Europe

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*[[Germany]]
 
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*[[Italy]]
 
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Never mind that ''all'' these countries are democracies, and don't even require passports to travel between them.  Hmmm, hello, [[Canada]] and [[Mexico]]?
 
Never mind that ''all'' these countries are democracies, and don't even require passports to travel between them.  Hmmm, hello, [[Canada]] and [[Mexico]]?
  

Revision as of 11:37, 19 July 2008

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

Contents

Old Europe

"Old Europe" is a fictional "talking point" used by "Young America"[1] to just act stupid in the world of politics. It should be noted that "Old Europe" ( Saddam appeasers and Cheese Eating Surrender Monkeys) is 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:

Never mind that all these countries are democracies, and 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. Et tu, Brute. The French wised up to the futility of war after World War I and just let the German Army invade rather than put up a serious resistance. They proceeded to try wars in smaller countries such as Vietnam and Algeria, losing those as well. That settled the futility issue once and for all in the French mind. Since then they've stuck to sinking Greenpeace ships and killing photographers.

New Europe

"New Europe" is manifested in the European Union, an economic bloc comprising virtually the entire continent now. They use a single currency, the euro (except for Denmark, Sweden and the UK, who have retained their previous currencies), which since its launch at parity with the US dollar, has risen to over USD 1.50.[2] With a combined population of almost 500 million people, and relatively open borders to movement of people and money,[3] the EU is well on its way to becoming the strongest single economy in the world.

In an interesting side note, Turkey is trying to join the EU. If certain legal, social and being "predominantly Muslim" hurdles can be cleared, they would be the first country not in Europe[4] to join the European Union, and could mark an end to the US-led policy of Islamophobia followed by current member states. Who's next, Egypt? Canada?

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.

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.

Some other bits of Yerp

Switzerland, formed as an artificial "buffer state" to keep other European countries from each other's throats, has "Cantons", banks, clocks, chocolate, neutrality, uses four languages but has none of its own, and if you say it seven times in a row, has no meaning. Four hundred years of peace, democracy and brotherly love, and what did they invent? The cuckoo clock. And the numbered bank account, beloved of tyrants, dictators and criminals the world over.

Sweden is a large country in Scandinavia. Usually considered a stronghold of liberalism, 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.

ABBA were great.[citation needed]

Rockall is an island a rock about halfway between Britain and Iceland, and geopolitically important because... "There may be oil/Under Rockall".[5]

No one from Rockall has ever won the Eurovision Song Contest, and probably never will.

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.

References, notes, and link spam

  1. According to Burroughs, America was old long before the Europeans found it. I'll link one of my poems soon, I promise!
  2. This may be more due to the dollar's weakness than anything else.
  3. 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.
  4. Depending on your definition of "Europe".
  5. The Gang of Four
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