[...] pg 8-9 of Jean Francois-Revel’s Anti-Americanism, After the first gushings of emotion and crocodile condolences, the [...]

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[...] Jean-Francois Revel, in his 2002 book Anti-Americanism, writes: But the truth is that the United States’ actions historically have been far less damaging to Muslim interests than the actions of Britain, France, or Russia. These European powers have conquered Muslim countries, occupied and indeed oppressed them over decades and even centuries. American, on the other hand, have never colonized a Muslim nation. Americans evince no hostility towards Islam as such today; on the contrary, their interventions in Somalia, Bosnia and Kosovo, as well as the pressure exerted on the Macedonian government, were designed to defend Muslim minorities. And the coalition of twenty-eight countries, led by the United States, that removed the Iraqi army from Kuwait was formed at the request of the Saudis, who feared what the Butcher of Baghdad might do next; so here again the Americans and their allies were defending a small Muslim country against a secular dictator who had used chemical weapons against the Muslim Shi’ites in the south and the Muslim Kurds in the north. It is strange that America-hating Muslims see nothing disturbing in the fact that Iraq, with a largely Muslim population, has attacked Muslim countries- first Iran in 1981, then Kuwait in 1990- in primitively imperialistic and bellicose fashion. Likewise in Algeria, Muslims have been massacring their coreligionists since 1990. [...]

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Revel is amazing.
Last summer I read in Spanish “The flight from Truth: the reign of deceit in the age of information” and his book of memories (I don’t know if it is translated into English), “Memories: the thief in the empty house”, published soon after he died. I was really shocked by the first one and I have been eager to read more. I have now waiting on my bookshelf “How democracies perish”, and “Anti-Americanism” is another one I want to read.

I am from Spain but I live in USA. You wouldn’t believe the deep prejudices against Americans that exist in Europe, and in Spain more than in any other European country. It is basically the leftish people, and it is pure prejudice, because people have this anti-American prejudice but most of them have never been to USA and don’t know anything about America. But of course, they are big talkers. They are such idiots.

The stupid leftish president of Spain, Zapatero, didn’t stand up and purposely remained seated on a military parade when the American flag passed by. Do you know why? Because many leftish people was going to applaud that stupid act of rudeness and diplomatic incompetence.

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>>Yet, in spite of this the United States remains the number one destination of immigrants from all around the globe; funny how that is…>>

Someone was collecting slogans…was it here? six word truisms or something like that. The one I liked best was: 20 million Mexicans can’t _all_ be wrong! (20 million counts as one word…!)

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The best ” rightwing” intellectual our country has had for decades: the liberals hated him because he came from the left and ditch it in the 1950′s after realising the horrors of marxism .
But a certain fringe of the right also disliked him because as said in your article he favoured the USA : that dumb coward Chirac barely acknowledge his death .

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Yup, another book to go on my Amazon list. Good stuff Word. Always good to know there are still more then a few Europeans not brainwashed.

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Here’s something interesting: Matthieu Ricard (I believe, Revel’s original last name) is the son of Jean-Francois Revel, and he serves as the Dali Lama’s French translator.

And something that the Dali Lama expressed a few years ago that is of interest:

Dali Lama: Iraq War May Be Justified
Scott Lindlaw, AP, September 10, 2003 11:09 PM

The Dalai Lama said Wednesday that the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan may have been justified to win a larger peace, but that is it too soon to judge whether the Iraq war was warranted. “I think history will tell,” he said in an interview with The Associated Press on Wednesday, just after he met with President Bush.

“In principle, I always believe nonviolence is the right thing, and nonviolent method is in the long run more effective,” said the Dalai Lama, who after the Sept. 11 attacks had implored Bush to avoid a violent response by the United States.

The exile Tibetan leader, awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989, said the Vietnam War increased suffering and was a “failure.” But, he said, some wars, including the Korean War and World War II, helped “protect the rest of civilization, democracy.” He said he saw a similar result in Afghanistan – “perhaps some kind of liberation.”

“The people themselves, I think, suffer a lot under their previous regimes,” he said. But he was adamant that the United States not lose sight of rebuilding Afghanistan.

The Dalai Lama urged Bush, in a letter on Sept. 12, 2001, to “think seriously whether a violent action is the right thing to do and in the greater interest of the nation and people in the long run.” Asked whether the Iraq war was just, the Dalai Lama said the situation there is “more complicated” and will take more time before he can judge.

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Another book to go on my reading list!
One of the great truths out there is that “people vote with their feet.” The immigration of the middle class to suburbia as an expression of their lack of confidence in the new emerging urban landscape of the 1960′s for example. There are wide ranging cries of rampant racism in the U.S. by the U.N. and other fellow travelers (feel free to check out this article I came across):
http://www.frontpagemagazine.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=8DE590C7-411A-4383-A0E1-249E57B17EDB
Yet, in spite of this the United States remains the number one destination of immigrants from all around the globe; funny how that is…

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Wow, I’m going to have a lot of reading to do. Thanks Wordsmith.

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