Why I Care....

....what the rest of the world thinks.


Today I was talking about the election results with a coworker. I won't go into great detail about what was discussed but I will share one part.

We got on the topic of news coverage the day after the election. I mentioned a story that really intrigued me. CNN made a point to say that the day after every presidential election since the network was on the air, they have shown footage of some crazy people somewhere in the world burning an Amercian flag. Well, this year, they were unable to find any footage anywhere in the world where someone was burning an American flag. As random as it is, I felt that it meant that basically the whole world was rooting for Obama. Simplitic, I know, but being a world traveler, and having a deep appriciation for other cultures, I felt good about the possibilty of the United States redeeming themselves on the world stage.

The next thing my coworker said to me inspired this blog entry....

"Why should we care what the rest of the world thinks of us?"

Well......talk about opening the floodgates with that question! I got seriously fired up and started spouting off everything from.....

"Maybe because the United States is not as invinceable as we think we are, and someday we might need another country to be on our side."

to

"You know some of us would like to visit other countries in the world and not be afraid to be attacked or killed just because we are Americans."

and

"We better hope other countries like us, because the way this country spends money, we may need more than just China and Russia to lend to us!"


And this started me thinking about one of my favorite articles that I have ever read about American politics. And it was from a British newspaper. I'm sure many of you remember it from four years ago. It was the London Daily Mirror and they had a pic of Goerge W. Bush and the now infamous quote....

"How can 59,054,087 people be so DUMB"

It was a jab at the number of American who voted for Bush. I personally thought it was hilarious. And although the cover was on news shows in the US all over the place....I don't think very many people actually stopped to read the article. It'a a shame, because it really is a brilliant commentary, and a nice perspective on what foriegners thought of the re-election of Bush. The title was "God Save America".

An excerpt:

"They say that in life you get what you deserve. Well, today America has deservedly got a lawless cowboy to lead them further into carnage and isolation and the unreserved contempt of most of the rest of the world. This once-great country has pulled up its drawbridge for another four years and stuck a finger up to the billions of us forced to share the same air. And in doing so, it has shown itself to be a fearful, backward-looking and very small nation. This should have been the day when Americans finally answered their critics by raising their eyes from their own sidewalks and looking outward towards the rest of humanity."

Well, here we are four years later, and I feel like, with the election of Obama, we are finally going to do what we didn't four years ago....start rebuilding our relationships with the rest of the world. And just for the record, I get it that just electing Obama is not automatically going to fix our international relationships, but at least it puts us on the right track. I mean, can you imagine what would be written about us in other countries if the McCain/Palin ticket had won???? And I am sure CNN would have had all kinds of burning American flag images to air.


O.K. Just for fun, one more excerpt from "God Save America". This one about Bush himself.....

"America chose a man without morals or vision. An economic incompetent who inherited a huge surplus from Clinton, gave it in tax cuts to the rich and turned the US into the world's largest debtor nation. A man who sneers at the rights of other nations. Who has withdrawn from international treaties on the environment and chemical weapons. A man who flattens sovereign states then hands the rebuilding contracts to his own billionaire party backers. A man who promotes trade protectionism and backs an Israeli government which continually flouts UN resolutions. America has chosen a menacingly immature buffoon who likened the pursuit of the 9/11 terrorists to a Wild West, Wanted Dead or Alive man-hunt.... A RADICAL Christian fanatic who decided the world was made up of the forces of good and evil, who invented a war on terror, and thus as author of it, believed he had the right to set the rules of engagement. "

I read these angry words from four years ago, and I realize that this is what the US is finally walking away from. Its a new beginning. A new era. And as overused as this word was in this latest election, its still true.....a chance for change.