Wednesday, September 05, 2007

Re: African wisdom   [Mark Steyn]

I've been off the old Internet for 24 hours, so, belatedly, I'd like to second Jonah's post on Hillary's discovery of yet another all-purpose "African" proverb. There is no "Africa", and there are no Africa-wide proverbs. Did Senator Clinton pick up her latest bon mot in Chad or Lesotho, Rwanda or Botswana? Democrats claim to "celebrate diversity" yet seem reluctant to accord any to Africa other than as a one-stop shop for generically exotic folk-wisdom. The next Democratic Presidential debate should have a "Name That Tribe" round.

Till then, Hillary reminds me of some Seventies movie I caught on late-night TV years ago. A castle loomed mistily in the distance. Scotland? The Rhine valley? The Balkans? A theme restaurant in Jersey? Then up popped the caption:

"Europe. The Middle Ages."

Hey, why get hung up on details? 

09/05 05:27 PMShare