Bush is in Europe where he's supposed to act nice to the Europeans, especially the French. This is such b.s. I mean, come on, some people in France thinks Bush shouldn't have been invited to D-Day celebrations. The American President shouldn't be present at a commemoration of the liberation of Europe from Nazi tyranny? That's just bizarre.

What is this strange fascination some in the media have with the Europeans and what they think of us? Who cares? How come no one ever questions what the Bolivians think (probably nothing good) or the Mongolians (maybe ok, they are with us in Iraq)? Doesn't anyone remember that our country was founded by people who didn't give a rip what their fellow countrymen (i.e., Europeans) thought of them and just wanted to get away, start over and be free?

What's a European anyway? There are a bunch of countries over there (ok, ok, I know stupid American, can't specify just how many) and we're supposed to believe that the Swedes think about us the same way as the Poles and the Portugese. Please! That's like saying Texans and Vermonters see the world the same way (and trust me having lived in or near both places, they don't!) because they are both part of the U.S.A.

Since we have been told ad nauseum that we are hated everywhere, what difference can it make how we act or what the President does or says? I think we should wear the Europeans' disdain of us as a badge of honor. They aren't going to like us any better if we are obsequious and weak and toady to their arrogant condescenion and hatred of us. They will just feel all the more justified.

I read a great line in a book recently, can't remember the name of it offhand but the novel was set at the end of WWII in post-war Germany and it went something like this: "The British walk around like they own the world, the French walk like they should own it and the Americans walk like they don't care who owns it." We don't. We have our thing here and we don't want what anyone else has or thinks they have. We don't want an empire. Truth be told, we're Garboesque...we want to be left alone. But no one else in the world can ever seem to solve their problems without our help. And then they spit on us for it (pretty much all except the Israelis, who stand up and fight for themselves and don't expect us to do it for them).

I will concern myself with the Europeans and their view of us the day we have to set aside land in our country for the the graves of foreign soldiers who died fighting to protect and defend us. Won't ever happen but until it does, I'll just go on being the stupid, ugly American being sneered at by all those cultured Euro-snobs.