America the weird

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I don't think most Americans fully appreciate how weird we look to other people around the world nowadays.

The United States has always been picturesque and different for others, but I think nowadays it just looks weird and perhaps sinister.

I'm 62 years old, a middle westerner, born and bred. I grew up on Chicago's North Shore and I attended both public and private grade schools there in the 1950s. Believe me, my school days had more in common with the madrassa in the picture than with the Louisiana school described in the AP story below. And I think the schools most parents send their children to around the world have more in common with the madrassa in the photo than the one in the article or to Columbine etc, etc.

Are the children in the AP article going to grow up and become the voters, the citizens and the soldiers of the only superpower... with their fingers on the atomic trigger? I don't the world is ready for that, and I don't think any amount of money spent on public diplomacy will be able to sell it. DS

Kids allegedly had sex in classroom during assembly about killing - Associated Press

Abstract: Two fifth-graders had sex on a classroom floor while two others fondled each other in the classroom, according to a teacher at Spearsville High School.(...) First-year teacher Michael Walker, who teaches fifth- through eighth-grade English, said three students were either expelled or sent to an alternative school and two others got detention. Students at the kindergarten through 12th grade school are unruly, disrespectful and rarely disciplined, Walker said. "They cuss at the teachers and throw things at them, and nothing is done," Walker said. "There was even one student who grabbed a teacher in the butt and nothing was done. The students run the school." Walker said teachers learned Wednesday about the incident, which allegedly occurred during an assembly Tuesday to talk about a 15-year-old student accused of stabbing another student to death over the weekend. The assembly was for sixth- through 12th-grade students. Fifth-grade students were not told about it, he said. But one class of about 15 fifth-grade students that routinely moves from a portable building to a main building classroom during the second hour of the school day was unattended on Tuesday. "The teacher thought it was a normal day and sent the kids to second hour," he said. "She didn't know the teacher that would normally be in there was still at the assembly." The students were alone for about 30 minutes.(...) School officials notified the Union Parish Sheriff's Office on Thursday morning and detectives questioned students. "This is one incident and everyone is making a big deal out of it," Futch said. "I never had a teacher complain to me, but I have heard them complain to each other." Sheriff Bob Buckley said charges are likely. "I have zero tolerance for drugs, violence or anything like that that goes on in school," he said. READ IT ALL

USA tanks in world poll... the beginning of the beginning

In the 18 countries previously polled by the BBC, people who said the United States was having a generally positive influence in the world dropped to 29 percent, from 36 percent last year and 40 percent the year before. "I thought it had bottomed out a year ago, but it's gotten worse, and we really are at historic lows," said Steven Kull, director of the Program on International Policy Attitudes.

David Seaton's News Links
What appears here as a catastrophe, is in fact, good news. This is not a "every cloud has a silver lining" exercise in mental self-abuse, but a simple statement of fact.

The result of this world wide poll taken by the BBC is not so much a failure of US policy or even its "packaging" (public diplomacy) but rather the triumph of the new technologies of communications and the social networks they are forming.

The fact is that very little has changed in the way the USA operates since the 1980s, and even many of the names are the same: Cheney, Rumsfeld, Negroponte, Abrams. It could be argued that much of what the United States did in Central America during the 1980s was as bad or even worse than what America is doing today in Iraq. The USA was even condemned by the World Court for its actions in Nicaragua, and walked out in a huff when the case went against it. Nothing much happened, Noam Chomsky wrote and lectured tirelessly about all of it to a tiny public, to no avail.

What has changed? The way information moves, that's what. Simply put, in those days of the cellphone-video and the blog it's getting harder and harder to get away with that kind of shit any more. This is wonderful news!

And some of the best news in the WP article I'm quoting below, is the following, "Views of U.S. foreign policy are also becoming more negative among U.S. citizens (...) 57 percent said the United States is having a mainly positive influence in the world, down from 63 percent last year and 71 percent two years ago." One of the most exasperating things for any informed person anywhere has always been the naive-smug attitude of the American people, that somehow they were wonderfully benevolent, generous and universally admired for it. With that mind set, nothing was ever going to change for the better.

If Americans ever change their way of looking at the world and their role in it... If that 57 percent goes down to 40 and the 60 percent that would be in doubt was moved to get together to do something about it, we would be looking at a political renaissance, even a re-founding of the Republic that would benefit Americans and the entire world exponentially. The wonderful thing about this is that the technology and the social networks they generate are quintessentially American, deeply rooted in the oldest cultural and political traditions of its history... (any pioneer family would have understood Craigslist in a minute) there is nothing foreign in this technology and its application to politics, it is rather a return to the roots, a return to the best traditions of the country. Cleaning up America's act would be America's true gift to the world, and believe me the world would be forever grateful. DS

Views on U.S. Drop Sharply In Worldwide Opinion Poll - Washington Post
Abstract: Global opinion of U.S. foreign policy has sharply deteriorated in the past two years, according to a BBC poll released on the eve of President Bush's annual State of the Union address.(...) Nearly half of those polled in Europe, Africa, Asia, South America and the Middle East said the United States is now playing a mainly negative role in the world. More than 26,000 people were questioned for the survey. "It's been a horrible slide," said Doug Miller, president of GlobeScan, an international polling company that conducted the BBC survey with the Program on International Policy Attitudes, an affiliate of the University of Maryland. He said views of U.S. policy have steadily declined since the annual poll began two years ago. In the 18 countries previously polled by the BBC, people who said the United States was having a generally positive influence in the world dropped to 29 percent, from 36 percent last year and 40 percent the year before. "I thought it had bottomed out a year ago, but it's gotten worse, and we really are at historic lows," said Steven Kull, director of the Program on International Policy Attitudes. Kull attributed much of the problem to a growing perception of "hypocrisy" on the part of the United States in such areas as cooperation with the United Nations and other international bodies, especially involving the use of military force. "The thing that comes up repeatedly is not just anger about Iraq," Kull said, adding that the BBC poll is consistent with numerous other surveys around the world that have measured attitudes toward the United States. "The common theme is hypocrisy. The reaction tends to be: 'You were a champion of a certain set of rules. Now you are breaking your own rules, so you are being hypocritical.' " The BBC survey found that a majority of those polled hold negative views on U.S. policies on a wide range of issues. Sixty-seven percent disapproved of U.S. handling of detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Sixty-five percent disliked the U.S. stance on last summer's military conflict between Israel and the Hezbollah militia in Lebanon, 60 percent opposed U.S. policies on Iran's nuclear program, 56 percent opposed Washington's position on global climate change and 54 percent disapproved of U.S. policies toward North Korea. "If this keeps up, it's going to be very difficult for the United States to exercise its moral suasion in the world," Miller said. The survey of 26,381 people was conducted in Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Britain, Chile, China, Egypt, France, Germany, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Italy, Kenya, Lebanon, Mexico, Nigeria, the Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Russia, South Korea, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and the United States. The polling took place from November to January. Although Prime Minister Tony Blair has been Bush's chief foreign ally in the Iraq war, British views of U.S. policies were particularly negative. Fifty-seven percent of Britons surveyed said the United States plays a mainly negative role in the world; 33 percent said the U.S. influence was mainly positive, down three percentage points from last year. Eighty-one percent of Britons opposed U.S. actions in Iraq, while 72 percent said the U.S. military presence in the Middle East provokes more conflict than it prevents. Just 14 percent of Britons said the United States was a "stabilizing force" in the region.(...) Views of U.S. foreign policy are also becoming more negative among U.S. citizens, the poll found. Of the 1,000 Americans surveyed, 57 percent said the United States is having a mainly positive influence in the world. That is down from 63 percent last year and 71 percent two years ago. READ IT ALL

Billmon is back and kicking serious butt

David Seaton's News Links

In case you missed his long awaited return, Billmon, (guru jai, jai, guru maharaj!) is back on line after a well deserved vacation and is still kicking very serious butt. Check out the number he does on Condoleeza (Secretary of State from Hell) Rice. DS

Tidbits: Maybe the simplest explanation is also the most accurate. Maybe Condi is just a cold, heartless bitch -- as morally numb and sociopathic as her office husband. (...) Does Condi understand how many deaths, mutilations and wrecked lives lie behind her "investments" and "birth pangs"? Undoubtedly. Does she care? I don't know. But, from a public diplomacy point of view, it would behoove her to show some sign that she has an emotional connection to the rest of the human race -- or, if she doesn't, to at least pretend that she does. READ IT ALL