France called a framework trade deal between the United States and European Union a “dark day” for Europe, saying the bloc had caved in to U.S. President Donald Trump with an unbalanced deal that slaps a headline 15 per cent tariff on EU goods while sparing U.S. imports from any immediate European retaliation.
I did most of my growing up in the 1970s, where the universal parental advice to every single child who was bullied was, “The only way to stop a bully is to stand up to him.”
Like so many other things Gen-X was taught in our childhood, I now believe it was just a hollow lie. Maybe my parents repeated it without realizing it was one, like so many others.
That is the only way to deal with them. Problem is all the “both sides” bullshit in schools now where both the bully and the kid trying to stop his lunch getting stolen get punished equally. It’s changed how people think you’re supposed to deal with an aggressor.
Thanks, good point, I think I just had a subconscious need to take a sideswipe at the reality that, had the US I was taught about in school not been a fabrication, we would not today be in the circumstances we are in.
I’m carrying a certain baseline level of rage pretty continuously since Jan 20, 2025, and it sometimes leaks out at inappropriate times.
Edit: No, since the morning of November 6th when I awoke to find myself having this reaction: