Free Toilettes Undermine EU’s Decouple Threat

Letter to Romans: As Trump’s Greenland bid ramps up, WSJ predicts decoupling of EU’s & USA’s economies. But is that so, or would it mean righting a historical trade imbalance? Aren’t the two now so intertwined that more Euros speak English than folks in Minneapolis?

I could swear it was easier to talk to locals during my recent Rhein River cruise -- from Amsterdam to Basel & through Holland, Germany, France & Switzerland -- than it would be to talk to the insurgents in America’s Land of a Thousand nationalities. The Euros, it seemed, are now so “Americanized” that fast disappearing is their old sadistic tradition of making tourists needing to relief themselves of the grape pay to do so. Yet, then I noticed in Tuesday’s WSJ stories bewailing how “President Trump’s bid to annex Greenland & unleash tariffs on several European nations has plunged the trans-Atlantic alliance into crisis. If a trade war breaks out, the US could feel the pain …” That, we’re told would include the EU’s threat to “decouple” their economies with ours.

Heaven forbid. Or, has Heaven already made it impossible? To be sure, the Old-World System of having the US subsidize the EU for everything from defense to energy needs would be cutback a lot, but it’s hard to see how America, with more money in its pocket than theres, would be the worse off after that. The US no longer having to pay unequal if not exorbitant tariffs to EU countries on trade goods is another pain-free plus for Americans. (Tho, I’m still waiting for my Cuckoo Clock from the Black Forest to pass through German Customs.) While any trade war would inevitably make some winners & losers in America, as the WSJ opines, let's also remember that both sides are smart enough to realize Soccer in the US and Football in the EU (among most other things of value) are here to stay.

Davd Soul