This letter is associated with the following article:
Letters
Monday, January 23, 2006 12:00 AM

America's unlikely defender

French provocateur Bernard-Henri Levy denounces anti-Americanism and defends the idealism of the neocons.

Read other letters about this article

  • Monday, January 23, 2006 08:45 AM

    Possibility and Probability are two different things

    Bernard-Henri Levy declares "[t]he reality of the United States means the possibility of Europe." Those realities grow in America because they're impossibilities in Europe. His astonishment at the course of recent politics and intellects proves this.

    Even the European Union which BHL supports is inspired more by the United Nations than the United States. In any language the EU constitution is a bureaucratic nightmare, albeit a bureaucrat's dream. The debates over the European Union are stagnant pools of stillwater compared to American discussions on the US Constitution and America in general. Any hint of comparison of the EU with the US constitutions are immediately snuffed out with a dismissive wave of the hand, as if something not to the minister's taste had just been brought from the bureau's kitchen.

    If BHL was as open-minded or courageous as he wishes the American left were, he would consider more of his countrymen's anti-American prejudices - or even his own. As much as he likes American culture but despises American politics (and what open-minded European doesn't?), I should like to see him dare to write a book arguing the merits of the American political system over the European.

    He wouldn't lack for company if he does. British journalist Jonathan Freedland, himself no Rupert Murdoch or even William Kristol, wrote one called "Bring Home the Revolution." Even French author Regis Debray wrote "Empire 2.0," a modest tongue-in-cheek proposal for a pan-Atlantic political union.

Most Active Letters Threads

405

I'm thankful I'm not President Obama

Backers deride Katrina-style negligence, haters hate him more each day. Can this presidency be saved? Of course
321

Tough-guy John Bolton, hiding under his bed

As usual, right-wing pseudo-warriors are drowning in extreme cowardice.
320

Greg Craig and Obama's worsening civil liberties record

A new Time account of the fall of Obama's White House counsel sheds much light on rule of law issues.
207

A key British official reminds us of the forgotten anthrax attack

A vast array of establishment and expert sources do not believe this episode was really resolved.
154

Phil Carter's resignation from key detainee policy post

Many of the "War on Terror" policies he spent years condemning were ones expressly embraced by Obama.

View all »

Letters Help

Currently in Salon