This is for commenter Bradley13, from Amy's post about Europe yesterday, in which he said some inane and smirky things about the the United States' place in the world... But then refused to answer questions.

Well, Bradley's made about thousand comments here, which is a lot of comments. He has strong feelings about how we should be doing things! But he's not been here so frequently or eloquently as to have established an identity.

When someone with an American-sounding signature offers offhand instruction about how our policy and and culture ought to work, you'd wanna know if that person didn't actually have anything of their own on the line, right? Well, for these topics, Bradley13 didn't bother to mention that he was speaking from (and presumably for) another nation:

US immigration enforcement (multiple topics)

US Tax policy (multiple topics)

Racism in the United States (multiple topics)

US credit practices (multiple topics)

US Employment Benefits

Pornography law in the United States

Spending scandals at the Veteran's Administration

USA Food freshness standards

Islamic practice in the United States (multiple topics)

First Amendment exclusions and parameters (multiple topics)

Criminal prosecutions in the United States

PBS and NPR

Street signs in New York City

Obama (multiple topics)

Oprah Winfrey

Freedom of religious association in the United States

Health Insurance for illegal aliens in the United States

Olympic participation by the United States

The Americans with Disabilities Act

Feminism in the United States

Do you suppose Bradley13 has strong feelings about how his country might be doing better? I see no reason to think so, but he apparently doesn't give it a lot of thought... Or feels so impotent there that he doesn't bother to form the words. No, he just likes to show up, unidentified, in the strongest, most rewarding and decent culture the world has ever known to say you're not so cool...

The favorite passage from our comedian, PJ, written about the primitive world, but no less applicable in modern Europe:

The Third World attitude toward the United States is also easy to understand if you think of it in terms of adolescence. The citizens of the Third World are in a teenage muddle about us--full of envy, imitation, anger and blind puppy love. I have been held at gunpoint by a Shi'ite youth in West Beirut who told me in one breath that America was "pig Satan devil" and that he planned to go to dental school in Dearborn as soon as he got his green card. In Ulundi, in Zululand, I talked to a young man who, as usual, blamed apartheid on the United States. However, he had just visited the U.S. with a church group and also told me, "Everything is so wonderful there. The race relations are so good. And everyone is rich." Just what part of America had he visited, I asked. "The South Side of Chicago," he said.

We are a beautiful twenty-year-old woman and they are a wildly infatuated thirteen-year-old boy. They think of us every moment of the day and we take no notice of them whatsoever. If they can't have a chance to love us, a chance to pester us will do--by becoming "Communists," for example. Anything for attention.

PJ O'Rourke
Give War a Chance
©1992, First Grove Press

Bradley13 boasts, weirdly, of military service: But of course, Switzerland is most famous for pussing out of war in order to play politics, a posture increasingly irrelevant in the era of modern banking. When you read about their military, it's pathos from head to toe: Old men stumbling in administrative spazz-circles. In Kosovo, essentially their own backyard, no Swiss soldiers were even armed. You'll search endlessly for the name of a single causality since the 19th century.

But one of the most interesting things I read from the Swiss government in ten minutes of Googling last night was this:

Approximately two-thirds of Switzerland's oil imports are in the form of finished products, while the remaining third is in the form of crude oil. Around 88% of the crude oil imported into Switzerland comes from countries of North and West Africa, while finished products are imported solely from EU countries.

That passage is remarkable, given the ferocity of Bradley13's (factually incorrect) comments about the United States in Iraq yesterday. Smart folks know the States never got more that 15% of its oil from the whole of the Middle East; the eradication of Saddam's crime family from the first- or second-largest source of crude oil on the planet happened basically on behalf of Europe and (soon enough, thirsty) Asia. If Bradley13 knew how to deal with such things, he'd have done so himself, as would his nation..

Duplicitous, cowardly posturing in Bradley13's style is everywhere in Europe, and it deserves a better takedown than this... But it's time to sleep. More later if anyone wants to read it.

Let me know.

To follow up on Crid's summary: The United States' dependence on Middle Eastern oil is and has always been a creation of the American Left. But, thanks the disrupting effects of technology (there's that again!), we are now very close to being able to bypass that, and then we will have no further need of Mideast oil (or Mideast anything). The liberalization of the Middle East and its oil, if it is to occur at all, will be largely so that Western Europe does not totally become a colony of Russia.

However, it does seem that many in western Europe actually welcome that possibility. So maybe we should stop knocking ourselves out -- which does seem to be the widespread attitude among Americans today, and who can blame them?

But of course, Switzerland is most famous for pussing out of war in order to play politics, a posture increasingly irrelevant in the era of modern banking. -- Crid at June 19, 2014 1:51 AM

If you knew the history of the Swiss, their troops were some of the best trained and fearsome fighterz for centuries.

That is why in the signing of the Treaty of Paris (1815) all the other treaty countries the signing of the Act of Acknowledgement and Guarantee of the perpetual Neutrality of Switzerland.

They have kept their promise to this day. The only Swiss military outside of the country are the Papal Guards.

Nope, didn't know that. And in the context of 20th and 21st century outcomes, I don't care, either.

Whatever the Swiss and their neighbors did to make peace with each other, including deployment of magical thinking about one nation's forces detached from practical outcomes, it didn't matter... The cycles of violence continued, spiraling eventually into the application of modern industrial technique in slaughter: The Holocaust.

The United States made the difference, and we did it through sacrifice and involvement, not by pretending to stay out of the way (but then boasting of our military service).

Well Crid, I hope you enjoyed your little research project. Let me fill in the blanks for you: I grew up in Texas and spent 10 years in the U.S. military. The reason I have such strong opinions about US emigration and tax policy is because they directly affected me for many years after I moved abroad. With the advent of FATCA, it became impossible to live as an American in a foreign country unless you are willing to agree to some outrageous conditions. (Details are unimportant here; presumably they are in my previous posts). So I handed in my US citizenship, and am now purely a citizen of my adopted country.

That whole story is a bit long to post as a footnote to every post I make. And why is it important? Surely an opinion can be evaluated on the basis of its own merits?

I am not sure what facts you think I got wrong about Iraq. I said that the US attack in 2003 made a bad situation worse, by replacing a dictator with chaos and a whole new generation of Islamic extremists who hate the West. You say this was "on behalf of Europe" - as I said yesterday "gee, thanks".

Your comments about Switzerland are ill-informed, but given the tone of your posts there is no point to further discussion. Rah-rah, America is the best, America can do no wrong, down with anyone who dares offer criticism. Ad hominem debating tactics win the day.

Bye now...

> Let me fill in the blanks for you:

There are no blanks— You've selected a team and a set of beliefs, all very clear to us.

> Details are unimportant here;

Then why are you troubling us with your darling snowflake specifics at all?

> presumably they are in my previous posts

You have to "presume" the meaning of your own words, and expect our trust?

> And why is it important?

Because your interests and ours aren't covalent, and it's obviously dishonest for you to pretend that they are.

> You say this was "on behalf of Europe" -
> as I said yesterday "gee, thanks".

Exactly. In a world of blood and tragedy, America's neutering shelter of Europe has reduced your discourse to teenage snark as political expression.

> Rah-rah, America is the best, America
> can do no wrong

I never said anything of the kind, otherwise you'd have offered a direct quotation instead of a schoolboy's sarcasm; only that American supremacy has brought more peace, wealth, intelligence and decency to the world than was possible by any other scenario. This is essentially beyond dispute. And while this might be humbling to other, older nations, there's no need to be bashful about it. The United States of America summoned these wonders; Switzerland quite obviously did not.

> Ad hominem debating tactics

No A.H. at work in these threads. And as I noted just a few days ago, chatter about A.H. is inexplicably popular with people whose lives are undistracted by either Latin or logic.

> Bye now...

Tressider used to do that, too. People who get call starlet-on-a-soundstage huffy and say I'm outta here!/ on the way to their trailers don't really mean it... They'll always be back under the Klieg lights before anyone wants to see them again.

Is there some kind of soccer match happening over the weekend?