Just heard about this and thought I'd post it for all the P&R-inclined guys and gals out there.

What the World Thinks of America
CBC Newsworld - 8:00 p.m. EST
Tuesday, June 17, 2003

"In a TV first, broadcast networks from Canada, Isreal, Britain, the Middle East, Russia, South Korea, Australia, France, Brazil and Indonesia will take part in the discussion, as news anchors from these 10 locales reveal how people from around the world perceive the U.S. – and how differently they perceive it. Internet users can tune in at the Web site (www.cbc.ca/news/america)."

Hope you enjoy.

Sooorry (in my best faux Canadian accent) - I listen to CBC and "As It Happens" and already have an idea. Why depress myself further, eh? I'm not a hoser, ya know...

You know for all the complaints I have against this country, I wouldn't want to live anywhere else. Ok, maybe in Australia because they have hot-looking guys in Speedos on the beach. Of course, I wouldn't mind living in Hawaii either. or have a weekend retreat in Miami. or a penthouse in New York. Sorry, my mind wandered there!

I agree - I just hope that "they" don't screw it up for us...

I already pretty much know the outcome as well, and it ain't real pretty. Not too hard to figure out why either.

They sure do like those free money handouts now dont they? we hate you, give us money... thanks.

The US just gave 1 billion for AIDS in Africa, by the way... the EU didnt, they cant afford it. So really, who are the horrible scum balls?

Why is the rest of the world so obsessed with us? Imagine seeing something like "What the World Thinks of xxx" and xxx isn't the United States. It's inconceivable.

The world is "obsessed" with us, because of our complete change of direction regarding how we treat the other people of the world. You can go right down the policy list and see where the past 2+ years have taken us in a completely different direction.

Other people don't like it when the only world superpower (who suddenly is willing to use its power whenever it decides it wants to) changes course abruptly.

And in terms of the $1B for fighting AIDS in Africa -- 1) the entire world knows that the AIDS epidemic in Africa is leading to serious destabilization of that continent, 2) the US has largely ignored the world-wide and domestic AIDS issues because the conservatives don't want to deal with trying to sell compassion to constituents when it comes to a "gay disease", and 3) you don't see the White House coming to the table and providing similar assistance domestically. This is not about being a kind and caring government. It is about buying some time before the world (read US) has to deal with the fallout of African anarchy and chaos.

Yeah dude, i remember just back 2 1/2 years ago when the people of the middle east loved us.. get a clue.

It makes me chuckle how you can even turn around giving a billion to fight aids into some bush hating post, very nice. But really if bushy was so anti-gay and so anti-aids...and didnt give a hoot about it... wouldnt he just not give any money? You just said he made eveyone hate us... so why would an evil dictator give money?

I am caught in an interesting dilemma; I am both repulsed by Shrub's snub of the entire planet, yet I am personally never concerned with how anyone perceives me or my country. Who cares with anyone else thinks?

I guess the difference is that I don't drop bombs on anyone. Unless you count the bathroom at work. wink

[ June 23, 2003, 06:39 PM: Message edited by: AU Tiger in LA ]

It's nothing new. The rest of the world has pretty much had the same opinion of us way before Junior, Clinton, Bush..... probably started with Viet Nam. We still get the imperialist tag no matter what. Do I like that? No. Is there anything anyone can do about it? I don't know. Both parties have had a hand in this. I kinda wonder if it's an "economic manifest destiny" that can't be avoided. Maybe Europe needs to grow a pair and start playing hardball with us?

How sad that folks are willing to criticize our role in the fight against AIDS in order to make cheap political points. The "why" of the funds is irrelevant; what's important is that we're trying to make some headway against a plague that has decimated some parts of Africa. Rather than criticize the imputed rationale for it, I think we should be concentrating on simply making sure it's only the first battle of a long war.

As for what the world thinks of America, it can usually be summed up in "Yankee go home - and take me with you."

Quoth budge, "Maybe Europe needs to grow a pair and start playing hardball with us? "

Which reminds me of my favorite joke.

How many French does it take to defend Paris?
No one knows - its never been tried.

My comments can hardly be classified as trying to make "cheap political points". Except by somebody trying to do just that in their own post.

Do your homework. Nobody (out in the world of experts) has even tried to make the African AIDS funding be anything about the administration trying to do the right thing. It is a purely political move on their part, and the administration clearly states the policy is tied to national security (due to the destabilization of Africa).

So stop being a hypocrite and trying to make it out to be some benevolent motive where the administration (and Congress) suddenly give a crap about people who have been dying of this disease for the past 20 years.

If the administration was truly concerned about AIDS and the plight of people living with the disease, they would be taking real actions to combat the disease. Nobody (including President Clinton) has taken any kind of meaningful action to address the disease. It is not about political gain, it is about respecting human beings and the terrible things they go through because of this disease. Once again I point out that if this were a truly important issue to the administration, they would be funding money to domestic programs addressing AIDS right here in our own country.

It is fine if you actually believe and want to express the view that the administration is truly compassionate (and try to dig up some iota of evidence to that fact). But get off the same-old strategy of trying to discredit other views just because you can't find a way to support your own.

Brazil has more and hotter looking guys on exponentially more unspeakably beautiful beaches!

I sure in the hell do! I don't want fanatics who loathe the US and all we stand for trying to kill us either on our shores or off. You don't see the wackos going after the Finns or the Swedes or even Canadians, do you? It does matter what the world thinks of us--and not only the fanatical religious crackpots, but our longstanding friends as well. The US doesn't exist in the world alone; we're in a global system that we've played a great part in creating, and we can't operate successfully without the cooperation (which must come through means other than coercion and bullying) of our friends and neighbor nations.

I suppose some of us will choose to remain in the dark shroud of rugged individualism. Its not a nationlist idealogy at all. Its an idealogy of the singular human spirit - live and let live.

People all over the world are free to do what they wish. But attack me, and I'll use the modern weapon of choice to spread your DNA across six acres. Does this sound "cowboy?" No more so than it sounds "Arab." The evil Cult of Death hiding behind a Burka is far more sinister than any folly cooked up by Dubya.

Trying to make the world love America would be better served by tearing down every goddamn McDonald's or BK or KFC in Europe and Asia.

If the integration of our global economy is based on hideous American fast food and pleading for Hamas to love us, well, that's not a world I give a shit about protecting.

Perhaps someone should ask these people:

"In the history of the world, name the superpower that has done the least to expand its power and influence."

Answer: The United States

[ June 24, 2003, 06:59 AM: Message edited by: PCC ]

Try telling that to the Mexicans. Or the Cherokee, Muskogee & other tribes rounded up & deported in the 1830s. Or the Spanish. Or the Hawaiians. Or the Filipinos. Or the Panamanians & Nicaraguans & Guatemalans & Dominicans & Haitians & all the other Latin American countries that have been on the receiving end of "gunboat diplomacy". Over the years the U.S.A. has done its share of swashbuckling adventurism & land-grabs & crushing anyone who got in its way.

To give you a non-comprehensive run-through, the US has since its establishment in 1776 launched wars against its two neighbors, Canada and Mexico, defeating the latter; fought non-defensive wars against Britain, France, Spain, North Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, Iraq; invaded for non-defensive purposes Hawai'i (which is now a US state), the Philippines, Cuba, Puerto Rico (we've never that nation go), Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Honduras, Panama, Costa Rica, Colombia, Grenada; and directly or covertly engineered the violent overthrow of governments and supported pro-US, repressive anti-democratic regimes in Greece, Spain, Portugal, Guatemala, Brazil, El Salvador, Uruguay, Nicaragua, Colombia, Venezuela, Chile, Paraguay, Liberia, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, Zaire/Congo, Angola, Mozambique, Syria, Lebanon, and on and on. You can believe the blamelessness tales if you want, but realistically, the US has the blood of otehrs (sometimes justified) all over its history.

[ June 24, 2003, 07:51 AM: Message edited by: fantomas ]

First, the United States didn't become a superpower until after World War II.

The United States is the most benign superpower, EVER. And anyone who doubts that should have lived in times where there were really, really malignant superpowers.

...and lived nearby them.

[ June 24, 2003, 08:06 AM: Message edited by: PCC ]

You're side-stepping through semantics there. After all, almost all of Russia's expansion came during the time of the tsars, well before the Soviet Union acquired superpower status. Further, one could draw a parallel between the U.S. treatment of the Latin American "banana republics" & the Soviet satellite states during the Cold War era--both were nominally independent but on a short leash, & both were on several occasions subjected to outright invasion when their governments strayed too far from their prescribed role.

Ya know we, do have a lot of influence economically. When you see fast food restaurants and american retail businesses all over Europe, I would think it fosters some resentment. One time there was a KFC in Lebanon, they bombed that right away. Or big companies like NIKE paying people in Asia slave wages, it kinda makes people a little angry over there. Some say they should be happy having a job. Well, They chopped off ol' Antoinette's head, didn't they?

I'm not sidestepping through anything. The reason this question is being asked now is because the United States is the world's preeminent superpower therefore, you must compare the United States to other superpowers. If the United States was just another country no one would be asking this question.

The truth is that no superpower in history has done less to expand its power and influence. Note I wrote "less" which doesn't mean "nothing".

The United States did not invade the Phillipines. We freed them from Japan who definetely invaded and raped the country in WW2, before that it was occupied by Spain and a Spanish territory for over a century. We only occupied or considered the Phillipines one of our territories for a few years after WW2, then they finally got their independence through us. Many Fillipinos wanted to become the 51st state.

A lot of Fillipinos were angry with the U.S. because of our support for Ferdinand Marcos, especially Ronald Reagan who said of him and Marcos, "we are similiar and think a lot alike". This country is so mixed and diverse though that all Fillipinos wont have the same opinion, but for the most part they are greatfull for what we did and like Americans.

[ June 24, 2003, 12:17 PM: Message edited by: 34ra ]

Just for the record, When Spain lost the Phillippines as a colony, it was lost to the United States during the Spanish-american war. The US paid $20 million to Spain to "buy" The Phillippines, Guam and Puerto Rico. That's right. just $20 mill for all that. By the way, the filipinos were pissed that their country was bought and sold just like that.

The United States then claimed the islands as "a protectorate" in 1898

the next year, 1899, the filipinos revolted in "The Phillippine War of Independence" lasting two years. The United States sent 126,000 soldiers to subdue the rebellion. around 200,000 civilians and military died to do the job.

Still think that we babysat after WWII and that's all we did?

[ June 24, 2003, 12:26 PM: Message edited by: ung ]

It would be difficult to quantify the amount of effort put into obtaining and maintaining superpower status by the US even more difficult to compare to other nations and epochs in history.

When I first read the question as to which nation has done the least, my gut reaction was going to be China. Then I thought maybe they're not considered a superpower.

Certainly the US has put great effort into establishing it's hegemony in the post-World War Two era. The US has established a wide range of international organizations political, financial and military which have been used to extend US power and influence around the world (The UN, IMF, World Bank, NATO and others). We have established formal alliances with other nations (Japan, So. Korea, Australia, New Zealand) and informal alliances with many others at various points as suited our needs. We've toppled governments: Germany, Japan, Iran, Chile, Afghanistan, and Iraq to tick off just a few of the more prominent and some of the more recent examples. We've fought wars in Korea, Vietnam, Central America, the Caribbean, the Balkans. We've assassinated foreign leaders and engaged in other covert activities all over the globe. All in just the last half century or so.

The American people may not desire "hegemony" and may not always view the actions of their government in that vein. Americans are content, generally, to remain ignorant of foreign affairs and allow their leaders a good deal of latitude in international dealings. American political leaders are clearly aware of the need to establish and maintain America's hyperpower status. Who would want to live in a world managed by others after all? Politicians crave power like nothing else. The notion that the mantle of greatness has been thrust upon us is pure self indulgence.

Ok then how about this. Put any other superpower in the place of the United States. Which one of them would have left Canada as an independent nation?

Let's ask the frenchies about that superpower germany and it all turned out for them....

Canada? we allow them to exist.. Other than beer, really what are they good for? SARS and strip clubs?

Oh, please. Canada exists because:

1. Prior to WWI, the most powerful nation in the world would have for it--and did so in 1812.

2. Canada is a friendly nation, so there's no need to subdue it.

3. Britain remains arguably the most important ally of the U.S. and would hardly approve an invasion of Canada.

You forgot hockey? :confused:

the sport is dying...

Canada exists as an independent nation because the US tried to invade it several times, most recently during the period of the War of 1812, which basically ended in a stalemate and Washington and Buffalo were burnt down (it's in the history books), and since the Treaty of Ghent in 1814, the US and Canada (which was then British territory) have never warred against each other again. We had, until recently, the longest unguarded border in the world, as the two nations are basically sister (or brother) entities. Our origins are common. Your reasoning doesn't hold up. The US has invaded or occupied neighboring countries repeatedly. Do you want a list?

Thank you, ung, for providing the exact history here. Yes, the US did invade the Phillippines; we eventually left. We have never managed to leave the people of Puerto Rico alone, however.

"American political leaders are clearly aware of the need to establish and maintain America's hyperpower status. "
I think this post put it best. The US has sought out it current position on the world stage. Would I rather any other nation to be in that position ( other than th US) no. Do I think it is a good thing for any one nation to be in this position, No. As so many post's have shown we tend to think our hands are clean, action, noble- and that are not always. I forget the percentage, but in the latest gallup poll there is a % of American who think Iraq used WMD during the "war"