Here is the rule: the degree to which Europe is amoral is directly proportional to the degree of its spokesmen's moral posturing against the U.S.

Look at the unrest in Lebanon, the voting in the West Bank, fear in Libya, pressure to reform from the Gulf to Egypt—all impossible without the removal and humiliation of Saddam Hussein, who, had he remained in power, would be nursing Arab pride by blaming us while he recycled petro-dollars, hand in glove with corrupt UN officials and Euros, for more weapons and his own debauchery

says Victor Davis Hanson in an interview with Arthur Chrenkoff (thanks to Instapundit).

Look, the more we [and the Europeans] talk about past "shared values" and a once "common heritage," the more we know the present problem: a postmodern Europe doesn't want to spend any money on defense, and is furious that the US doesn't follow its multilateral lead in a policy that could be described as moral sanctimoniousness while millions die and the West totters—whether that is a matter of Milosveric, Darfur, the Taliban, or Saddam.

So we are on to them at last; here is the rule regarding these strange folk who peddle weapons to communist China, whitewash Hizbollah, fund Hamas, and looted Iraq: the degree to which Europe is amoral by either its commission or negligence is directly proportional to the degree we see in its media and state spokesmen moral posturing and invective against the United States.

So... we sit tight, praise them, and keep our powder dry, looking to see the fallow out from Islamicism on their shores, and whether they curb anti-Semitism, get their birthrates up, rearm and make a real alliance, avoid antagonizing a surrounded Russia, and buy off an Iran or crazy former Soviet Republic. We cannot do much in all that and so should expect very little from them and get ready for some pretty crazy things coming out of Europe in the next few years. …

Look at Jason Blair, Rathergate, the Moyers PBS family octopus, the crazy CNN President's statements, and so on. The old reformers on four feet are the new entrenched on two inside the former farmer's house, to paraphrase Orwell who had seen the same thing in the socialist world of the 1930s. …