Le Monde

,4 Nov 2004 : I don’t know how often this happens, but obviously disasters like the one that has just occurred in the US don’t happen every day. ‘J.-M. C.’ (Jean-Marie Colombani) has written an opinion piece (Un monde à part). Here is a rough translation of some of what he had to say.

The temptation is almost blinding from now on, but Europeans have to be careful not to make anti-Americanism their ideology. … Not that Europe has to have a defence budget as gargantuan as the Pentagon’s, but as long as they consider the least increase in the military budget as a social regression, nothing will change. To be credible when one wishes to regulate the use of force, it is necessary to possess some.

We have to recognize that the incredible dynamism of the US economy is due in part to its ability to integrate waves of immigration. While Europe, which is ageing, thinks only of closing its borders.

Who would be able to understand a French ‘no’ vote to that minimum vital element which is the European constitution? … Since the fall of the Wall, it is not the European model that has arisen, but a different one, one that mixes economic liberty with moral surveillance. For that not to be one day our model, let the American vote at least be for us an electric shock.

Elsewhere they carry a translation of Timothy Garton Ash’s piece from The Guardian, one from Niall Ferguson and Ron Suskind’s article from The New York Times Magazine of 17 Oct.

They also quote Michael Ledeen as saying (on Iran) ‘We will not get anywhere as long as Colin Powell is Secretary of State’. (Obviously this has suffered a double translation).’

Still, Le Monde makes a change from the increasingly infantile Guardian, say.