In a world where western Europe lived in the fear of the red army rolling in - a balance had been created that kept them motivated to sustain western beliefs and values.

As it stands, the red army did roll in - or at least a facsimile of it made of refugees from eastern Europe. They brought with them their beliefs, work ethic and the sense of entitlement that comes from living under a "government is god" system.

Balance.

That is the key. Balance sustained Europe. Europe has always been weak, cruel and provincial to the utmost. When a common threat was taken away the peoples of these various nations returned to their provincial patterns and self-destructive nature.

Now Europe slowly sinks. A dismal birthrate of citizens in most nations is slowly destroying the individual cultures and customs of European states. The EU is economic poison--a socialist utopia that will lead to low quality of life for all. Crime, poverty and a sense of hopelessness are always socialists' final inheritance.

Reagan had no far-seeing advisors to second-guess him when he asked, "Mr. Gorbachev tear down this wall." I suspect he didn't think it would come to fruition so soon.

Who could have guessed that by fulfilling Reagan's wish and freeing half of the masses from one type of servitude and suffering would only lead to a chain reaction of suffering for all the European masses--and an all new distinct threat to western culture by moral turpitude and corruption from within?

The evil genie has escaped from the bottle and there's almost no hope of getting him back in.

It would be educational to compare parallel timestreams wherein one Europe in the 21st century still feared an intact USSR and in the other the EU is assimilating former east-bloc countries and its leaders seek more global power. Follow each timestream for a hundred years from 1989 and observe the results.

One of the truths of this world is that the pinnacle of progress keeps moving. Illumination never lasts long in any one spot and it moves with the most illumined peoples who are always fleeing the darkness. From Egypt to Greece, from Greece to Carthage, from Carthage to Rome, From Rome to Germany, England and France. Our founding fathers were illumined and when they left, they brought the torch of illumination with them.

The east coast...the west coast and now, the fastest growing spot in the nation, the still somewhat conservative undeveloped "virgin" southwest are receiving the latest in technology and the exodus of people from the regions which are slowly sinking, where the torch once burned bright but now merely flickers as the intuitive see the writing on the wall. These folks are the torch-bearers and the world would be lost without them.

America will survive, but the next twenty years will determine whether it prospers and remains the home of the torch of illumination or whether it grows dross and dumb and some other region is better suited for the activities of the illumined.