Casual
STELZER, IRWIN M.
Casual HOMEWARD BOUND When your eyes tear up at the singing of "God Bless America" during the broadcast of the Super Bowl on your favorite British television station, it's time to go home. That's...
...So harrumph some old-line Tories, who recall their ancestors' courage in the Sudan from their easy chairs at their clubs...
...is useless, and that Saddam must go...
...Bush's sentences are a horror, not the sort we were taught to use at the (mostly) posh Eastern schools we attended, and not at all as well formed as those of our heroes, Adlai Stevenson, Jack Kennedy (he and Jackie never, ever embarrassed us when they visited Europe), and even Bill Clinton, whose drawl is simply charming...
...London is a wonderful place, but it has suddenly become more foreign, more hostile, at times drowning us in a rising tide of anti-Americanism...
...The prime minister, at great damage to his political standing, will be with us in Iraq because—cynics, take note—"it is the right thing to do...
...Not all are quite as, er, unversed as one who at a dinner party told me she resented being called "expatriot" when she visits America...
...The native political class is worse...
...The followers of Labour's lefty politicians at least have a degree of courage not present in their elected representatives...
...And then there is all that Shakespeare, ballet, opera, and music...
...They have boarded buses for a leisurely, fun-filled tour of Europe, en route to Iraq, where they plan to deploy themselves as human shields to protect the military installations that will be the targets of the Anglo-American coalition when it loses patience with the U.N.'s foot-dragging...
...They love Florida in the winter, New York any time of year, understand that the U.N...
...To its members, America is the debaser of Britain's culture...
...No matter: Once you have decided that American rednecks subsist on reality television and Texas barbecues, and shun Britain's elevating but breathtakingly boring television, facts become the enemy of truth, to resurrect a slogan of the old left...
...Why, Britain's television audiences seem to prefer The West Wing and The Simpsons to the latest BBC documentary on the fate of Scotland's hedgehogs...
...And that's just the Am^iricans resident in Britain...
...Bush wasn't "really" elected, but was appointed by a rabidly right-wing Supreme Court...
...has the moral authority to disarm Iraq by force, and wish the Bushies would treat our European allies, France and Germany, with more deference...
...The expat litany goes something like this...
...Most of all, please don’t associate us with his unilateralism: We favor the Kyoto accord, think that only the U.N...
...Nor can an American in London take much comfort from the political right...
...IRWIN M. STELZER...
...Prime Minister Tony Blair may be a stalwart supporter of America...
...Start with a group you might think would be on our—America's—side: expatriate American citizens...
...When I explained that she had misunderstood the word, she shed 30 years of resentment at being tagged with what she considered an unpleasant label...
...And they treat us Americans as the cousins we are...
...But his is now a lonely voice...
...don't blame me, I voted for Gore...
...It seems that the absence of these American philistines is sharply reducing audiences for Shakespeare plays, the ballet, and the opera, threatening the finances of these arts groups...
...he may say over and over that Britain and America share common values...
...The Labour left views America as an evil force...
...That's what my wife, Cita, and I decided...
...Let me not leave you with an unre-lievedly gloomy picture...
...Not that expatriot is entirely inapt, either in my dinner companion's case or in that of many other Americans who have chosen to live permanently in Britain...
...he may emphasize the powerful influence that ^^ Britain has on American policy...
...The president's positions on gun control and abortion certainly don't reflect those of any Americans we know, and his flag-waving should have gone out of style with Teddy Roosevelt...
...But when a couple is tired of anti-Americanism, it's best to get out of London...
...A contradiction...
...At least for a while...
...Worse still, Americans are not visiting Britain in the same numbers as in the past, in part because they are too cowardly to travel when a war in the Middle East looms...
...Cab drivers, shop clerks, construction workers, and others who don't hobnob with the chattering classes are pro-American almost to a man and a woman...
...Johnson had it right, "When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life...
...its parliamentary members shuttle to Baghdad to pay court to Saddam Hussein...
...Like most expatriates we meet, she finds George W. Bush an embarrassment, and feels forced to forestall any guilt-by-association by making her contempt for the president clear to all auditors...
...They believe the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the rest of the media are Bush's poodles, and that's how he can get away with his saber-rattling and oppression of the domestic poor...
Vol. 8 • February 2003 • No. 21
