Europe

When it came down to it, two of America's closest Cold War allies -- France and Germany -- were unwilling to bear the responsibility of major powers when it came to Iraq. They weren't there when we -- and the world -- needed them. Instead, they carped, complained,...

According to French President Jacques Chirac, the United States is little more than a bully on the world stage, determined to intimidate all who fail to see the need to disarm Saddam Hussein. But we have nothing on Chirac, who can bully with the best of them when...

Leading French politicians made some remarkably defeatist pronouncements last month. Rejecting any U.S. military action against Iraq, President Jacques Chirac said that "War is always the admission of defeat, and is always the worst of solutions. And hence everything...

Things looked so clear in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, when the forces of civilization stood on one side and the barbarians on the other. The very evening after the attack, President Bush announced that "America and our friends and allies join with all those who...

Two years ago, politicians and bureaucrats at the European Commission announced their intention to turn the 15 nations of the European Union into "the most competitive knowledge-based economy in the world by 2010." This is a tall order. Smothered by oppressive tax...

You don't have to be an economist to know that when tax collectors from the European Union complain about "certain distortions of competition" and announce a need to "correct" it, a blueprint for higher taxes can't be far behind. This normally wouldn't concern most...

The rocks have been lifted all over Europe, and the snakes of Jew-hatred are slithering free. In Belgium, thugs beat up the chief rabbi, kicking him in the face and calling him "a dirty Jew." Two synagogues in Brussels were firebombed; a third, in Charleroi, was...

Globalization is bad news for the world's over-taxed welfare states, particularly those in Europe. Thanks to the increased mobility of capital, individuals can more easily shift their economic activity to low-tax jurisdictions. Such tax competition liberalizes the...

Dear Sir, The policy of military conscription followed by the Greek government is an absolute and unmitigated outrage. At the beginning of their adult lives, young Greek men are enslaved into the military, with their formative years, career plans, and even their lives...

High oil prices and rising fuel taxes have lit an explosion of fury across the European continent, resulting in protests and blockades of depots and refineries. Following the recent oil price rise, the Europeans have finally realized what a massive burden fuel taxes...

In recent years, the leftist parties of England and Germany returned to power by promising voters that they had turned their back on command and control, tax and spend, economic policies. Instead they promised to "transcend" the old right and left by pursuing an...

In Judge Jackson's "findings of fact" in which he declared Microsoft to be a dangerous monopoly, one fact was undisputed: the defendant is extraordinarily successful. This success is often described in terms of "market share," which is a measurement of millions of...

For years the socialists have been claiming that England should join the single European currency (the Euro) and should follow a central economic policy as voted by all 15 nations. England, we are told, faces dire economic woes if it fails to join the economic "party"...