I loathe America, and what it has done to the rest of the world.

Telegraph.Com ^ | Filed: 08/05/2003) | Margaret Drabble

[Leisler]

I knew that the wave of anti-Americanism that would swell up after the Iraq war would make me feel ill. And it has. It has made me much, much more ill than I had expected.

My anti-Americanism has become almost uncontrollable. It has possessed me, like a disease. It rises up in my throat like acid reflux, that fashionable American sickness. I now loathe the United States and what it has done to Iraq and the rest of the helpless world.

I can hardly bear to see the faces of Bush and Rumsfeld, or to watch their posturing body language, or to hear their self-satisfied and incoherent platitudes. The liberal press here has done its best to make them appear ridiculous, but these two men are not funny.

I was tipped into uncontainable rage by a report on Channel 4 News about "friendly fire", which included footage of what must have been one of the most horrific bombardments ever filmed. But what struck home hardest was the subsequent image, of a row of American warplanes, with grinning cartoon faces painted on their noses. Cartoon faces, with big sharp teeth.

It is grotesque. It is hideous. This great and powerful nation bombs foreign cities and the people in those cities from Disneyland cartoon planes out of comic strips. This is simply not possible. And yet, there they were.

Others have written eloquently about the euphemistic and affectionate names that the Americans give to their weapons of mass destruction: Big Boy, Little Boy, Daisy Cutter, and so forth.

We are accustomed to these sobriquets; to phrases such as "collateral damage" and "friendly fire" and "pre-emptive strikes". We have almost ceased to notice when suicide bombers are described as "cowards". The abuse of language is part of warfare. Long ago, Voltaire told us that we invent words to conceal truths. More recently, Orwell pointed out to us the dangers of Newspeak.

But there was something about those playfully grinning warplane faces that went beyond deception and distortion into the land of madness. A nation that can allow those faces to be painted as an image on its national aeroplanes has regressed into unimaginable irresponsibility. A nation that can paint those faces on death machines must be insane.

There, I have said it. I have tried to control my anti-Americanism, remembering the many Americans that I know and respect, but I can't keep it down any longer. I detest Disneyfication, I detest Coca-Cola, I detest burgers, I detest sentimental and violent Hollywood movies that tell lies about history.

I detest American imperialism, American infantilism, and American triumphalism about victories it didn't even win.

On April 29, 2000, I switched on CNN in my hotel room and, by chance, saw an item designed to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam war. The camera showed us a street scene in which a shabby elderly Vietnamese man was seen speaking English and bartering in dollars in a city that I took to be Ho Chi Minh City, still familiarly known in America by its old French colonial name of Saigon.

"The language of Shakespeare," the commentator intoned, "has conquered Vietnam." I did not note down the dialogue, though I can vouch for that sentence about the language of Shakespeare. But the word "dollar" was certainly repeated several times, and the implications of what the camera showed were clear enough.

The elderly Vietnamese man was impoverished, and he wanted hard currency. The Vietnamese had won the war, but had lost the peace.

Just leave Shakespeare and Shakespeare's homeland out of this squalid bit of revisionism, I thought at the time. Little did I then think that now, three years on, Shakespeare's country would have been dragged by our leader into this illegal, unjustifiable, aggressive war. We are all contaminated by it. Not in my name, I want to keep repeating, though I don't suppose anybody will listen.

America uses the word "democracy" as its battle cry, and its nervous soldiers gun down Iraqi civilians when they try to hold street demonstrations to protest against the invasion of their country. So much for democracy. (At least the British Army is better trained.)

America is one of the few countries in the world that executes minors. Well, it doesn't really execute them - it just keeps them in jail for years and years until they are old enough to execute, and then it executes them. It administers drugs to mentally disturbed prisoners on Death Row until they are back in their right mind, and then it executes them, too.

They call this justice and the rule of law. America is holding more than 600 people in detention in Guantánamo Bay, indefinitely, and it may well hold them there for ever. Guantánamo Bay has become the Bastille of America. They call this serving the cause of democracy and freedom.

I keep writing to Jack Straw about the so-called "illegal combatants", including minors, who are detained there without charge or trial or access to lawyers, and I shall go on writing to him and his successors until something happens. This one-way correspondence may last my lifetime. I suppose the minors won't be minors for long, although the youngest of them is only 13, so in time I shall have to drop that part of my objection, but I shall continue to protest.

A great democratic nation cannot behave in this manner. But it does. I keep remembering those words from Nineteen Eighty-Four, on the dynamics of history at the end of history, when O'Brien tells Winston: "Always there will be the intoxication of power… Always, at every moment, there will be the thrill of victory, the sensation of trampling on an enemy who is helpless. If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face - for ever."

We have seen enough boots in the past few months to last us a lifetime. Iraqi boots, American boots, British boots. Enough of boots.

I hate feeling this hatred. I have to keep reminding myself that if Bush hadn't been (so narrowly) elected, we wouldn't be here, and none of this would have happened. There is another America. Long live the other America, and may this one pass away soon.

[bk1000]

I believe she could do with a bit more fiber in her diet.

[Pukka Puck]

Very True, WaterDragon.

After all there is not much difference between the nutcase, leftist, ranter and the "news" report in the Telegraph regarding what happened at Fallujah, which was described as follows:

"Last week, Americans killed 15 people - among them two young boys - at Fallujah, an impoverished Shia area 30 miles west of Baghdad - when locals became angry at their occupation of the local school. Though the US troops say they fired in self-defence - and may well have done so - television footage of bleeding Iraqis, clearly unarmed, lying on the roads, have shocked Western viewers."

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/905654/posts

It appears that our "conservative friends" in Britain are highly skeptical about whether or not American troops would fire on unarmed protesters for no reason whatsoever. That certainly indicates a general bias against our troops, fanned by the Telegraph in multiple articles.

Neither the leftist ranter nor the reporter mention anything about AK_47s found in the area around the shootings or the fact that folks in the area later threw grenades over the wall of the compound where the troops were staying, wounding many of our troops.

[WaterDragon]

A conservative newspaper would report this AS Leftist drivel while pointing out the twisting of information, at the least. The Telegraph prints the article as-is, just another opinion, without comment.

I think the Telegraph, rather than being a conservative newspaper, is in fact something on the order of the Washington Post, which itself frequently prints conservative opinions occasionally, and also sometimes reports NEWS accurately (which is a conservative position to take in reporting.) The Telegraph also appears to have a conservative opinion page. Good for it.

It appears to me that Britain does NOT have, actually, a conservattive newspaper, but rather one that is SOMETIMES conservative, other times Leftist.

Now I begin to understand a bit more about what is considered conservatism in Britain. No, I won't ping you again. It appears rather hopeless.

I read the Washington Post and appreciate the accurate, professional reporting there WHEN it appears.

When I want to know what the Lefty/liberals have to say, there are the Washington Post, the New York Times, the L.A. Times, etc.

I DON'T expect to see THEIR VENOMOUS HATRED printed in the Washington Times or the Opinion Page of the Wall Street Journal, printed AS IF it were normal, professional comment or news.

[Tijeras_Slim]

Apparently this is the same Margret Drabble who writes very tedious, boring, and pedantic introductions to the Signet editions of Jane Austen books.

[prairiebreeze]

bttt

[Happygal]

What part of 'don't ping' me DON'T you understand?

[Jakarta ex-pat]

"On April 29, 2000, I switched on CNN in my hotel room and.."

I guess that's about all there is to say.

[WaterDragon]

When you ping me, I'll probably ping you back.

By the way, why do you post so many articles from the supposedly-conservative Telegraph....articles that insult Americans?

That garbage is regularly available from the Guardian, the New York Times, the L.A. Times, etc.

Our conservative newspapers don't print trash like this. They leave that to the Lefty newspapers.

[Happygal]

Water Dragon - I am not interested in carrying on the same old, same old with you on this issue. I've asked you repeatedly to stop pinging me on this subject.

I am not interested in getting into a flame war with you.

[HamiltonJay]

I detest American imperialism, American infantilism, and American triumphalism about victories it didn't even win.

So she detests something that doesn't exist, is long over and things that never existed? Sounds like a real catch... gotta have pity for her husband, or maybe she is the husband.

[Dad was my hero]

There is NO doubt that HATE is the property of the LEFT.

This woman no doubt is someone who probably has a bumpersticker preaching "Hate is not a family value." I love how indignant liberals can be when they are:

1) out of power and...

2) proven time and time again to be wrong.

Her tone of moral superiority comes through loud and clear, why doesn't she just say, I'm superior to conservatives and the military? Then we could applaud her courage to speak out and the bravery it shows. (I think I'm sick after writing that about this piece of crap.)

[WaterDragon]

Then please stop pinging me.

[js1138]

I wonder how she'll feel in 2012 when Jeb is running.

[AnAmericanMother]

Apparently this is the same Margret Drabble who writes very tedious, boring, and pedantic introductions to the Signet editions of Jane Austen books.

I don't have Miss Austen's books with me, but I believe you are correct. I don't mind pedantic, but I can't stand boring. And she also pushes the feminist line and blames Miss Austen for failing to adhere to HER enlightened 21st century doctrines, which are of course correctly whatever the place and time. She condemns Miss Austen for having Marianne Dashwood marry Colonel Brandon - thinks it's an "unhappy ending" and claims that it was just stuck on because Miss Austen couldn't figure out what to do with an "independent woman." This argument is so totally out of touch with 19th century life, Miss Austen's writings, and even reality in general that it's hard to understand.

Jane lies in Winchester--blessed be her shade!
Praise the lord for making her, and her for all she made!
And while the stones of Winchester, or Milsom Street, remain,
Glory, love, and honour unto England's Jane!

- Rudyard Kipling

[CobaltBlue]

>>The elderly Vietnamese man was impoverished, and he wanted hard currency. The Vietnamese had won the war, but had lost the peace.<<

Which ought to give her a clue, you'd think.

[Celtic Conservative]

This is how I sum this diatribe up:

" I detest America, I detest disneyfication, I detest burgers...BUT, GOD DO I LOVE THE SOUND OF MY OWN VOICE!"

---

Slainte,

CC

[TaxRelief]

She also defaces new editions of Moby Dick with her rambling essays about how color-blind the Melville is.

[Rocko]

I wonder how she'll feel in 2012 when Jeb is running.

If she writes a few more pieces like this, she'll have given herself a stroke before then.

[bootless]

Sheesh, who p***ed in HER B!tch Flakes this morning?!