History Forum / General / General Topics / June 2004

The New York Times has an article to be published June 28 that supports my
earlier assertions that much of the trouble Bush is having with Europe comes
from his own failed "diplomacy" - i.e. They are pissed at his unilateralism.
I have underliined key points.

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Senator Carl Levin of Michigan, the ranking Democrat on the committee, said
the reluctance of NATO ambassadors was based in part on resentments over
"the unilateral approach the United States has taken to world challenges."

"To some extent," Senator Levin said, "the reluctance here represents
chickens coming home to roost."

Ivo Daalder, a foreign policy scholar at the Brookings Institution and a
former national security council official in the Clinton administration,
agreed. "More and more countries are saying we're just not willing to play
your game anymore," he said. "They're saying, `We're not going to contribute
forces to what we view as a failed policy in Iraq.' "

But, "The Europeans have a bit of a dilemma," said Stanley R. Sloan, a
former Europe specialist at the Congressional Research Service and now a
visiting scholar at Middlebury College in Vermont. "They don't want the
United States to fail in Iraq because it would hurt their interests as
well." At the same time, Mr. Sloan said, such nations are loath to provide
Mr. Bush with anything he could turn into a political victory at home. "They
don't want to give George Bush something that will get him re-elected," he
said. Their calculations hinge, he added, on the question, "Are things going
so badly that they have no choice?"

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/28/politics/28DIPL.html?hp

By CHRISTOPHER MARQUIS published June 28, 2004

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The problem is not Hippo's lame "conspiracy theory" about the French and
Russians afraid of being caught in trades that the UN would not have
approved of.

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I also notice that Fahrenheit 9/11 was a box office smash hit this weekend.
My son went. He had to order tickets in advance, the lines were still longer
than for Harry Potter, and every seat was filled for every showing.

I suspect that this is a bad omen for Bush if he expects reelection in
November.