I think Dave Schuler has it right. A new president will not change the fundamental differences between Europe and the United States. It's more than the war, more than foreign policy differences, it's a difference in attitudes about who we are in the world.

Well, you're BOTH right, so far as you each go. What yo're missing, here is what explains the brittle-ness of the exchanges; The Euopians are seeking to supplant the US as the dominant force in world politics, and in world culture. What did you think the EU was, simply a monetary arrangement?

I watched a recent program about developing a new racing motorcycle and was struck about what one of the Italian designers said. He spoke of Americans not being programed to fail. What he meant was we see the sky as the limit and are not limited by class structure while Europeans still hold class distinctions and the idea you should never aspire to be more than you are born. That concept has no place in American thinking and we are judged arrogant for not recognizing it. That perceived arrogance is a good part of why Europeans dislike us yet also envy us.

We can't undo the last hundred years of American power and prestige that led to this envy. We can't undo our economic progress that made us the envy of the world. We can never stop thinking like Americans who ignore class lines and teach our children they can do anything and be anybody they want. Our optimism will always be somewhat irritating to some.

Oh, I think Americans are interested in sacrifice. It's just that most of us are interested in letting someone else, or someone else's kid, make the sacrifice.

Personal sacrifice? No, I don't think so.
Fighting the war? No, not really.
Paying for the war? Forget it.

Aside from the dispute over the war in Iraq, the issues which divide us are overstated and our commonality of interests vastly understated.

I agree with this, James, but I think that it should be emphasized that the overstatements and understatements are on both sides of the Atlantic. That having been said I think there are real differences, too, that neither most Europeans nor most Americans probably appreciate. Politically, the U. S. is an outlier. Our mainstream politics ends nearly where French mainstream politics begins.

My own view is that both sides of the Atlantic need to agree to disagree. They're entitled to their opinions and systems and we're entitled to ours and I have no more reason to believe that we'd be happy under the accommodations that they're satisfied with than I am that they'd be happy with ours. Live and let live.

However, I've been arguing for probably the last seven years that any notion that a new president will heal all ills is, in Sam Clemens's words, an exaggeration. Our European cousins have been mistrusting and looking down on us for the last 200 years or more and I doubt that a change of administration will change their minds.