Back to Reality

The UK Telegraph contains some insightful editorials in light of President Bush's imminent arrival in Britain. As an anglophile, and husband to an English lady, I will follow the President's reception with interest and, I'm sure, annoyance - though not with surprise. I've had enough debates with English friends, family, and acquaintances during the recent past to expect our president to get a real drubbing - he appears to many Brits to apotheosize the worst stereotypes of what it means to be American.

Mark Steyn's piece in the Telegraph (simple login required) reminds us that, just as we are wont to think of the U.S. as a "melting pot" for diverse nationalities, so - for its critics and enemies - it has become a cauldron in which almost every conceivable diabolical ingredient has been admixed, a stew of malignity. As he ruefully notes,

"The fanatical Muslims despise America because it's all lapdancing and gay porn; the secular Europeans despise America because it's all born-again Christians hung up on abortion; the anti-Semites despise America because it's controlled by Jews. Too Jewish, too Christian, too Godless, America is also too isolationist, except when it's too imperialist. And even its imperialism is too vulgar and arriviste to appeal to real imperialists: let's face it, the ghastly Yanks never stick it to the fuzzy-wuzzy with the dash and élan of the Bengal Lancers, which appears to be the principal complaint of Sir Max Hastings and his ilk."

Like a person, judge a nation by its friends - and its enemies.