Europeans believe in democracy - or, at least, in republican government - but they have considered the alternatives, and continue to do so, and that scandalizes Americans.

The problems of elites is an old one for which Americans have found no solid answer.

For four hundred years European civilization has dominated the world - for better or for worse. It is convenient, and flattering, for Americans to assume that this is all over; but it very rash to do so.

Our culture is teleological-it presumes purposive development and a conclusion.

The moral spectacle of capitalism still offends, as does American capitalism's implacable insistence that the market determine value even in the political, intellectual, and artistic spheres.

The center holds; passion falls away. That is what happened ideologically in Western Europe over recent years.

But Americans are different from everyone else in the world - except the Canadians, and Americans are more different from the Canadians than they often think.