Kagan's Heroes

The weasels will soon descend on the Bush Administration's carcass to fight over the scraps of 43's legacy. I'll stick my toe in before the sharks. In 2000, Western Europe was ruled by far-left anti-American governments. With the recent Tory landslide, the Bush presidency has succeeded in wrenching Europe right. Schroeder and Chirac have been replaced by Merkel and Sarkozy, Berlusconi sits astride Italy, and Labour is being wrung out--not just in England but across the continent. With the exception of Spain—the first European country toppled by Islamic crusaders in a millennium--Europe has done an about face in the last 8 years. Liberals will see and find nothing but paradoxes in this. And American conservatives, put off by alien Continental politics and the dazzling styles of European statesman like Sarkozy and Berlusconi, may be unaware that their stake is improving. Europeans are beginning to suspect that low opportunity, declining demographics and spiritual emptiness are the roots of their weakness and not youth gangs—they are the carrion.