Sir, - Kevin Myers takes us to task for our reaction to President Bush's rejection of the Kyoto agreement on the environment (An Irishman's Diary, April 3rd).
The reaction comes mainly from Europe's antipathy to the continued US dominance of practically every area from entertainment to global politics. It is also the result of:
America's plans for oil exploration in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
America's responsibility for 25 per cent of mankind's emissions of carbon dioxide.
America's refusal to ratify the treaties on land-mines.
America's refusal to stand up to the gun lobby.
The espousal in so many American states of the death penalty.
The sad thing is that this clouds the admiration, held by all, for the great American gifts to us, encapsulated in the works of Rothko and Pollock, Balanchine and Graham, Ives and Bernstein, Miller and Williams, Ford and Scorsese and many, many others. But then, a deeply conformist administration as President Bush's would probably regarded as an equivalent to Charlie McCreevy's "left-wing pinkos". - Yours, etc.,
Desmond Graham, Collins Avenue East, Dublin 5.