After the primaries, John Kerry tried to impress the voters by saying that world leaders supported him over Bush. Within days, Kerry was not saying that anymore. Kerry's pollsters told him the truth: Americans are not very fond of the world these days. Kerry did not repeat this line anymore!
Let me make a prediction. The American public is fed up with the world and the cheap shots. I pick up these vibes everywhere, from casual talk to serious political conversation.
The anti-world message is all over talk radio, the town meeting of modern America. Do you want to know what Americans are thinking? Listen to talk radio! Americans are angry at the world. They feel that the world is taking too many cheap shots.
I think that most Americans feel unappreciated. I am not suggesting that Americans want roses every Friday. I think an occasional "thank you" would do! The world owes the US, its military and taxpayers lots of "thank you's" rather than all of the cheap shots that we've been hearing lately!
The straw that broke the camel's back was the "stingy" comments made by some idiot at the UN. I think that you will see increasing pressure to pull the US out of the UN.
What we are hearing from the world goes beyond criticism. They are cheap shots. It has become fashionable in many corners to attack the US. Look at any international newspaper and you will see mean attacks on the US. Much of the world's press has completely forgotten that Saddam Hussein left thousands of mass graves and used chemical weapons twice.
John Fund of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL reports today that
"....Jean-Pierre Tailleur, the author of a book that harshly criticizes the French media, says the coverage of the Iraq war in some French media was almost cartoonish in its opposition.
"They minimized the atrocities of Saddam's regime and presented Bush as a criminal on the same level as Saddam and Hitler, wrote Tailleur."
Comparing Bush to Hitler or Saddam is a cheap shot. We can expect that from fringe leftist groups. Unfortunately, we are now hearing this from the mainstream press. That's unacceptable as well as ignorant.
Some soften the cheap shots by saying that they hate Bush but love Americans. I can understand this to a point. It may explain the ideological differences with Bush but not the cheap shots.
Bush is a straight shooter. He is blunt and he did not hold back after 3,000 Americans were murdered on 9-11. He is also the kind of fellow that will do what he says. In other words, if Bush says "come clean or face consequences" then Saddam will face consequences if he does not come clean!
Also, Bush is a conservative and many of our allies have left of center leaders at the moment. I don't expect Bush to have much in common with Canada's Paul Martin or Spain's J.L. Rodriguez-Zapatero.
You can disagree with Bush. But calling the US evil goes beyond that. Putting Hitler and Bush on the same sentence is nonsense. Cheap shots are cheap shots.
Why are Americans getting so disenchanted with the world?
It starts at the United Nations, an organization that is subsidized by US taxpayers but spends its time calling us "stingy" or issuing resolutions attacking Israel. Of course, the UN also spent the last few years looking the other way as Saddam Hussein used the Oil for Food program to buy favors from member states like France.
Another reason is that most Americans have a father or grandfather who fought in WW2, Korea or Vietnam.
Let's start with France which was liberated by US soldiers in WW2. There are thousands of US young men buried in France. Without their sacrifice, the French would have been forced to fight Hitler on their own. (Any bets on a French surrender?) Yet, French leaders go around blasting US imperialism.
The Rasmussen Reports shows that "...Fifty-seven percent (57%) of American voters have an unfavorable view of France...25% have a favorable opinion of that nation. In fact, more Americans believe France is our enemy (31%) in the War on Terror than believe Jacques Chirac's country is our ally (22%). A plurality, 43%, believe that France's role is somewhere in between ally and enemy."
Is anyone surprised? I am not. Iraq is a factor. But the overall arrogant anti-Americanism of the French is a bigger factor.
From DeGaulle to Chirac, the French have had a bad case of superpower complex. Yet, France is neither a superpower or much of any power.
Who are the French fooling? They are not fooling the American people anymore!
Another reason is that US soldiers, and tanks, protected Western Europe and the world after WW2.
Why didn't Soviet tanks march into Paris or Berlin?
Why did Taiwan, South Korea and Japan turn into economic success stories rather than nations threatened by China or the USSR?
Why didn't Soviet submarines put Mexican oil fields at risk?
Why do oil tankers travel freely in the Persian Gulf?
Who protects the world's commercial sea lanes?
Who checked the Soviets throughout the world?
The answer is US power, i.e., the US military. The second answer is US presidents who were not afraid to use that power.
Every American taxpayer has paid for the defense of the world. Europeans have enjoyed 60 years of peace because the US was prepared to stop Soviet tanks. Frankly, new generations of Europeans are ingrates and ignorant of the US sacrifice in blood and treasury.
Why do people in European capitals have the freedom to march against the US? Because they were not overrun by Soviet tanks. American power gave the Europeans the freedom to march against American power.
Who are these people fooling? They are not fooling the Americans anymore!
How bad has the US been as a superpower? Victor Davis Hanson is a professor and commentator on world affairs. He wrote:
"Imagine a world in which there was no United States during the last 15 years. Iraq, Iran, and Libya would now have nukes. Afghanistan would remain a seventh-century Islamic terrorist haven sending out the minions of Zarqawi and Bin Laden worldwide. The lieutenants of Noriega, Milosevic, Mullah Omar, Saddam, and Moammar Khaddafi would no doubt be adjudicating human rights at the United Nations. The Ortega Brothers and Fidel Castro, not democracy, would be the exemplars of Latin America. Bosnia and Kosovo would be national graveyards like Pol Pot's Cambodia. Add in Kurdistan as well — the periodic laboratory for Saddam's latest varieties of gas. Saddam himself, of course, would have statues throughout the Gulf attesting to his control of half the world's oil reservoirs. Europeans would be in two-day mourning that their arms sales to Arab monstrocracies ensured a second holocaust. North Korea would be shooting missiles over Tokyo from its new bases around Seoul and Pusan. For their own survival, Germany, Taiwan, and Japan would all now be nuclear."
Read the last paragraph again and again.
In fact, the US has been a very responsible power. The US has freed more people than all of its critics. Again, where would the world be without the US foreign policy?
The anti-American world is about to have a reality check over the next 10 years because of China and the coming changes in Europe. As they say in Texas, there is a big attitude adjustment coming!
It won't be long before Muslims have enough votes to change governments in Europe. Can the secular Europeans co-exist with people who view abortion and homosexual marriage as sins? Can they share power with people who think that the role of women is to have lots of babies and cover their faces?
Time will answer these questions. Early results from Holland are not very encouraging.
It won't be long before China starts pushing its weight around the world. China needs oil and natural resources to feed its growing economy. China is determined to feed itself.
Who is going to stop China? The Chinese will laugh at the Kyoto-tistas and won't give "a four letter word" what the Western liberals think about nuclear power or environmental concerns.
Marshall Auerback is an international strategist with David W. Tice & Associates, LLC, a USVI-based money management firm, wrote this recently on China:
"China's already vigorous response to this challenge is likely to bring it increasingly up against the United States. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, for instance, returned from a Christmas trip to China where he apparently sold America's historic Venezuelan oil supplies to the Chinese together with future prospecting rights. Even Canada (in the words of President Bush, "our most important neighbors to the north") is negotiating to sell up to one-third of its oil reserves to China. CNOOC, China's third largest oil and gas group, is actually considering a bid of more that $13 billion for its American rival, Unocal. The real significance of the deal (which, given the size, could not have been contemplated in the absence of Chinese state support) is that it illustrates the emerging competition between China and the U.S. for global influence -- and resources.
The NYTimes reports that China is moving rapidly into nuclear power:
"There are countless ways to show how China is climbing the world's economic ladder, hurdling developed countries in its path, but few are more pronounced than the country's rush into nuclear energy - a technology that for environmental, safety and economic reasons most of the world has put on hold."
In the near future, China will disrupt environmental protocols, cheat on trade accords, and push their neighbors.
China will be a threat to Taiwan and Japan.
A report from Channelnewsasia.com points out that Japan has been increasingly alarmed by the expanding military capabilities of China. The guidelines said: "China, which has a great impact on security in this region, is pushing ahead with enhancing its nuclear and missile capabilities in modernizing its navy and air force while expanding marine activities."
What liberal group is going to tell the Chinese that they are polluting their air, abusing their workers and violating human rights accords?
What Chinese leader is going to care what the NYTimes thinks? They will laugh at the liberals in much the same way that Hitler laughed at the appeasers of the 1930s.
The US won't look so evil after China starts to push its weight around.
So let me close by going back to Professor Hanson:
"We will finish the job in Iraq, nursemaid democratic Afghanistan through its birthpangs, and continue to ensure that bandits and criminal states stay off the world's streets. But what is new is that the disenchanted American is becoming savvy and developing a long memory — and so we all fear the day is coming when he casts aside the badge, rides the buckboard out of town, and leaves such sanctimonious folk to themselves."
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