The best thing to happen to the world in my lifetime was the collapse of European Communism. The man who so desperately tried to stave off that collapse is now lecturing the United States on its missed opportunities to improve the world. Mikhail Gorbachev claims that American officials suffer from a disease "worse than AIDS," which he calls "the victor's complex."

What might the world have looked like had Gorbachev and his cronies won? How did the "victor's complex" play out in postwar Europe for Czechoslovakia, Poland, and Hungary? Should anyone listen to a retread who continues to defend an ideology that killed 100 million people in the twentieth century?

Gorbachev told a German paper, "The Americans will have to understand that in future they will have to cooperate and make decisions jointly, instead of just always wanting to give orders." I'd rather the U.S. not give orders to other nations, but isn't "cooperate and make decisions jointly" just code for Eurocrats giving orders to the U.S.? Criticism of American power is often just a mask for covetousness of American power.

Does he still have that map of the Phillipines on his forehead?

Dan, I think you may be guilty of a little Tu quoque here.

Just because Gorbachev may be a hypocrite, doesn't mean he isn't right?

My guess-- and maybe I'm wrong-- is that he isn't saying that the US must institute hate speech laws, sign the Kyoto protocols, or abolish the Death Penaly. Rather he is upset about us bombing countries and expecting the rest of Old Europe to go along and eat freedom fries.