One aspect of the presidential debate last Friday that becomes more apparent when you read the transcript is the complete disregard Bush has for the international community. Sebastian Hesse has a good post on this in his campaign blog for ARD. Hesse notes that any bashing of the UN gets the biggest applause from any Republican audience, and President Bush has sought to capitalize on this by attacking Kerry’s comment concerning a ‘Global Test’ from the first debate of September 30. Bush uses ‘Global Test’ as a code phrase for the traditional US allies in Europe – France and Germany – who refused to join the ‘coalition of the willing’ in a preemptive invasion of Iraq.
Another convenient target is the International Court of Justice in Den Haag, which Bush ridicules since a European judge might decide a case involving a US citizen. This despite wide international support for such a court from traditional alliance partners of the US.
Bush also attacked the Kyoto Treaty – which even his friend ‘Vladimir’ has ratified – since it might impact on US jobs. But the Bush administration has gone even further by denying the research of the global scientific community which concludes that global warming is probably the greatest threat for the planet.
Probably the most telling moment was when a woman asked Bush why Americans are disliked abroad – something she had experienced first-hand while traveling in Europe. Bush’s face contorted in anger and disgust as he talked about having to make ‘hard decisions’ which were not well-received in “European capitals”.
Of course, it is not only Old Europe that is the target of Bush’s wrath. Canada has become an honorary member of the European Community, even though Bush presumably is aware that it borders the US. Prescription drugs, Bush said, cannot be imported from Canada since they might be ‘contaminated’. (Witness the huge number of Canadians dying needlessly due to tainted drugs.}
In his blog post, Sebastian Hesse asks how any European could support Bush:
Ich werde hier in den USA haeufig gefragt, ob ich ein Bush-Befuerworter waere. Ich frage dann immer zurueck, ob ueberhaupt ein Europaeer denkbar waere, der sich angesichts dieser regelmaessigen, kalkulierten anti-europaeischen Tiraden mit der Weltsicht dieses Praesidenten identifizieren koenne
NEW YORK TIMES UPDATE: Two good pieces in today’s paper. Richard Berstein examines the national malaise in Germany by looking at the situation in Gelsinkirchen. Then John Wray has a humorous Op/Ed piece about the eventful week in Austria, which saw a ‘sado-masochistic’ Austrian writer receive the Nobel Prize for Literature while the pope beatified Charles I, the last Hapsburg to rule as emperor and the ‘father of chemical warfare’.
