Anyone who travels outside the U.S. has experienced it. As far back as President Bush’s very first year in office, people living in other countries seem to be interested in one thing: Did you vote for George W. Bush?
Sensing the growing skeptisicm and then later hostility, and not wanting to call attention to myself by engaging in a political discussion, I always answered with a quick “no” and then moved on to another topic.
So it is with interest that I started following Amar Bakshi’s Post Global project called “How the World Sees America.” Amar examines international opinion about Americans and American policy and finds a striking disconnect. With polls showing “anti-Americanism reaching all-time highs,” he finds vitriol directed more at American policies than Americans themselves — a small silver lining in a very dark cloud.
Discouragingly, in this country, it seems people have a hard time making this distinction between bad policies and bad people. I don’t know about you, but this political mailer in Monroe County, NY stikes me as repulsive. It attempts to conflate Democrats, illegal immigrants, terrorists and even welfare recipients (see background graphic) into one boiling cauldron of fear.
Interestingly, this same general area of the world (upstate NY) is working hard to bill itself as tolerant. Sounds to me like they’re trying to convince themselves they’re something they’re not too sure they are. I’d say they have a long way, a very long way, to go.
