Not particularly.
Bush’s disinterest in being part of the international community was not a quality I admired in him as a candidate. I don’t like him any more now than I did then.
That being said, I don’t dislike Bush as much as I dislike the advice he’s getting, if that makes any sense. That has little to do with what the rest of the world thinks.
Further to the poll in question, see http://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/04/international/04POLL.html
Ah I see on preview my dear Jack has a reply. Perhaps he can trouble himself to read further.
I again note your lack of information and apparent unwilling to remedy the matter.
As an addendum to Collunsbury’s point that anti-Bush sentiment is predominant, from the June 3 New York Times article:
Because the right wing hysteriocracy told them to be.
I think much of the posting on this thread is missing the point. Everyone agrees that Bush has been far more unilateralist in his dealings with other countries than he might have been. Whether that is a good or bad thing for the US is debatable. But the fact that those who he has chosen not to go along with are not too keen on him is a given. His unpopularity in Europe and elsewhere is not a reflection on the bad job he is doing on behalf of US interests, but rather a reflection on the fact that he has, to an extent, stuck it to European and foreign interests.
It is silly to assume that foreign “conservatives” will be in favor of Bush merely because of ideological sympathy. That’s not far from assuming that extremist militaristic Israelis should look favorably on extremist militaristic Arabs because of ideological sympathy. No sense at all.
As for US ignorance, I see where people have pointed to findings about US ignorance. But we have no comparison to European knowledge (let alone Third World knowledge). And to stress one point - it is highly likely that Europeans are far more knowledgeable about other European countries than Americans are about these countries. A valid comparison would be US vs. European knowledge of Third world or Asian countries. Or US knowledge about Europe vs. European knowledge about the US.
The FT mentioned “the perception that the Bush administration pursues a unilateralist foreign policy.” I sort-of agree. However I’d say the Bush administration was resented for pursuing more of a leadership role. That is, for making more of the decisions. E.g, we didn’t go into Iraq and Afghanistan alone, but we went in our way.
It’s natural to resent having one’s prerogatives reduced.
Who the fuck do you think you are. You do NOT speak for me. I think Bush is a clueless jackass, but apologize all you want, for yourself, but don’t apologize for me. Arrogance knows no bounds these days, I guess.
Jacques Chirac was/is not liked by a lot of people either. Not because of Iraq (a lot of people agree with that) but on many many other issues.
Here’s a summary of a poll released today, on this and similar issues.
And another, from the UK:
U.K. Poll: Bush A Threat To World Peace
I see that my friend Collounsbury has remedied his lack of data by inviting me to register for the Times online. No, but thanks anyway.
Ino’s link boils down to this:
"Despite his popularity at home, President Bush is a polarizing figure abroad. Nations that expressed unfavorable views toward the United States overwhelmingly said the problem was “mostly Bush” and not “America in general.”
I’m not sure how “Nations” are expressing views here, and since there are no numbers or indications of what questions were asked, this is a rather imperfect source on which to base one’s opinions.
Add me to the alarmingly small camp that cares what other nations think of us. Does the general loathing of America make me like Bush more? Quite the opposite. As the world’s most visible diplomat, he is failing miserably. He is an international embarrassment, and I am loth to travel abroad these days for fear of what attitudes I may encounter.
Americans largely don’t know if Europe is a country or a continent.
Europeans don’t either. When it is decided, please let us know.
Lets put this in perspective though. For you French Dopers out there. Your president Chirac is not exactly popular here in the states. I don’t have any poll data, but I’d say its pretty obvious that he isn’t. Do you care? Should it change what he and your government does that he’s not popular here? Should it change what you, a citizen thinks? English Dopers…Blair is pretty popular here, but my understanding is he isn’t as popular in England. Again, no poll data, I might be wrong. But if he is or isn’t…do you care what the average American thinks of your government/policies/Prime Minister? If you are being honest, the answer is most likely no. And if you are REALLY honest, you would probably take an almost perverse pleasure in taking your governments/president/prime minister/local voodo king’s side against outside opinion. You might not agree with them, you might think they are idiots…but they are YOUR idiots.
I didn’t vote for Bush, and don’t particularly like him. I won’t be voting for him come next election either (I’ll probably be forced to vote None of the Above it looks like atm). I don’t form that opinion based on what ‘The World’ thinks, though. Frankly, ‘The World’ bases their opinion on other factors then I do.
I don’t think the present anti-American posture of ‘The World’ comes exclusively from Dubya either. Its been growing for years, and accelerated after the cold war ended, especially in Europe. I can’t think of a single world power (Rome, Greece, Persia, British Empire, France, etc) in history that was EVER popular with outside countries. If someone has an example, please correct me. I think that we, America, were kind of were living on borrowed time popularity wise from say the 40’s to the 90’s (and even then, we weren’t TOO popular) due to the worlds fear of the Soviet Union.
A government, especially a super power, can’t form policy based on popular world opinion all the time. Sometimes, in its own interests, a government has to do things that are very unpopular with other countries that have other interests (please, I’m NOT talking about Iraq atm…no flames about the Iraq mess please). Sometimes (though politicians rarely have the guts to do it) countries have to do things that are unpopular with their own people. And sometimes, countries and Administrations make mistakes. Here, we have a self correcting mechinism for that, which I feel pretty confident that GW will find out about come 2004…
I think that, as the only super power in the world atm, America and America’s policies are under a microscope from ‘The World’ and that people of other countries are very critical of everthing we do (as far as our foriegn policies go…you could probably gve a rip as far as our domestic policies go). Again, from a historical perspective, this seems to be the norm as far as I know. To my mind, its a case of people in glass countries throwing bricks at our spun sugar castle…
But thats just my opinion…I could be wrong.
-XT
While the Pew Research Center doesn’t appear to have anything on the new poll on its website, I did find a few numbers in a USA Today front-page article.
According to the survey, “Bush is blamed by many” for declining approval of the U.S. (again, no questions or numbers supplied). The poll cites 45% of Germans and 43% of the French having favorable opinions of the U.S., down from majorities expressing those sentiments last year. Without knowing if “undecided” was a poll option, it’s unclear if majorities in those nations disapprove of the U.S.
More curiously, the poll numbers indicate a sizable shift in foreign public opinion in favor of the United States, compared to a similar poll done just before the Iraq war. In particular, there were striking gains in favorable opinion of the U.S. in…France and Germany! (in March, just 25% of Germans and 31% of the French surveyed reported favorable opinions of America. You’d never know this from the way the current poll is being reported in the American press.
Did GWB get a boost in foreign approval based on the Iraq war? If you trust the folks at Pew, it looks that way.
One other nugget from the poll: “80% of those in the Palestinian authority said co-existence (between Israelis and Palestinians) isn’t possible. But in Israel, 68% of Jews and 62% of Arabs said it is possible”.
Make of that what you will.
It does for me a little. When everyone hates your political leader naturally you feel some urge to come to his aid rather than jump in bed with people from Canada or Spain in condemning yourselves and your leadership because you won’t obey their whims. I tend to think anti-americanism is partially based on scapegoating, cultural clashes and antipathy for US power. If the motives for modern anti-americanism are these things (ignonble, badly thought out motives) then yes i will support the president more under criticism. if the motives for hating him are rational then maybe i wouldn’t.
Also, bush is only popular because of the war on terror & war in Iraq because people unify when there is an outside threat. His domestic policy is shit and the less important the war on terror becomes the lower his ratings will go.
Again, I have to agree that Europeans don’t give a rat’s ass about Bush’s domestic policies, all they care about is his foreign policy. That is, they care more about what happens in their countries than what happens in the US. Exactly why is it surprising that Americans feel the same way?
American foreign policy is reviled simply because America is the most powerful country in the world by a large margin. No one cares about the crappy foreign policy mistakes of Belgium, do they?
And honestly, if a political figure in your country was widely despised by Americans, would that change your opinion of them? No, you’d probably dismiss American attitudes as ignorant. You don’t give a rat’s ass what Americans think of your politicians, why should we give a rat’s ass what you think of our politicians?
Frankly I think we’d be better off with Reagan at the helm.
As he is now.
I’d rather say “American foreign policy is important for the rest of the world, because America is the most powerful (strictly military speaking) country in the world.”
Nobody has a problem with a powerful nation, however I’d add “It is reviled, because the president makes an effort to make it clear to foreign leaders that their opinions don’t concern him and that he is going to defy any and all reason while going through with his plans.”
Just weighing in re: the OP.
No, the world’s opinion of Bush doesn’t affect my opinion of him at all. I don’t mean to sound bitchy here but why should it?
From Optihut
"I’d rather say “American foreign policy is important for the rest of the world, because America is the most powerful (strictly military speaking) country in the world.”
I’m sure you’d RATHER say that Optihut. You seem to be implying that America is only a superpower due to our military. Sorry for the hijack but, who is the most powerful country from a NOT “strictly military speaking” point?? France? Japan? Germany? I’m curious…please cite that.
-XT