#europe

We habitually engage in meddling with nature. Until this century most of this meddling was good. Witness the preservation of the European countryside. But since then we've smoked it up and littered it and dumped too much in too many waters. I don't think it's our privilege to behave this way. ↗

— Lewis Thomas

#century #countryside #dumped #engage #european

We've talked to the Europeans about it. It's clear if those negotiations fail, then we are agreed with the Europeans that the next step is to take the matter to the U.N. Security Council. ↗

— Stephen Hadley

#agreed #clear #council #europeans #fail

The fact that the church is convinced of not having the right to confer priestly ordination on women is now considered by some as irreconcilable with the European Constitution. ↗

— Joseph Ratzinger

#confer #considered #constitution #convinced #european

China protects the Chinese, America protects the Americans, I don't see why Europe should not protect the Europeans. ↗

— Dominique de Villepin

#china #chinese #europe #europeans #i

In Paris the cashiers sit rather than stand. They run your goods over a scanner, tally up the price, and then ask you for exact change. The story they give is that there aren't enough euros to go around. "The entire EU is short on coins." And I say, "Really?" because there are plenty of them in Germany. I'm never asked for exact change in Spain or Holland or Italy, so I think the real problem lies with the Parisian cashiers, who are, in a word, lazy. Here in Tokyo they're not just hard working but almost violently cheerful. Down at the Peacock, the change flows like tap water. The women behind the registers bow to you, and I don't mean that they lower their heads a little, the way you might if passing someone on the street. These cashiers press their hands together and bend from the waist. Then they say what sounds to me like "We, the people of this store, worship you as we might a god. ↗

— David Sedaris

#cashiers #europe #euros #hospitality #japan

Among the many misdeeds of British rule in India, history will look upon the Act which deprived a whole nation of arms as the blackest. ↗

— Mahatma Gandhi

#asia #conquest #england #europe #great-britain

Fallujah was a Guernica with no Picasso. A city of 300,000 was deprived of water, electricity, and food, emptied of most of its inhabitants who ended up parked in camps. Then came the methodical bombing and recapture of the city block by block. When soldiers occupied the hospital, The New York Times managed to justify this act on grounds that the hospital served as an enemy propaganda center by exaggerating the number of casualties. And by the way, just how many casualties were there? Nobody knows, there is no body count for Iraqis. When estimates are published, even by reputable scientific reviews, they are denounced as exaggerated. Finally, the inhabitants were allowed to return to their devastated city, by way of military checkpoints, and start to sift through the rubble, under the watchful eye of soldiers and biometric controls. ↗

— Jean Bricmont

#foreign-policy #france #human-rights #iraq #kosovo-war

We hope to see a Europe where men of every country will think of being a European as of belonging to their native land, and...wherever they go in this wide domain...will truly feel, ‘Here I am at home. ↗

— Winston Churchill

#inspirational #home

Europe has a long and tragic history of mostly domestic terrorism. ↗

— Gijs de Vries

#europe #history #long #mostly #terrorism

I hate this argument that says little Britain or something outside, or Britain is part of a wider Europe. We can both be within our trading relationships within Europe but we can also be a fantastic global trader. ↗

— Iain Duncan Smith

#argument #both #britain #europe #fantastic