Economics: Europe has been the source of many of America's most beloved fairy tales. Not all are of ancient origin. Take the European Union's insistence five years ago that its economy would leapfrog ours by 2010. The so-called Lisbon Strategy was unveiled with much fanfare. Struck in the Portuguese capital, the deal essentially predicted the EU economy would pass up America's and leave it in the dust. At the time, it sounded reasonable. The EU was adding new members, and the common wisdom was that the U.S., though a big military power, was suffering from what geostrategists like to call...