Critical Mass

This is so good I had to quote it in full.  From yesterday's Best of the Web Today:

The Real American Threat
Britain's Prime Minister Tony Blair is having political problems at home, but he has a message Europe would do well to listen to, the so-called news agency Reuters reports:

Blair launched a withering attack on Thursday on what he called "mad anti-Americanism" among European politicians.

Blair, U.S. President George W. Bush's closest ally in the so-called war on terror, said the world urgently needs the United States to help tackle the globe's most pressing problems.

"The danger is if they decide to pull up the drawbridge and disengage. We need them involved," Blair said, spelling out his political vision in a pamphlet published by The Foreign Policy Center think-tank.

"The strain of, frankly, anti-American feeling in parts of European politics is madness when set against the long-term interests of the world we believe in," he said.

This is spot on. The more isolationist America becomes, the more Europe will be left to fend for itself. Given the continent's weak militaries, greedy welfare states, lax attitudes toward crime, low native birthrates and exploding Muslim populations, it's hard to muster much confidence in Europe's ability to go it alone.

One man who seems to have a dim understanding of the need for American engagement is, believe it or not, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan. Reports Agence France-Presse:

Asked what Middle East leaders had told him about their views of the consequences of the US-led war in Iraq, he said: "Most of the leaders I spoke to felt that the invasion of Iraq and its aftermath have been a real disaster for them . . . They believe it has destabilized the region."

He added that many leaders wanted the Americans to stay in Iraq until the security situation improves, noting that "having created the problem they cannot walk away."

Walking away is precisely what the Murtha-Kerry wing of the Democratic Party wants to do. Let us hope their irresponsible unilateralism does not prevail.

On an informal discussion board of which I am a part, a group of mostly college students were asked where they were on 9/11. I hope they don't mind my sharing their answers -- they are a thought provoking, moving tribute to a day that forever changed America.

Where were you when you first heard of the attack on the Twin Towers and the Pentagon?

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Growing up, I often heard people say in relation to November 22, 1963, “I’ll never forget where I was and what I was doing on that day.” On September 11, 2001, another such memory was burned into the minds of the American public. Unfortunately, the latter has spawned perhaps an even greater number of conspiracy theories and has led to more finger pointing, this time on a far greater scale.

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