Doesn’t sound much like our friends the cheese-eating surrender monkeys to me. What happened?! Is it possible, perish the thought, that the French were right on Iraq and are now right on Iran??

France elected a conservative for the first time since—well, ever?

With the news that Iran has a ‘smart bomb’ and is willing to use them on ‘their enemies’, one has to now try to discern: who does Iran consider their enemies?

If he’s opposed to Turkey’s becoming a member of the EU, he’s a fool. This is a great and wonderful opportunity to coopt moderate Muslims (the great majority) and expose the bankruptcy of the extreme Islamist agenda.

Is it possible to be elected in France and NOT oppose Turkish entry to the EU?  I too think it’s folly, but it may be one of those things a candidate has to affirm/decry to get elected.

#4

Hi, I’m glad we’re friends and can agree on some things. I dropped off the previous thread - different time zones. By the way, I’m not English, though I am British.

As am I.  I’ve dropped off that thread, too, I rarely look at anything that isn’t on the first page.  Tends to turn into talking to myself if I do. 
Distinction noted.  Don’t know why, but had it in my head you were Cornish. 

I’m hopeful that Sarkozy may come around on turkey as the election fades.  Maybe if only to move to simply remaining silent in public and not working against it in private.  Do you know Merkel’s position offhand?

If he’s opposed to Turkey’s becoming a member of the EU, he’s a fool.
I find that bafflingly wrong-headed.

I’m with Sherri,
Though Turkey has some small portion of its land in Europe, it is basically an eastern nation, not a western one.

And just why, would the EU be strengthened by bringing the Turks in, be they secular Muslims or not?  It seems that a large part of Europe’s problems, apart from their growing secularism, is a surfeit of Moslems turning the place upside down.

Oops, I’m sorry. It is Sarkozy I find bafflingly wrongheaded. Turkey is moderate and has been a friend to the west more than once. Why not let them in?

Turkey is a secular democracy today ONLY because periodically (every decade or so) the MILITARY steps in and sets aside the looney, popularly elected Islamist government seeking to overturn Attaturk’s secularizing reforms.  You’d immediatly end up with potential millions of radicalized Islamists (not your fantasy secular Turks) let loose into the continent…

True, I’ve had the actions of the Turkish military sued as examples of a “good coup” but isn’t Europe more or less awash in radicalized Islam already?  Or is it just France?

Make that “used” not “sued.”

Europe certainly is.  The Turks are great military allies and members of NATO.  Their secular military is a great ally.  However, the issue with allowing them into the EU would be that it would completely erase the border between Europe and a large Muslim nation full of Islamists (not just the secular Turks you run into on your discount mediterranean vacation).

The counter argument is that membership in the EU would help draw Turkey into that orbit, and away from the Arab middle east.  Membership in the EU would prevent the imposition of Sharia, and give secularism some breathing space, as well as giving protections to the Turkish Christians.  The spread of Muslims in Europe is already far enough along that letting Turkey in wouldn’t be as huge a jump as it would be otherwise (we’re only what, two generations from Eurabia anyway?) while denying Turkish entry gives a useful prop to the Islamists who say “look, we can never live peacefully with the West, they will never accept us.”