Regression to the mean for both Iraq and America.

I will believe the EU is viable when it has a single seat at the UN and a single soccer team in FIFA. Until then, as long as it constituent subject polities pretend independence, it does not exist.

In the early 1930s even the Social Democrat Party in Germany had street thugs (one later become a professor at the U. OK.), unfortunately the amoral, dictatorial parties (Nazis and Communists) were better at it. Always will be.

There is nothing in these videos that couldn't have been exposed in "teach-ins" in the 1960s. Nearly 50 years on, it's too late short of total abolition of universities and governments to rescue the USA from the worshippers of Stalin, Mao, and Castro: they have colonized all academia, all levels of government, and are currently the majority in most representative bodies.

The book was hilariously anti-human; not merely anti-humanist, but anti-human. (Not surprising given the behavior of Europeans in the 20th century.) The book, too, had a surprise ending: that apes were reading the astronaut's journal. That ending couldn't be used by the movie, of course, because it couldn't be hidden that the spacefarers (in the book, the apes have a highly technological civilization, superior to humans) who found the message in a bottle were apes.

In it the fall of human race came about from... reading detective novels (among other things). Boulle blamed intellectual and cultural laziness for the collapse. He's the heir of Nietzsche, who complained about little minds reading newspapers (similar to Mussolini fan Cole Porter, say, complaining about ruining your mind listening to the little radios--I wonder which idiots echo this message today?).

In more modern movies the evolutionary successors to men are machines, as in the Matrix: "when we began to do your thinking for you, it become our civilization." Showing people failing to read European philosophy (for their own good) seemed to lack drama so in the movie the eco-nuclear catastrophe was substituted for it. As we now know, showing people becoming stupid by failing to read makes for a very watchable documentary on America's schools.

Planet of the Apes (the book) can be read as a racist track against slavery; e.g., if you hire slaves to do your work for you, you lose the necessary vigor to support a civilization, then become degenerates. It's a timeless message, the replacement of civilization by the scorned underclass, whether by Tacitus or Raspail or Onstott.

And this i s different from the pro-Soviet stories NPR & PBS ran in the 1970s and 1980s how? Rail freely, here and elsewhere. Talk is all that will ever happen. No abolition. No effective action.

I have no opinion on politicians performing in reality TV, but I wish politicians would live in reality.

'Apparently Batman couldn’t find any actual Frenchman to be the “French savior.”'

This does reflect reality. And to Moslems, the French have the same right to their "ancestral lands" as the Jews do to Israel. And in this case, I favor the Moslems; they're almost indistinguishable from France's current occupants: anti-Semitic, anti-Amercian, anti-freedom, anti-Capitalist. An Islamic France couldn't come too soon for my tastes. Couldn't happen to a nicer bunch.

I had always assumed this was an EU phenomenon. Was no one in the store willing to spray these neo-Nazis with catsup? Yes, "neo-Nazis," because if you don't want to be compared to Nazis, don't call for boycotts on Jewish businesses. Next time, spray them with red paint (a la PETA); scream "nazi" at them. I'm ashamed that America contains such Jew-haters.

"almost every other country in the Western world did the exact same thing, most of them prior to the 13th Amendment"

On the contrary, most of the countries in the Western World abolished slavery in my lifetime. And until recently, EUrope was crowded with academics and theorists defending slavery: Wells, Shaw, etc.

Oh, don't recall this? Slavery was ended in France, Belgium, Netherlands, Denmark, Norway, etc. only when Nazis were overthrown. Or don't slave labour camps count as slavery? And every academic who praised Hitler was in favor of slavery. Slavery was ended in Germany, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Estonia, Russia, Romania, etc. only when Communism ended. Or don't slave labour camps count as slavery? And every academic who praised Socialism with a Human Face defended slavery.

EUrope was ruled by slave states until 1991!

Why would Obama punish his allies and friends? Totalitarian Socialism is Obama's ideology. He's probably taking notes right now.

Man up, Costa Rica. If you're that desperate, call me. I'll buy the country a box of AK47 rounds. Stop being neutral like Costa Rica and start being neutral like Switzerland. Costa Rica needs a militia. Oh, heck. I'm fifty-something. Buy my plane ticket and arrange for enough weapons and ammo and I'll clear that island with a few volunteers. (I'm surprised no one in Costa Rica is willing to fight for his or her country.)

Do not solve this problem through diplomacy. It's like explaining to a puppy why being house-broken is of benefit to everyone. It won't clean up the mess or stop the next one.