Madam, - I must be getting old and soft when I read an article by Mark Steyn that I find simplistic, disingenuous and offensive only when I get to the last paragraph (Opinion, June 24th). Mr Steyn made some interesting comments about the perception of US Presidents in Europe. Some of these comments were, to my astonishment, partly accurate and provided some morsels of food for thought.
He detected a slippery slope of decreasing respect, starting with JFK and steadily worsening via Ronald Reagan to George W. Bush. In the last paragraph, however, he attributed all of this to European snobs. This is a vacuous explanation.
There is a strange blind spot in Mr Steyn's political vision: he simply chose to ignore Democratic presidents and their relations, good or otherwise, with the outside world. I cannot speak on behalf of the snobs in the rest of Europe but I have a vague recollection of huge crowds in Ireland, North and South, who welcomed Bill Clinton and his efforts to help the Irish peace process. I, along with many others, valued his contribution to peace and prosperity here.
What Mr Steyn is perhaps trying to say is that there is a political gulf between the most conservative and right-wing elements of the US Republican Party and the most liberal and left-wing Europeans and that he sides with the former. That is valid and believable and a bit less insulting to my fellow snobs, not to mention my intelligence. - Yours, etc.,
DES HIGGINS, Monsktown, Co Dublin.