Europe

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Europe is the western end of the Eurasian land mass, usually defined as being west of the Ural mountain range.

Contents 1 Old Europe 2 New Europe 2.1 Another interpretation of New Europe 3 "#1 product in Europe", or, selling cheap white plastic tchotchkes to the rubes 4 Some other bits of Yerp 5 Footnotes

[edit] Old Europe

"Old Europe" was a fictional "talking point" used by the Bush administration to just act stupid in the world of politics. It should be noted that, in terms of the thankfully departed Bush administration, "Old Europe" (Saddam appeasers and Cheese Eating Surrender Monkeys) are not to be confused with "Our European Allies" who gallantly stood shoulder to shoulder with the US to defy the United Nations and International Law Saddam and the non-existent very real threat he posed to oil prices the Free World.

Members of "Old Europe" include:

• The United Kingdom
• France
• Germany
• Spain
• Portugal
• Italy
• Holland
• Switzerland

Never mind that all these countries are democracies, and most of 'em don't even require passports to travel between them. Hmmm, hello, Canada and Mexico?

In general, "old Europe" has wised up to the stupidity of war as a solution to human problems, having fought them on their own land for too many centuries. Europeans now leave it to the United States to intervene in European genocidal conflicts such as the one in Serbia and Bosnia.

[edit] New Europe

"New Europe" is manifested in the European Union, an economic bloc comprising virtually the entire continent now. Many of them use a single currency, the euro (except for refuseniks and new members), which since its launch at roughly parity with the US dollar, has risen steadily to hover around USD 1.50 (or did the dollar fall?). With a combined population of almost 500 million people, and relatively open borders to movement of people and money,^[1] the EU was thought to be on its way to becoming the strongest single economy in the world. Despite these successes, there is still a strong current of scepticism towards closer integration amongst people of a certain political orientation, especially in the UK.

As a further interesting side note... why does the United States no longer seem to encourage peoples and places it conquers/buys/otherwise pwns to become states of the Union? Answer: rather than incur the expense of supporting the infrastructure of a developing country that it has defeated in war, the United States prefers to develop them as markets for American products.

[edit] Another interpretation of New Europe

New Europe is a conglomeration of widely disparate and dispersed ex-colonial territories, including but not limited to:

• Nova Scotia (Translation: "Do not go to Scotland")
• New South Wales
• New England/New Hampshire/New York/New Jersey/New Mexico/New a lot of places in the US
• New France (sold and renamed)
• New Spain (lost and renamed)
• New Amsterdam (misplaced and renamed)

This is a neologism we just made up, so don't expect an article on it at Wikipedia any time soon.^[2]

[edit] "#1 product in Europe", or, selling cheap white plastic tchotchkes to the rubes

Aficionados of As Seen On TV products will note that many products are presented as "European design", or "the #1 Cosmetic Product in Europe", or something like that. ^[3] Being "European" has apparently been used for quite some time as a marketing pitch for people who think that getting something foreign (but not too foreign of course) is equal to something fancy. As a general rule, though, "European design" usually seems to consist of lots of rounded white or beige plastic applied to vaguely interesting but somewhat useless gadgetry and built at rock bottom dollar in a factory in China; one is inclined to suspect that very few of these things are actually European. ^[4] So obviously bullshit is this approach that Comedy Central even brought out a mock variety show called Viva Variety with two nonspecifically European (though with French names) co-hosts that played with the whole idea. (In fact, it was actually a predecessor of sorts to the more popular Reno 911, being produced by cast members from The State.)

This vision of Europe as one giant monolithic Otherworld has a dark side as well: the same marketing points that are used to move barely-useful plastic tchotchkes are also used to market scams such as HYIPs. The existence of the hypersecrecy of the Swiss banking system makes the idea that rich people can do things in Europe that they aren't allowed to do in the United States plausible to people who can't be bothered to look into it more, and thus "European" becomes a byword for "something we should have but aren't allowed to"; in fact, these scams usually explicitly encourage belief in such things as "prime banks" that have special privileges that other banks don't.^[5] There may be an undercurrent of anti-Semitism to this as well; some anti-Jewish conspiracy theories are centered around places like Zurich, and there isn't much doubt that many people who refer to "international bankers" are talking about Jewish bankers.

[edit] Some other bits of Yerp

• Sweden is a large country in Scandinavia. Usually considered a stronghold of social democracy, Sweden is a welfare state, and consistently ranks in the top 10 in the UN Human Development Index.
  • They make Saabs, Volvos and hot tubs. And Husqvarna chainsaws and sewing machines. And akvavit.
  • ABBA were great overrated great.
• Daneland, also known as "Denmark", or the Great Danish Empire, rules over many smaller, less interesting breakfast pastries, including but not limited to the donut and the muffin. It is one of the few empires to survive intact after the end of the Second World Donut War.
• Åland is an archipelago in the Baltic Sea about halfway between Sweden and Finland. It's officially part of Finland, but it has undemocratic privileges autonomy and everybody there speaks Swedish. It's considered the garden spot of Scandinavia, kind of like Hawaii if the beach at Waikiki had knee-high snowdrifts.
• Rockall is an island a rock about halfway between Britain and Iceland, and geopolitically important because... "There may be oil/Under Rockall".^[6]
  • No one from Rockall has ever won the Eurovision Song Contest, and probably never will.
  • Rockall's total land mass is about 1/5 of an acre with a center point that juts about 70 feet above sea level. Denmark, Iceland, Ireland and Great Britain all claim it as theirs.

[edit] Footnotes

1. ↑ Contrast this with NAFTA, where the money is free to go wherever it buys the most cheap labor, but the people have giant fences built to stop them from crossing the borders.
2. ↑ Apart from this one, that is.
3. ↑ If they want to get really specific, they'll say things like "You know the Germans always make good stuff." or refer to oddly designed, retro-futurist furniture as "Scandinavian".
4. ↑ There was this thing called the RoboMaid that was brought out to capitalize on the popularity of the Roomba robot vacuum cleaner; it was apparently designed in Norway, but a Swiffer powered by a robotic ball whose single function was "random walk" isn't exactly impressive.
5. ↑ In actual fact, "prime bank" is simply a nickname for the top 50 or so banks in the world and has no regulatory meaning.
6. ↑ The Gang of Four