatant dishonesty in perpetuating an ongoing genocide in Georgia would reveal how wrong their analyses have been, and would also make their boy Obama look bad. As simple as that. Obama really and truly dropped the ball here, and no one in the media wants to put that brutal reality front and center in front of voters just before the DNC Denver festivities begin.

Everyone who wants to relax and take a complete "hands off" approach--just let Russia do whatever it wants within its "sphere of influence," must not play strategy games very well. Because Putin thinks Russia's sphere of influence encompasses all of Europe, all of Central Asia, and most of the Arctic. Bad boy Putin is on a collision course with reality, but how many will he take with him when he goes? The longer he is allowed to crash through newly democratic neighborhoods, the freer he will feel to reach out further and further--sound like any other hyper-ambitious lebensraum seeking dictator you may have read about somewhere?

America Crumbling and In Decline

If you consume a lot of European or Russian media, the title of this post will be old hat to you. Of course America is crumbling! We read about it in the papers and see it on the TV news every day, it's pounded into our heads. It must be true! And since human nature deplores a power vacuum, what power bloc is poised to step into the void left by the decline of America?

In contrast to the declinists’ arguments and analyses, America boasts a position of unmatched preponderance. No single country or even grouping of countries has emerged as a plausible counterpart or peer competitor, and apart from the very long-term possibility of China, none is likely to do so.

...Europe faces steep obstacles in achieving anything resembling a common foreign and security policy. Its cumbersome institutions, public demands for enormous rates of domestic expenditure, hamstrung attempts at political integration, as well as its Hamlet-like uncertainties about the use of force and military spending, give Europe a global impact far less than its size and wealth would otherwise dictate...With the passage of time as well as the coming to power of Atlanticist leaders in Germany (Merkel), France (Sarkozy), and Italy (Berlusconi), there appears to be, if anything, even less inclination to stand in America’s way.

...Russia remains overwhelmingly dependent on the current boom in energy and commodity prices—and correspondingly vulnerable in the event of their decline. The country suffers from pervasive corruption, with a ranking from Transparency International that puts it at 121 among 163 countries in this category. Its population, already less than half that of the U.S. and plagued with alcoholism, chronic violence, a decrepit health-care system, and a male life expectancy of fewer than 60 years of age (lower than that of Bangladesh), shrinks by some half a million people per year.

Japan...only recently recovered from the effects of its economic collapse in the early 1990s. Moreover, as a result of China’s newfound economic weight and military power, Japan has moved into a closer embrace with the United States than ever before. This has meant greater cooperation from military logistics through to the strategic realm, and it has even included logistical and personnel support in Iraq. The Japanese case offers a basic reminder of something declinists too often forget: When assessing a rising power such as China, one ought to consider the near-historical certainty that the rising power will provoke a counterbalancing of its own.

...India’s substantial shift toward the United States, made partly in response to China’s awakening, offers another example of “bandwagoning” with us rather than balancing against us.

...China may indeed emerge as a great power rival to the United States. But this seems very, very unlikely in the near or medium term.

...The overall size and dynamism of [America's] economy remains unmatched, and America continues to lead the rest of the world in measures of competitiveness, technology, and innovation. Here, higher education and science count as an enormous asset. America’s major research universities lead the world in stature and rankings, occupying seventeen of the top twenty slots. Broad demographic trends also favor the United States, whereas countries typically mentioned as peer competitors sag under the weight of aging populations. This is not only true for Russia, Europe, and Japan, but also for China, whose long-standing one-child policy has had an anticipated effect.

...Over the years, America’s staying power has been regularly and chronically underestimated—by condescending French and British statesmen in the nineteenth century, by German, Japanese, and Soviet militarists in the twentieth, and by homegrown prophets of doom today. The critiques come and go. The object of their contempt never does..._WorldAffairsJournal

America has serious problems--most brought on by irresponsible and excessive government. Either Americans will learn to rein in the malignant bureaucracies and ballooning agencies of government, or they will continue to suffer from their excesses. If government is allowed to continue growing unchecked, the predictions of America crumbling will eventually occur. And if it does, the shaking will not subside for a very long time.

European Anti-Americanism--A Study in Media Bigotry

This video gives a fascinating glimpse into Euro-media instigated anti-American attitudes in Europe. Even though the US saved Europe three times in the 20th century from hot and cold wars, and continues to provide an expensive defensive umbrella over all of Europe, European media continues to successfully promote anti-Americanism among Europeans.

The American media has not covered this rather egregious display of Euro-media bigotry, but published book accounts and blog accounts describing the bias are common.

Much more at David's Medienkritik

It is sad to see a continent turning on a nation that has spilled so much blood to protect its freedoms. What is so perverse about this media-inspired and driven hatred of America, is the imminent threat to Europe from another direction altogether--Islamist jihad and imperialist supremacy. If the Europeans do not wake up to this threat, and stop wasting so much time and energy generating imaginary phantom threats from across the Atlantic, there may not be a free Europe for many decades longer.