For someone who slags environmentalists, there seems to be a whole lot of recycling going on in Mark Steyn’s writing. The same chunks of text in one article (at times identical, at times slightly rephrased) seem to be repurposed in one or several columns on (ostensibly) different topics. I’m sure this occurs to some extent with all writers, but this much, and so easy to find?
1. An article published by Imprimis in August 2008 (the same piece appeared in New Zealand’s Investigate Magazine on October 2008) contains a section from a 2002 National Post column, along with paragraphs found in three separate Maclean’s columns on a variety of topics, two of which were published earlier (January and February 2008), and one later (April 2009). The American version appears as Copyright © 2008 Hillsdale College.
From “Lights out on Liberty”, Mark Steyn, Imprimis/Investigate, 2008:
For example, a recent poll found that 36 percent of Muslims between the ages of 16 and 24 believe that those who convert to another religion should be punished by death. That’s not 36 percent of young Muslims in Waziristan or Yemen or Sudan, but 36 percent of young Muslims in the United Kingdom. Forty percent of British Muslims would like to live under Sharia—in Britain. Twenty percent have sympathy for the July 7 Tube bombers. And, given that Islam is the principal source of population growth in every city down the spine of England from Manchester to Sheffield to Birmingham to London, and in every major Western European city, these statistics are not without significance for the future.
From “Here's what offends this writer”, Mark Steyn, Maclean’s, Jan. 3, 2008:
For example, a recent poll found that 36 per cent of Muslims between the ages of 16 and 24 believe that those who convert to another religion should be punished by death. That's not 36 per cent of young Muslims in Waziristan or Yemen or Sudan, but 36 per cent in the United Kingdom. Forty per cent of British Muslims would like to live under sharia, in Britain. Twenty per cent have sympathy for the July 7 Tube bombers. And, given that Islam is the principal source of population growth in every city down the spine of England from Manchester to Sheffield to Birmingham to London, these statistics are not without significance for Britain's future.
From “Lights out on Liberty”, Imprimis/Investigate, August, 2008:
Last month, in a characteristically clotted speech followed by a rather more careless BBC interview, the Archbishop of Canterbury said that it was dangerous to have one law for everyone and that the introduction of Sharia to the United Kingdom was "inevitable." Within days of His Grace's remarks, the British and Ontario governments both confirmed that thousands of polygamous men in their jurisdictions are receiving welfare payments for each of their wives.
From “Sharia in Britain? Taxpayer-subsidized polygamy in T.O.? Yawn. Nothing to see here”, Mark Steyn, Maclean’s, February 14, 2008:
The other day, in a characteristically clotted speech followed by a rather more careless BBC interview, the Archbishop of Canterbury said that it was dangerous to have one law for everyone and that the introduction of sharia — Islamic law — to the United Kingdom was "inevitable."… Last week, the British and Ontario governments confirmed within days of each other that thousands of polygamous men in their jurisdictions receive welfare payments for each of their wives.
Note: Like Steyn’s earlier error about the number of “polygamous” unions blessed by Toronto imam, Aly Hindy, Steyn’s claim that “thousands” of men receive welfare benefits for their multiple spouses is contradicted by reports. These note that “hundreds” of men may claim for benefits, and claim to be in a polygamous union. But since polygamy is illegal in Canada, the men are unable to claim benefits for more than one spouse.
From “Lights out on Liberty”, Imprimis/Investigate, August, 2008:
I see British Muslim nurses in public hospitals riddled with C. difficile are refusing to comply with hygiene procedures on the grounds that scrubbing requires them to bare their arms, which is un-Islamic. Which is a thought to ponder just before you go under the anaesthetic.
Macleans, Feb. 14, 2008:
I see British Muslim nurses in public hospitals riddled with C. difficile are refusing to comply with hygiene procedures on the grounds that scrubbing requires them to bare their arms, which is un-Islamic. Which is a thought to ponder just before you go under the anaesthetic.
From “Lights out on Liberty”, Imprimis/Investigate, August, 2008:
Sharia in Britain? Taxpayer-subsidized polygamy in Toronto? Yawn. Nothing to see here. True, if you'd suggested such things on Sept. 10, 2001, most Britons and Canadians would have said you were nuts. But a few years on and it doesn't seem such a big deal, and nor will the next concession, and the one after that. The assumption that you can hop on the Sharia Express and just ride a couple of stops is one almighty leap of faith. More to the point, who are you relying on to "hold the line"? Influential figures like the Archbishop of Canterbury? The politically correct bureaucrats at Canada’s Human Rights Commissions?
Macleans, Feb. 14, 2008:
Sharia in Britain? Taxpayer-subsidized polygamy in Toronto? Yawn. Nothing to see here. True, if you'd suggested such things on Sept. 10, 2001, most Britons and Canadians would have said you were nuts. But a few years on and it doesn't seem such a big deal, and nor will the next concession, and the one after that…. The assumption that you can hop on the Sharia Express and just ride a couple of stops is one almighty leap of faith. More to the point, who are you relying on to "hold the line"? Influential figures like the Archbishop of Canterbury? The bureaucrats at Ontario Social Services?
From “Lights out on Liberty”, Imprimis/Investigate, August, 2008:
Kipling wrote that East is East and West is West, and ne'er the twain shall meet. But when the twain do meet, you often wind up with the worst of both worlds. Say what you like about a polygamist in Waziristan or Somalia, but he has to do it on his own dime. To collect a welfare check for each spouse, he has to move to London or Toronto. Government-subsidized polygamy is an innovation of the Western world.
From “We’re in the fast lane to polygamy”, Mark Steyn, Macleans, April 9, 2009:
In fairness to your big-time polygamist in Yemen or Waziristan, he has to do it on his own dime. If he wants to get the taxpayer to pick up the tab, he has to hop a flight to Toronto. East is east and west is west, and these days when the twain meet you usually get the worst of both worlds, of which government-funded polygamy would appear to be a near parodic example.
Imprimis/Investigate 2008:
… large numbers of British Muslims marched through English cities openly calling for Rushdie to be killed. A reader in Bradford wrote to me recalling asking a West Yorkshire policeman on the street that day why the various "Muslim community leaders" weren’t being arrested for incitement to murder. The officer said they’d been told to "play it cool." The calls for blood got more raucous. My correspondent asked his question again. The policeman told him to "Push off" (he expressed the sentiment rather more Anglo-Saxonly, but let that pass) "or I’ll arrest you."
From “A Fatwa of one’s own”, Mark Steyn, National Post, December 5, 2002:
… large numbers of British Muslims had marched through English cities openly calling for Rushdie to be killed. In the last few months, several readers have e-mailed me with their memories of those marches. One man in Bradford remembers asking a West Yorkshire police officer why the "Muslim community leaders" weren't being arrested for incitement to murder. The officer said they'd been told to play it cool. The cries for blood got more raucous. My correspondent asked his question again. The police officer told him to "F--- off, or I'll arrest you."
Imprimis/Investigate, 2008:
Mr. Rushdie was infuriated when the then Archbishop of Canterbury lapsed into root-cause mode. "I well understand the devout Muslims’ reaction, wounded by what they hold most dear and would themselves die for," said His Grace. Rushdie replied tersely: "There is only one person around here who is in any danger of dying."
“A Fatwa of one’s own”, Mark Steyn, National Post, December 5, 2002:
Rushdie was infuriated when the Archbishop of Canterbury lapsed into root-cause mode. "I well understand the devout Muslims' reaction, wounded by what they hold most dear and would themselves die for," said His Grace. Rushdie replied tersely: "There is only one person around here who is in any danger of dying."
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2. A 2009 article in National Review Online about Roman Polanski’s recent legal troubles contains sections virtually identical to Steyn’s 2003 UK Telegraph article on Polanski.
From “Beyond Transgression”, Mark Steyn, Oct. 3, 2009, National Review:
In a movie, the father would either die or survive for a tearful reunion with his boy. But after the war Polanski's dad remarried, and the new wife didn't want young Roman around. By the age of 13, the pattern of his life was set: That hurried escape through the wire of the ghetto would be only the first of a series of hasty exits.
In Swingin' London, he made his name with "Repulsion" (1965), in which Catherine Deneuve descends into schizophrenia and kills a man she believes has come to rape her. He hit Hollywood with "Rosemary's Baby" (1967), in which Mia Farrow is impregnated by the Devil. You could make the case that these films reflect the psychological burdens of his childhood — if it weren't that they're almost freakily literal pre-echoes of the violence in his adult life.
In 1969, Sharon Tate and four others were murdered at Polanski's house by a group called "Satan's Slaves." "I remember," wrote Joan Didion, "that no one was surprised."
From “Genius on the run”, Mark Steyn, March 2, 2003:
In a movie, the father would either die or survive for a tearful reunion with his boy. But after the war Polanski's dad remarried, and the new wife didn't want young Roman around. So he became an actor. By the age of 13, the pattern of his life was set…That hurried escape through the wire of the ghetto would be only the first of a series of hasty exits…
In London, he made his name with Repulsion (1965), in which Catherine Deneuve descends into schizophrenia and kills a man she believes has come to rape her. He hit Hollywood with Rosemary's Baby (1967), in which Mia Farrow is impregnated by the Devil. You could easily make the case that these films reflect the psychological burdens of his childhood if it weren't that they seem instead almost freakily literal pre-echoes of the violence in his adult life.
In 1969, while Polanski was filming in London, his wife Sharon Tate, eight months pregnant, and four others were murdered at the couple's Hollywood home by a group called "Satan's Slaves". ….Joan Didion, "…I remember that no one was surprised."
National Review:
He is the only movie director to have had three generations of his immediate family murdered — his mother, by the Nazis; his wife and unborn child, by Charles Manson's acolytes. The only reason he didn't wind up with his parents in Auschwitz is that, when he was 8, his father cut a hole in the barbed wire of the Warsaw ghetto and pushed his son out.
Telegraph:
He is the only movie director to have had three generations of his immediate family murdered - his mother, at Auschwitz; his wife and unborn child, by Charles Manson's acolytes….The only reason he didn't wind up with them in Auschwitz is that, when he was eight, his father cut a hole in the barbed wire of the Warsaw ghetto and pushed his son out.
National Review:
…Towne found it hard to concentrate at the director's pad, what with "the teenyboppers that Roman would run out and take Polaroid pictures of diving off the f***ing diving board without tops on. Which was distracting. With braces."
Telegraph: Towne found it hard to concentrate at Polanski's pad, what with "the teenyboppers that Roman would run out and take Polaroid pictures of diving off the f***ing diving board without tops on. Which was distracting. With braces."
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3. Similar paragraphs from a 2005 UK Telegraph article reappear in a 2008 Maclean’s article:
From “Why progressive Westerners never understood John Paul II, Mark Steyn, UK Telegraph , April 5, 2005:
…the creepy suck-up letters Gerhard Schröder wrote to the East German totalitarian leaders when he was a West German pol on the make in the 1980s. As he wrote to Honecker's deputy, Egon Krenz: "I will certainly need the endurance you have wished me in this busy election year. But you will certainly also need great strength and good health for your People's Chamber election." The only difference being that, on one side of the border, the election result was not in doubt.
When a free man enjoying the blessings of a free society promotes an equivalence between real democracy and a sham, he's colluding in the great lie being perpetrated by the prison state. Too many Western politicians of a generation ago - Schmidt, Trudeau, Mitterrand - failed to see what John Paul saw so clearly.
From “Love with the perfect dictator”, Mark Steyn, Feb. 20, 2008, Maclean’s:
Back in the eighties, Gerhard Schröder was a fairly standard West German pol on the make.... Here's one of the many creepy suck-up letters he wrote to the leaders of the East German prison state — in this case, to Erich Honecker's deputy, Egon Krenz: "I will certainly need the endurance you have wished me in this busy election year. But you will certainly also need great strength and good health for your People's Chamber election."…
…When a free man enjoying the blessings of a free society promotes an equivalence between real democracy and a sham, he's colluding in the great lie being perpetrated by the prison state. A generation ago, to their shame, almost every Western politician did it — Trudeau, Mitterrand, Carter, Helmut Schmidt.
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4. Sections from an October 2007 National Review article (also published by the
Washington Times) and a November 2007 article in Maclean’s:
From “The ideologues have it”, Mark Steyn, National Review, Oct. 14 2007:
… on CNN the other night Anderson Cooper was worrying about the homicide rate in Philadelphia. The city of brotherly love is the murder capital of the nation, and CNN had dispatched a reporter to interview the grieving mother of a young black boy killed while riding his bicycle in the street. Apparently, a couple of cars had got backed up behind him, and an impatient passenger in one of them pulled out a gun and shot the kid. Anderson Cooper then went to commercials and, when he returned, introduced a report on how easy it is to buy guns in Philadelphia and how local politicians are reluctant to do anything about it. This is, again, an argument only the expert class could make. In the 1990s, the number of guns in America went up by 40 million but the murder rate fell dramatically. If firearms availability were the determining factor, Vermont and Switzerland would have high murder rates. Yet in Montpelier or Geneva the solution to a boy carelessly bicycling in front of you down a city street when you’re in a hurry is not to grab your gun and blow him away.
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZGE2OWE0ZDdmNWQ1NTg5MGNmM2FkNjJlY2RjMzA0MzY=, http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2007/oct/15/ideologically-beside-the-point/
From “When it’s no country for old men”, Mark Steyn, Maclean’s, Nov. 28, 2007:
On CNN a week or two back, a reporter in Philadelphia, the murder capital of America, was interviewing the grieving mother of a young black boy killed while riding his bicycle in the residential street outside his home. Apparently, a couple of cars had got backed up behind him, and a tetchy passenger in one of them pulled out a gun and shot the kid dead. Inevitably, CNN followed this with a report on how easy it is to buy guns in Philadelphia and how local politicians are reluctant to do anything about it. This is an argument only the experts could make: in the 1990s, the number of firearms in America went up by 40 million but the murder rate fell dramatically. If gun ownership were the determining factor, Vermont and Switzerland would have high murder rates. Yet in Montpelier or Geneva, the solution to a boy carelessly bicycling in front of you down a city thoroughfare when you're in a hurry is not to grab your piece and blow the moppet away.
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5. A section of a May 2009 article appears almost verbatim in an October 2009 Maclean’s column about Michael Ignatieff.
From "Live Free or Die", Mark Steyn, Imprimis, and also published in: THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis, Volume XI, Issue # 119, May 8, 2009:
"... In Britain, a land with rampant property crime, undercover constables nevertheless find time to dine at curry restaurants on Friday nights to monitor adjoining tables lest someone in private conversation should make a racist remark. An author interviewed on BBC Radio expressed, very mildly and politely, some concerns about gay adoption and was investigated by Scotland Yard’s Community Safety Unit for Homophobic, Racist and Domestic Incidents. A Daily Telegraph columnist is arrested and detained in a jail cell over a joke in a speech. A Dutch legislator is invited to speak at the Palace of Westminster by a member of the House of Lords, but is banned by the government, arrested on arrival at Heathrow and deported..."
Copyright © 2009 Hillsdale College
From “Thinking about the old Ignatieff”, MacLean’s, Oct. 15, 2009:
“In Britain, a land with rampant property crime, undercover constables nevertheless find time to dine at curry restaurants on Friday nights to monitor adjoining tables lest someone in private conversation should make a racist remark. An author interviewed on BBC Radio expressed, very mildly and politely, some concerns about gay adoption and was investigated by Scotland Yard’s Community Safety Unit for Homophobic, Racist and Domestic Incidents. A Daily Telegraph columnist was arrested and detained in a jail cell over a joke in a speech. A Dutch legislator was invited to speak at the Palace of Westminster by a member of the House of Lords, but was banned by the government, arrested on arrival at Heathrow and deported”.
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6. A section which seems to come from the introduction to America Alone appears in a February 2008 Maclean’s article:
From America alone, introduction, Mark Steyn:
What does it mean when 57 percent of Pakistani Britons are married to first cousins and 70 percent are married to relatives? At the very least, it tells you that this community is strongly resistant to traditional immigrant assimilation patterns. Even in New York...in 80 percent of Pakistani families, the parents determine whom and when you marry....Of course, in any society, certain groups are self-segregating: the Amish, the Mennonites, and similar types [who themselves have well-known inbred recessive disorders]. But when that group is not merely a curiosity you point out as you're driving through Intercourse, Pennsyvania, but the principal source of population growth in all your major cities, the challenge posed by that self-segregation is of a different order.
In northern England, Pakistanis aren't assimilating with 'the host community;' the host community has assimilated with Pakistan. Again, if you had told a Yorkshireman in 1970 that by the early twenty-first century it would be entirely normal for half the kindergarten class to be the children of first cousins, he would have found it preposterous...
From “Sharia in Britain? Taxpayer-subsidized polygamy in T.O.? Yawn. Nothing to see here”, Mark Steyn, Maclean’s February 14, 2008:
What does it mean when 57 per cent of Pakistani Britons are married to first cousins and 70 per cent are married to relatives? At the very least, it tells you that this community is strongly resistant to traditional immigrant assimilation patterns. Of course, in any society, certain groups are self-segregating: the Amish, the Mennonites and whatnot. But when that group is not merely a curiosity on the fringe of the map but the principal source of population growth in all your major cities, the challenge posed by that self-segregation is of a different order.
There are now towns in northern England where cousin marriage is the norm: Pakistanis aren't assimilating with "the host community"; the host community has assimilated with Pakistan. Again, if you had told a Yorkshireman in 1970 that by the early 21st century it would be entirely normal for half the kindergarten class to be the children of first cousins, he would have found it preposterous.
7. A questionable quote (and in some cases, varying amounts of surrounding text) appears in four different contexts in 2006 and 2009. No report can be found as a source for the quote. Its only (online) appearance seems to be in material by Mr. Steyn, or those who in turn quote him.
From “Facing Down Iran”, Opinion Journal, April 19, 2006:
Or as a female Muslim demonstrator in Toronto put it: "We won't stop the protests until the world obeys Islamic law."
If that's a little too ferocious, Kofi Annan framed it rather more soothingly: "The offensive caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad were first published in a European country which has recently acquired a significant Muslim population, and is not yet sure how to adjust to it."
If you've also "recently acquired" a significant Muslim population and you're not sure how to "adjust" to it, well, here's the difference: back when my Belgian grandparents emigrated to Canada, the idea was that the immigrants assimilated to the host country. As Kofi and Co. see it, today the host country has to assimilate to the immigrants:
From America Alone, pg. 74:
During the Cartoon jihad, a Muslim demonstrator in Toronto spelled it out: “We won’t stop the protests until the world obeys Islamic law”. Or as Kofi Anan framed it rather more soothingly, "The offensive caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad were first published in a European country which has recently acquired a significant Muslim population, and is not yet sure how to adjust to it."
If you've also "recently acquired" a significant Muslim population and you're not sure how to "adjust" to it, well, here's the difference: back when my Belgian grandparents emigrated to Canada, the idea was that the immigrants assimilated to the host country. As Kofi and Co. see it, today the host country has to assimilate to the immigrants.
Chicago sun Times, Feb. 26, 2006:
Something very remarkable is happening around the globe and, if you want the short version, a Muslim demonstrator in Toronto the other day put it very well:
''We won't stop the protests until the world obeys Islamic law.''
from a September 7, 2009 issue of National Review, which appears to have disappeared from their online archive:
In 2006, during the original cartoon jihad, a Muslim demonstrator in Toronto spelled it out: “We won’t stop the protests until the world obeys Islamic law.”
Very nice review. It's the new media.
ReplyDeleteYour examples are recent, but Steyn has priors.
Paul Wells noted this tendancy back in Feb 2004 --
"Mark Steyn, no fool, allows Toro to pay him for the blog posting he ran on steynonline.com last autumn."
http://tinyurl.com/2apvj6
[this link is very slow. The original -- http://www.macleans.ca/paulwells/archives/week_2004_02_22-2004_02_28.asp now resides in the Internet Archive.]
It's unlikely that Steyn's readers will pick up on the fact he keeps recycling himself. If they liked it the first time they read it, they'll enjoy it even more the second time around.
ReplyDeleteFamiliarity breeds the contemptible, in the case of Steyn's fans.
He apparently thought it was so good he had to offer it up again, lest it fade into obscurity.
ReplyDeleteCall me a contemptible fan, but these paragraphs *are* pretty good, and if he can sell it in three or four different countries and then in book form on top of that, is that a crime? Or a violation of ethics, or even of accepted practice? We all have bills to pay.
ReplyDeleteConcerning "hundreds" vs. "thousands", I'm sure Steyn would be happy to acknowledge the error, and if a mistake on an order of ten refutes his point, then so be it. I'm not sure it does. He's usually accurate with his sources - recall that business when someonw tried to call him out on the Ayatollah's blue book or green book or whatever it was. When he's in error, he admits it. http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/795125/posts
The Secretary General's statement can be found at the top of the Google heap, which is a link to the official U.N. site: http://www.un.org/apps/sg/printsgstats.asp?nid=1936
Maybe I'm missing something, but this really seems to be straining a gnat to swallow a camel. What has been pointed out before is a little more troubling (and I never saw it resolved) is Steyn's review of "The DaVinci Code", in which he rather liberally borrowed a piece by Geoff Pullman at the Language Log.
http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/003147.html
But the author himself should have quoted rather than paraphrased Steyn's assistant, if he was really interested in a fair trial.
Familiarity breeds the contemptible, in the case of Steyn's fans.
ReplyDelete"Familiarity breeds the contemptible" sounds like there's some incest involved. If so, it confirms my suspicions about Steyn and his fans.
@ Steyn fans
ReplyDelete-
Mark Steyn's M.O. is to be both misinformed and misinforming. This is typical of wing-nut welfare pundits. Check out this "usually accurate" hit piece on Obama:
*
"He's young, gifted and black, and white, and Hawaiian, and Kansan, and charismatic, and Congregationalist, and Muslim... He smokes, which is different. He was raised in an Indonesian madrassah by radical imams, which is more than John Edwards can say. And he looks totally cool when he smokes!"
http://www.suntimes.com/news/politics/obamacommentary/220988,CST-EDT-steyn21.stng
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So, yes, Obama smokes, but the madrassah claim is total B.S. Is that what qualifies as "usually accurate" for Quin? Does being accurate 51% of the time and full of crap 49% of the time qualify as "usually accurate" for Quin and Steyn's other fans? To quote Ben Franklin, "Half a truth is often a great lie," and Steyn is a great... half-truth teller.
Mark Steyn rarely lets a day go by without lodging some complaint about America and various sections of its people. Maybe that's why Steyn has never bothered to become a US citizen.
Not that it makes Obama a Muslim--radical or otherwise-- but in point of fact he WAS enrolled in what we would call “Muslim” schools, in the same manner that we have Catholic schools, of which the young Obama also attended.
ReplyDeleteThe term “madrassa” could be said to be overstated, in that that would not be the term used in Indonesia, and it is certainly questionable just how much Islamic religious instruction would have been about in such a school. The rumor clearinghouse site of Snopes.com has looked into this, and has verified that while there’s no evidence of any long-term radicalization, and does not go into any great detail about just what was taught, it seems that among the many descriptions one might give a school that serves primarily Indonesian Muslims, the title “Muslim school” is not totally unfair.
Not a bad thing necessarily unto itself, since the whole point of such schools being extant was the demographics of the time in a what was and still is a majority Muslim nations. The whole issue of radicalized versions of this aside (since radical or not, it is not clear how much or to what extent any kind of Islam might have rubbed off on what would later be a more ideologically impressionable Barry--mostly apparently Chicago brand politics of scam and sham and force and threat and cheapjack jive talk) it seems Barry has had an interesting childhood, to say the least. The real problem for some of us not place of birth, religion, or odd childhood per se being dragged all over the planet for one relational reason or another due his globetrotting mom. Rather, it’s that he seems aloof and distant from the world of regular Americans. His haughty mockery of the plague of gasoline prices is but one of numerous examples.
That this concoction (or is that cacophony?) impresses some people--and not others--for all the counterproductive bull he's ladled out on the lap of the nation, is of far more interest. Steyn was commenting on this cacophony of a rather unusual background, and accurately predicted then (as verified now) that the nation would undergo paroxysms of radical shifts in priorities--like them or not.
PS—seems your Sun Times link is busted.
-W
The Sun Times link on the Steyn commentary about Obama and the "madrassa", that is.
ReplyDeleteAs to Steynposts "critical" of America, please be sure to add some handy context here:
Steyn is fond of Americans generally, and limits what mockery he has on some rare occasions to some not unfair characterizations that we South-of-the-Border types readily live up to: icky eating habits, culture kitsch of whatever plastic type, and of course the irritating habit (his main focus) of some of us in thinking that the natural corrective to some failings is to follow Euro-Canadian socialist slop off the economic and demographic cliff.
That is, it would be better for America to be a tacky, albeit lovable (Steyn now lives in New Hampshire, and unlike the minions of Fait Du Canada, has the ability to enjoy the legal status of guns and red meat-eating as much as the general visual availability status of sexy, cigarette-smoking Francophone females from the Great White North) place rather than a gigantic welfare state apparatus like Sweden, lost in Continental despond and Permanent Entitlement Envy mentality, all the while yawning at the latest antics of the Sons of Allah’s ever-widening claims on what’s left of Western Civilization’s aging groggy elders, due in turn to our inordinate delight in the temporal pleasures of the Welfare State’s ever-widening paunch.
That is to say, Steyn is far more approving of America's remaining penchant for actually squeezing out bambinos here and yonder, and paying attention to issues of hearth and home, personal struggle (sans constant government aid expectations) and production, family and faith (gasp!), over the more highbrow modes of fun like living as a childless liberal birthday party for one's pet kitty cat somewhere in the Beltway or the East Coast's drying demographic.