Actually the Trotsyite tag comes from CP's quoted source: Samuel Sillen in the Daily Worker commenting contemporaneously on Edmund Wilson's Euro trip immediately following WWII. Wilson, arguably the most crotchety man in creation, seems to have picked a fight with just about everyone on that jaunt and had some particularly ripe comments on the shortcomings of UKers contrasted with the general wonderfulness of Americans. Sample:
"The Americans like to act for themselves and do things with a freer hand. They do not always take their paperwork quite so seriously as the British do. To the latter, they doubtless seem hit-or-miss, and they probably make annoying mistakes of a kind that is rare with the British. It is the result of having more space to move in, more margin of resources to dispose of. With the British every penny counts and every link in the chain must be tight. They do not understand the effectiveness of a loose association of men working with a minimum of formality to put through some undertaking and then eat a good dinner—which is what the Americans in Europe sometimes seem to be."
<http://www.newyorker.com/archive/content/?050808fr_archive01>
It's a pity Wilson didn't live to see Gitmo Bay and Abu Ghraib, current examples of loose associations of Americans working with a minimum of formality to put through some undertaking and then eat a good dinner.
Carl