Non, non Babette!

■"A French 'No' Reminds Europe of Many Woes: Behind Constitution Vote Lies an Economic Malaise EU Leaders Haven't Cured," by Marc Champion, Dan Bilefsky and John Carregrou, Wall Street Journal, 2 June 2005, p. A1.

■"2 'No' Votes in Europe: The Anger Spreads; As Ruling Elites Falter, Union Suffers the Pain," by Richard Bernstein, New York Times, 2 June 2005, p. A1.

Several questions at The New Map Game and at my talk today to the Harris Corporation down in FLA about the recent "no" votes. A lot of queries about, "Doesn't this call into question Core unity?"

Two answers:

First, we have to remember that we began as a nation in revolution in 1776 and got our constitution in 1789ó13 years later. The American colonies were a helluva lot more incentivized to get their act together than safe and relatively rich Europe does today. The EU superstate project is really only about a dozen years old, so setbacks are to be expected, especially since this integration process occurs simultaneously with Europe's growing connectivity with the rest of the world through globalization, something that the relatively isolated American colonies didn't have to deal with much.

Second, my concept of growing the Core has far less to do with keeping "the West" strong than with "securing the East." In fact, that's the name of the third chapter of the book, "Growing the Core by securing the East." I'm not sure I mention the "West" at all in the book, except to discuss the notion of Occidentalism, or hatred of the West by non-Westerners within the context of the global Salafi jihadist movement represented by al Qaeda and others.

In my mind, if the U.S. wants Old Core Japan and Europe to come along for the ride of shrinking the Gap, the fastest route is by wooing Brazil, India, China and Russia, and letting the rest of the West take the hint.