Posted on 06/22/2010 6:55:01 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Can you imagine Vladimir Putin or Hu Jintao poring over global opinion polls?
Do we care what the world thinks of us? Should we? A new survey of global opinion is getting the usual respectful attention. The Pew Global Attitudes Project surveyed people in 57 countries and found that President Obama’s approval ratings have slipped a bit among Europeans, Latin Americans, and Asians — though he remains quite a bit more popular than George W. Bush was in his final year in office. (President Obama is far better liked abroad than he is at home.)
Liberals tend to care a great deal about the way America is perceived globally and will doubtless be gratified that their pin-up continues to score well in Brussels and Timbuktu. They remind us that Thomas Jefferson himself bowed to a “decent respect for the opinions of mankind” when drafting the Declaration of Independence.
Jefferson had never attended a session of the United Nations Human Rights Council. On June 18, the Council voted by acclamation to select Miguel D’Escoto Brockmann to serve on its Advisory Committee. D’Escoto, a defrocked priest who served as foreign minister for Nicaragua’s Communist Sandinista government in the 1980s, was fully implicated in that regime’s multiple and grievous human-rights abuses.
This is not D’Escoto’s first high-level posting at the U.N. He served as president of the General Assembly from 2008 to 2009, during which time he warmly embraced Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and described the U.S. invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq as “atrocities that must be condemned and repudiated by all who believe in the rule of law in international relations.” He branded Ronald Reagan as an “international outlaw” and suggested that Israel is “crucifying our Palestinian brothers and sisters.”
Well, perhaps the U.N. Human Rights Council isn’t the best measure of world opinion. Even stipulating that the U.N. represents only the twisted posturing of a largely unelected, corrupt, and cynical collection of thugs, are global opinion polls useful guides to anything? Did you know that 63 percent of Turks, according to one recent survey, approve of polygamy?
Americans, one suspects, pay far more attention to these global popularity contests than other nations. Can you imagine Vladimir Putin or Hu Jintao poring over these results? Ah, 50 percent of Germans have a favorable view of Russia compared with only 38 percent of Brazilians! Fifty-eight percent of Indonesians like the Chinese, but only 39 percent of Mexicans feel the same! Summon our image-makers!
President Obama’s most concerted effort since taking office has been to improve America’s image in the Muslim world. The president’s first interview was granted to al-Arabiya. He traveled to Cairo to sprinkle the fairy dust and filmed a fawning New Year’s message to the gangsters who rule in Tehran. He has sent multiple envoys, most notably Sen. John Kerry, to woo Syria’s brutal Bashar al-Assad. With what result?
As this survey indicates, President Obama has achieved very little in terms of popularity in Muslim lands. After a short spike following the inauguration, approval of America has fallen fast. The number of Egyptians expressing confidence in Obama fell from 41 to 31 percent, and in Turkey from 33 percent to 23 percent. The Pew report notes that “last year only 13 percent of Pakistani Muslims expressed confidence in Obama, but this year even fewer (8 percent) hold this view.”
Who knows why so many respondents in Muslim countries are disappointed in Obama? It’s possible, based on the way rumors and conspiracy theories metastasize in that part of the world, that many believed our president was actually a Muslim Manchurian candidate and have been disappointed in the reality. It’s possible they expected a complete repudiation of Israel, rather than the icy disdain this administration has shown. It’s hard enough to interpret the views of our own voters — South Carolina Democratic primary, anyone? — and the motives of foreigners are even more mysterious.
Okay, popularity is slipping, but perhaps the apology tour/charm offensive has yielded dividends in policy support? Not so much. Syria has clutched Iran even closer to her bosom than before and has recently transferred Scud missiles to Hezbollah in Lebanon — all while the U.S. continues to grovel before Assad. Iran is racing toward nuclear status while essentially dropping the fig leaf of “peaceful” energy. Turkey, the Muslim nation with the warmest relationship to the West, has accelerated its turn toward jihadism. Brazil has spurned the U.S. by embracing Iran and Turkey.
Machiavelli provides ballast for Jefferson: “And that prince who bases his power entirely on . . . words, finding himself completely without other preparations, comes to ruin.”
— Mona Charen is a nationally syndicated columnist.
Does Mona Charen ever write a bad column?
The masses of stupid Brits who chastised us for electing Bush are now understanding what so many of us “uneducated Yanks” already knew....
There is NO such thing as “world opinion.” What we rather have have is mostly the disinformation of state-run media of brutal dictatorships or elitist media of a few other countries. These will never give true “world opinion.”
Trying to follow “world opinion” is a fool’s game.
“It’s possible, based on the way rumors and conspiracy theories metastasize in that part of the world, that many believed our president was actually a Muslim Manchurian candidate and have been disappointed in the reality.”
Everyone knows it.
Get the UN out of the US and the US out of the UN!
Excellent, well said Mona! Love it, I'll try to commit that to memory.
Not really. 47% approval with heavy lifting from the press? It took 8 full years of negative advertising by the MSM acting as agents of the DNC for Bush to fall to his last year in office.
It’s exactly like the lesson I learned from my parents years ago when I was concerned about what others thought of me. “Do they pay our bills?” they asked.
Right on the money with regard to “world opinion,” I’d say, especially in view of the fact that we often pay THEIR bills!
‘World opinion’ (if it ever mattered) is by now, the whore of the MSM.
So the question is... Does world opinion STILL matter?
Answer: Impossible!
World Opinion, so compromised by and obligated to moneyed interests, cannot and must not be deferred to by legitimate and sovereign powers.
American Conservatives must stop looking for ‘global approval’ and just get on with surviving the current challenges to our sovereignty and to our society. The ‘world’ is NOT picking up the tab for what goes on in America, so the ‘world’ doesn’t get a vote in how we conduct ourselves. PERIOD
BTW, the UN is nothing but an institutionalized system of global corruption and has NO credibility.
That would be an excellent start. Then get rid of the Commerce Dept and interstate (a particular dirty used by the Senate for years).
Perhaps a double-entendre? LOL!!
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