I’m here listening to the United States Senate lob nice, gentle questions to Condeleeza Rice, the person who could not anticipate any terrorist acts against the country despite her access to every bit of intelligence the country held. It’s amazing to me that Rice is treated so kindly and thoughtfully and that the Democratic Senators perceive themselves as having so little “political capital.”
What’s the point? The point is that today, while these hearings are going on, Airbus has released the massive and immensely fascinating Airbus A380 family of planes. A collaboration among almost every major European country, the new airplane is supremely fuel efficient, can carry 555 passengers, and will be available for service in 2006. The airplane has two decks and (in typical European fashion) three classes. The development and production of this airplane is an indication of Europe’s new economic, technological, and monetary strength and stands in sharp contrast to the more-of-the-same coming out of our Washington, D.C.
Interestingly, one of the U.S. Senators today mentioned a new book by a journalist named T. R. Reid called The United States Of Europe: The New Superpower and the End of American Supremacy. I finished this book yesterday and it’s an absolutey must read for anyone concerned about the future of these United States.
Reid, a Washington Post writer, has written a book that demonstrates how Europe has quietly constructed a powerful new United States that is quickly becoming more economically instrumental in the world while maintaining its high quality of living and social security. The twenty-five nations that banded together to form the European Union have spent their entire “political capital” to ensure that their collective nationality can not only become an effective economic force but maintain its high standards for health, human rights, and transportation. Reid is careful to point out that the extraordinary amount of money used to support the European welfare state comes in part from the subsidies of the U.S. over the past 50 years in the form of military and other assistance. But Reid’s overall point is that the new U.S.E. has created a political, cultural, and social powerhouse despite its darkly divided historical record — and it’s done so with very little recognition on the part of most Americans of prominence.