# Does America's political climate look like weakness from outside? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [October 6, 2006, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-americas-political-climate-look-like-weakness-from-outside/375554 "2006-10-06T21:13:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2006, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-americas-political-climate-look-like-weakness-from-outside/375554/1 "2006-10-06T21:13:06Z")
As Abraham Lincoln said, ‘A house divided against itself cannot stand.’ We had the Republicans try to impeach Clinton. People have been clamouring for Bush to be impeached almost since he got elected. Nixon actually got successfully impeached. Does this not go beyond the normal vigorous political debate that goes on in all democracies? How do you think it is seen in countries that are not friendly to America? Do they see it as weakness? Do they seek to fan the flames? For example, Libya supported the NUM’s struggle against the U.K. goverment of the time. ---
**Author:** ![MonkeyMensch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/82dd89/32.png) [@MonkeyMensch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MonkeyMensch)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2006, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-americas-political-climate-look-like-weakness-from-outside/375554/2 "2006-10-06T21:31:06Z")
Just for the record, Nixon was never impeached, but Clinton was. ---
**Author:** ![Sevastopol](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cdc98d/32.png) [@Sevastopol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sevastopol)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2006, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-americas-political-climate-look-like-weakness-from-outside/375554/3 "2006-10-06T21:31:38Z")
America’s political **structure** is crap. It’s not a bad first effort, but really: - - first past the post elections - the concentration of power in one office the US presidential system mandates. - the unreasonable hurdles to constitutional change. ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2006, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-americas-political-climate-look-like-weakness-from-outside/375554/4 "2006-10-06T21:52:52Z")
I’m pretty sure most of the people that are enemies to America couldn’t really care less about the political climate there. For one thing, I think you’re overhyping the extent to which American politics is even reported about in other countries; we get elections and major scandal news, but we have governments of our own, too. And given the current climate, I would suggest that most countries that are unfriendly to the U.S. would be more concerned about being attacked than governmental squabbling. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2006, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-americas-political-climate-look-like-weakness-from-outside/375554/5 "2006-10-06T21:59:34Z")
If you read the papers you’ll occasionally see stories about people with improbable names from some country you’ve never heard of having some incomprehensible scandal involving some variation on money, nepotism, religion, sex, or what have you. And you skip over that story. Who cares if the minister for sport in Belgium got sacked for insulting some soccer star you never heard of? And this happens in dictatorships too, except it doesn’t get into the papers and the ministers don’t get sacked, they end up disemboweled and fed to hyaenas. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2006, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-americas-political-climate-look-like-weakness-from-outside/375554/6 "2006-10-06T22:02:07Z")
This is the [second](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=391033) most ridiculous, pathetic, embarrassing, disingenuously partisan OP I’ve seen today. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2006, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-americas-political-climate-look-like-weakness-from-outside/375554/7 "2006-10-06T22:03:13Z")
I think many non-Americans might not fully understand the difference between the strength of our government institutions as opposed to the political strength of the incumbents. People who were bitterly opposed to the administrations of Bill Clinton or Ronald Reagan had no interest in changing the structure of government. In ten years George Bush will not be President. But I’m virtually certain that somebody will be. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2006, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-americas-political-climate-look-like-weakness-from-outside/375554/8 "2006-10-06T22:51:27Z")
[QUOTE=BrainGlutton] This is the [second](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=391033) most ridiculous, pathetic, embarrassing, disingenuously partisan OP I’ve seen today. [/QUOTE] I’m sorry that you so interpret it, but it is not meant to be partisan. I could equally have subtitled the thread, ‘A plague on both your houses.’ ---
**Author:** ![Throatwarbler\_Mangrove](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8c91f0/32.png) [@Throatwarbler\_Mangrove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Throatwarbler_Mangrove)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2006, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-americas-political-climate-look-like-weakness-from-outside/375554/9 "2006-10-07T13:57:13Z")
I think **G. W. Bush** has certainly made his best effort to make the US appear weak to people in other countries WRT to Iraq. Most people in other countries neither know nor care about all the nuances of the WMD argument, all they know is that the US population were led to support the invasion of another sovereign nation on basically false pretense, and are now crying uncle after a measly 2,000 casualties. This shows that America as a nation are A) gullible ignoranmuses B) driven by fear and paranoia (remember that whole duct tape thing? when you guys were actually _worried_ that Saddam Hussein was going to launch a WMD attack against the US?) C) Utterly irresponsible (clamouring for a withdraw and leaving Iraq a mess to avoid the next American casualty) and flip flopping cowards all around. Americans are the fat, SUV driving oil guzzling security moms who screamed for an invasion when they things Saddam had anthrax warheads ready to go off in the US (_snerk_) and now protest against the war because they don’t want to bear the responsibility of rebuilding the country they so wantonly destroyed. Yes, my Saturday morning’s off to a great start, thanks for asking. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2006, 2:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-americas-political-climate-look-like-weakness-from-outside/375554/10 "2006-10-07T14:02:44Z")
[QUOTE=MonkeyMensch] Just for the record, Nixon was never impeached, but Clinton was. [/QUOTE] Just for the record, the impeachment process succeeded in getting rid of Nixon but failed in getting rid of Clinton. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2006, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-americas-political-climate-look-like-weakness-from-outside/375554/11 "2006-10-07T23:16:48Z")
[QUOTE=kawaiitentaclebeast] I think **G. W. Bush** has certainly made his best effort to make the US appear weak to people in other countries WRT to Iraq. [/QUOTE] I wouldn’t put it quite like that, but he’s certainly bollixed it with **Iran** - they’ve laughed in his face and he’s done nothing. ---
**Author:** ![Mops](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mops/32/16494_2.png) [@Mops](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mops)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2006, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-americas-political-climate-look-like-weakness-from-outside/375554/12 "2006-10-08T00:08:03Z")
Seen from another democratic country this does not go ‘beyond the normal vigorous political debate that goes on in all democracies’ - in fact, from the perspective of someone used to a parliamentary system it looks extraordinarily hard to get rid of the chief executive. And ignominious departures of cabinet members also seem to be relatively rare, compared to other Western democracies. ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2006, 5:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-americas-political-climate-look-like-weakness-from-outside/375554/13 "2006-10-08T05:14:34Z")
[QUOTE=kawaiitentaclebeast] I think **G. W. Bush** has certainly made his best effort to make the US appear weak to people in other countries WRT to Iraq. Most people in other countries neither know nor care about all the nuances of the WMD argument, all they know is that the US population were led to support the invasion of another sovereign nation on basically false pretense, and are now crying uncle after a measly 2,000 casualties. This shows that America as a nation are A) gullible ignoranmuses B) driven by fear and paranoia (remember that whole duct tape thing? when you guys were actually _worried_ that Saddam Hussein was going to launch a WMD attack against the US?) C) Utterly irresponsible (clamouring for a withdraw and leaving Iraq a mess to avoid the next American casualty) and flip flopping cowards all around. Americans are the fat, SUV driving oil guzzling security moms who screamed for an invasion when they things Saddam had anthrax warheads ready to go off in the US (_snerk_) and now protest against the war because they don’t want to bear the responsibility of rebuilding the country they so wantonly destroyed. Yes, my Saturday morning’s off to a great start, thanks for asking. 😛 [/QUOTE] Hesitantly raises hand. Some of us opposed this war from the start. And at least one of us has posted his disgust at the panicky reaction to the 9/11 attacks. ---
**Author:** ![MonkeyMensch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/82dd89/32.png) [@MonkeyMensch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MonkeyMensch)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2006, 6:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-americas-political-climate-look-like-weakness-from-outside/375554/14 "2006-10-08T06:41:23Z")
[QUOTE=ElvisL1ves] Just for the record, the impeachment process succeeded in getting rid of Nixon but failed in getting rid of Clinton. [/QUOTE] I was only trying to point out that impeachment doesn’t mean removal from office. It’s sometimes confused that way and that was the only meaning of my post. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2006, 9:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-americas-political-climate-look-like-weakness-from-outside/375554/15 "2006-10-08T09:04:59Z")
[QUOTE=Sevastopol] - first past the post elections [/quote] Personally I prefer FPTP over proportional systems because it means whoever is in power has a mandate larger than that of his opponents, and isn’t simply in power because of a coalition of persons with lesser mandates banding together. But I think both systems are good and there are good examples of them both working well throughout the world. > [@](#): > > - the concentration of power in one office the US presidential system mandates. Not really mandates. The legislative branch has an overwhelming amount of power Constitutionally, ridiculously more than the executive or judicial. The President is the head of a powerful branch because of how much the executive has grown, however bureaucracy and entrenched non-political career members of the executive agencies operate with a great deal of independence from the President. So eventhough he is the “Chief Executive” he doesn’t rule over the executive branch with an iron fist, nor does he have the power to do so. Most successful countries have a singular leader at the forefront of the country. In many countries this person has more actual power than the U.S. President within their system of government, although without the “presidential” trappings that being Head of State brings. For example Tony Blair and every Prime Minister to come before him has a command over legislative and executive functions simultaneously that an American President envies. Even when a President is serving with both houses of congress controlled by his party there is still enough legislative independence that his legislative initiatives will fail or have to be toned down significantly from what he wants. > [@](#): > > - the unreasonable hurdles to constitutional change. The Constitution is a compact between the states, any system which doesn’t require a supermajority of the states to agree to change would be highly inappropriate. ---
**Author:** ![newcrasher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/b3f665/32.png) [@newcrasher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/newcrasher)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2006, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-americas-political-climate-look-like-weakness-from-outside/375554/16 "2006-10-08T19:55:56Z")
[QUOTE=BrainGlutton] This is the [second](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=391033) most ridiculous, pathetic, embarrassing, disingenuously partisan OP I’ve seen today. [/QUOTE] Howso? Seems like the OP is asking if all of our partisan politics make us look weak to other countries. He mentions Nixon, Clinton and Bush, so I am not sure how it is partisan…? ---
**Author:** ![Sublight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@Sublight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sublight)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2006, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-americas-political-climate-look-like-weakness-from-outside/375554/17 "2006-10-09T01:41:35Z")
From where I’m sitting (in another country), no. As others here have said, the average joe in Asia or Europe knows who the President is, followed by maybe the VP and the Sec’y of State, but that’s pretty much it. The everyday debates and squabbles pass by unknown to all but international relations junkies (off the top of your head, can _you_ name the members of the new Japanese PM’s cabinet? Has the DJP/LDP split over Article 9 made Japan look weak to you?). Unless someone else does something _really_ outrageous (or directly relevant to the country in question), it doesn’t make the local news (none of the Japanese news stations or papers have mentioned Foley, for example). If America looks weak, incompetent childish or out of control, that impression comes from the man on top. ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2006, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-americas-political-climate-look-like-weakness-from-outside/375554/18 "2006-10-09T01:55:57Z")
[QUOTE=Sublight] If America looks weak, incompetent childish or out of control, that impression comes from the man on top. [/QUOTE] This hits on three out of four. We are in deep shit.