The War

This is the kind of article that you don't see on national news. It relates how a Knoxville-based Army Reserve unit (489th Civil Affairs Battalion) is helping rebuild Afghanistan. This is a typically American thing to do and we have always done it, even to Japan and Germany. Why aren't Dan Rather and his buddies reporting on this?

Memorial Day

Here are three fine articles on that most (except for the Fourth of July) American holiday, Memorial Day. Ralph Peters explains why we should enjoy "the nation our veterans have given us." Mac Owens reflects on why the "mystic chords of memory" tie together the Fourth and Memorial Day. And Victor Davis Hanson tells a good personal story of Okinawa and Sugar Loaf Hill and the 23 year old who Victor Davis is named after, and how he died there, and the ring he just received in the mail. Note the Virgilian sense of pride and sacrifice: "Perhaps there shall come a day when it will be sweet to remember even these things."

Bush in Europe

Although much could be said about the Europeans' highly imperfect attitude toward Bush (and toward Reagan at the time, for that matter), we should not be surprised that they don't like us for what they think is our moral arrogance and our simple cowboyish mode of behavior. The super-sophisticated European elites have always shown contempt for our frontier ways (except for Tocqueville!) but, to Hell with them. When they need to be bailed out again, we will do it, because we are magnanimous and they are the ones always in need. Bush did well on the trip, gently explaining to Europeans what they have to do to stay relevant. Of course, they are offended and hurt. That's life, and it's passing the Europeans by. The war against terrorism, Russia a partner in NATO, or remembrance of things past, are all now under direct American leadership. The ancient civility of the Europeans showed nicely, but the undercurrents aren't going to go away. See these short pieces from the Financial Times and the London Times to give you the flavor of the problem. That Bush likes to maintain his American mode of behavior is also obvious from this story about an altercation he had with NBC News White House correspondent David Gregory in Paris. That the President doesn't mind publicly dressing down a reporter is both revealing and amusing. This story should have been run on every national outlet!