Ishizu

Bonjour à tous ! Je vous laisse ci-dessous le commentaire d'un article anglais que je dois rendre mardi matin. J'aimerais que vous corrigiez mes éventuelles fautes de langue, si vous le voulez bien. Je vous en serais très reconnaissant. Merci d'avance !

This article, taken from the London-based weekly magazine The Economist of December, 22nd 2007 deals with the traditional, mainstream American mentality, and particulary focuses on the common optimism of the U.S. citizens and on their faith in future and in their country. The journalist nonetheless provides a contrast to such a frame of mind by concentrating on the current pessimistic, dismal behaviour of the Americans, who no longer trust in their government and are afraid of their future. Therefore, this attitude overtly runs counter to the Anglo-Saxon culture and spirit and the author of the article endeavours to demonstrate that it is incongruous with the present situation of the country. Indeed, he regards America as a model for Europe, for the latter has run out of steam and seems in dire straits. Therefore, whe shall follow his argumentation and draw our attention to the misgivings and uncertainties that Mr. Bush’s fellow citizens may experience nowadays, and which are to be balanced afterwards against their usual positive beliefs. Eventually, we shall throw light upon the way he denounces this fallacious vision of the United States and the views he puts forward about the greatest power of the world.


For the past five years, since the reelection of George W. Bush as the president of the U.S., the American citizens have lost their self-confidence and their helpful optimism, and doubt their future and their strength. According to the journalist, the more obvious proof of such a frame of mind is their halting behaviour and the popularity of some politicians who advocate hope and revival, that’s to say Barack Obama (the senator of Illinois, one of the fastest-rising stars in U.S. politics and one of the candidates to the Democratic candidacy to the presidency of the country) or Mike Huckabee (the former governor of Arkansas and a Republican candidate to the presidency, whose Southern roots and pastoral credentials make him the favourite candidate of the religious right). As a matter of face, the signs of the American decays may seem numerous ; the Bush administration faces the desastrous war in Iraq, which began in 2003, and which turns out to be a human and financial bane. For example, the accounts of abuse, rape, homicide and torture of prisoners held in the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq questioned the role of the United States as the paragon of democracy. Moreover, the surge policy performed by General David Petraeus can’t ease the tense atmosphere, even though it works, because of social and financial problems. Furthermore, the author of the article puts heavy emphasis on the Mr. Bush’s and Mrs Pelosi’s illegitimacy : both the president and Congress prove unable to lead America on the right track, and their fellow citizens are convinced that their country is doomed to decline.
Nevertheless, the author’s ideas seem to stand in sharp contrast to such a stance, since he intends to be more optimistic. The extended metaphor distilled throughout the text by the journalist – with economic phrases or sentences such as « bargain-basement » (a basement floor in a department store where goods and apparel are sold at reduced or discounted prices), « The gold is now turning into lead » or « a bull market » (a financial market of a certain group of securities in which prices are rising or are expected to rise) – strikes a note of fierce criticism towards those who blindly proclaim the U.S. decay, as Bill O’Reilly (the host of the political opinion show The O’Reilly Factor on the Fox News network) or Lou Dobbs (the CNN anchor and managing editor for Lou Dobbs Tonight). Indeed, these television personalities gainsay the author of the article and have grown famous thanks to specious arguments and ideas. The rhetorical questions of the fifth paragraph (« But coming apart ? Decomposing ? ») give us a hint of what the journalist may think of Patrick Buchanan’s book, Day of Reckoning : how hubris, ideology and greed are tearing America apart, although Mr. Buchanan (a famously outspoken conservative, he was a speechwriter and political advisor to President Richard Nixon) is an insider and a skilful politician. Similarly, his eventual familiar apostrophe to the latter (« lighten up » is an informal verb and « Pat » is a diminutive of his first name) also betray his point of view on the United States.



As a matter of fact, throughout this article, we are made aware of what means to be an American citizen, and the author isn’t wary of emphasizing his traditional qualities and optimism. The Anglo-Saxon culture is in fact based on hope and on the quest of a Promised Land, which turned out to be the thirteen first colonies of North America, for the father pilgrims. They strived to flee the old, hierarchical and monarchical European society, were the social station and the weath of his forefathers determined the entire life of each subject. According to the journalist, the Declaration of Independence of 1776 set up a new world with innovative rules and values : the faith in man’s will and power (he isn’t the « plaything of fate » anylonger and is able to change his destiny by his own means : that’s the definition of voluntarism), the possibility to go from rags to riches and to climb the social ladder despite all the hindrances quoted by the author (such as grinding poverty or « bankruptcy »), the ability to establish a dynamic cultural model where immigrants can form an integrated society (the famous melting pot),… In a nutshell, the American people proves daring, headstrong and egalitarian than the Old World. In order to uphold such ideas, the author of the article even borrows his language from John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the thirty-fifth Democratic president of the United States, who governed between 1961 and 1963. Such a seminal politician strengthens his argumentation and carries historical echoes, laden with emotional force : at the time, the country was self-confident and dreamt of conquering the Last Frontier, space. Such a quotation is given additional weight by the allusion to the comedy film Dumb and Dumber, a movie released in 1994 ; the attitude of its hero, Lloyd Christmas (a role performed by the popular actor Jim Carrey), becomes an exemple to be followed, in the author’s viewpoint. Indeed, in spite of his foolishness and his social rank, Mr. Christmas doesn’t give hope up, remains cheery and keeps on struggling in order to get what he wants. Consequently, the title « The Spirit of Christmas » proves ambiguous ; on the one hand, it may owes something to Lloyd Christmas’s optimism and perseverance. On the other hand, the journalist may have had the real spirit of Christmas (the Christian feast commemorating the birth of Jesus) in mind when he wrote his article ; on December, 25th, miracles can happen, and the American people should be more self-assured and self-possessed as the year 2007 comes to an end.
Such arguments are at odds with the image of a desperate, listless and downhearted Uncle Sam, who celebrates New Year’s Eve in a gloomy atmosphere ; nevertheless, all the balloons look smiling and pleasant in the caricature we can see at the top of the article. Likewise, the journalist’s standpoint isn’t unrealistic, for he clearly points out that the current American state of mind is at variance with the real situation of the country. In order to appear more convincing, he draws on article taken from the serious and documented magazine Commentary, and written by two insiders, Peter Wehner (a former senior White House aide) and Yuval Levin (a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Centre). These two experts corroborate his own point of view by drawing up a list of positive social evolutions in America : violent and property crimes have declined since 1973, drug addiction amongst the young people has fallen in 23%,… The journalist aims at suggesting that the United States are still the « land of opportunities » or the « land flowing with milk and honey » ; this phrase carries Biblical echoes, as it’s taken from the Exodus, such as the allusion to Gomorrah (a legendary city of ancient Palestine which stands for a wicked or depraved place). This language gives us a hint of the author’s background and posture : he must be all the more Conservative since he considers that sexual intercourse between young people are the evidence of a ill, endangered society.
The parallel which he draws between the U.S. and Europe seems overstated too, since we are made to understand that these two geographical areas are constantly at opposite poles. It’s true that the European birthrate is quite inferior to the U.S. and that the English language grows essential on the continent, above all in the Scandinavian countries (Norway, Sweden, Denmark). Nonetheless, the comment upon immigration problems in France proves distorted (the civil unrest of October and November 2005 has been overemphasized by the foreing media) and the American model is considered by some experts as a salad bowl (the various cultures are juxtaposed but do not merge together into a single homogeneous culture, which brings about a communitarianist model) rather than as a successful melting pot.



As a conclusion, the journalist admits that the Anglo-Saxons (and, therefore, the Americans) are more prone to despairing than to boasting : the testimony of two experts (John Adams, the U.S. president between 1797 and 1801, and Richard Hofstadter, an American historian who won two Pulitzer prizes in recognition of his leading role in reinterpreting United States history) is the epitome of such wistful behaviour, which misses a hypothetical golden age. Notwithstanding this, a moron as Lloyd Christmas seems to have adopted a better set of values, according to the author of the article…

Thanks a lot !