Yes, most people that "hates" america, hates it for the wrong reasons.
They stick with their "Bush is bad" routine, but in some cases this is
good, because it means the next president will not necessarily inherit
the same bad press.
Having said that, I feel that in general the people I know they got
right one thing: America is trying to policy our lives, but we cannot
intervene directly or indirectly with their plans and ideas. And that's
a powerful reason to dislike America. Press or not, We have not voted
for Bush, but boy, we are sure suffering it's consecuences!
I won't comment on the things I've read about america cutting budget on
research to invest more heavily on its army, or that religion is
thightening its grip on politics, as are the corporations. I do not have
a complete picture of these news, as Internet is not very partial, and I
cannot say if these are very isolated cases (as, for example, a church
that celebrated the recent airplane accident on Madrid, because us
Spaniards support "fag politics") or a more extended and common
situation (as airport authority problems, that seems both locals and
foreigns suffer).
As for the right-wing resurgence in Europe, I have to admit that lately
we had our share of conservative leaders there. Some of them are
extremely scary, and I'm not thinking about Sarkozy but people like
Berlusconi or Putin, that behave more like criminals and less like
politicians. Media has mentioned a lot of reasons, but if I have to
judge for my experience in Spain, is just that the people that used to
vote for the center-left parties has becomed disilusioned and stopped
going to vote. Right wing prevalence in Spain has been always directly
related to low percentage of voters.
Finally a disclaimer: I don't "hate" U.S. I am scared to death by it.
I've met some exttremely great people from there (being the list a good
example), but I don't/can't possibly understand how they can live in
their country. And much less why they want their country to be the
example to be followed by the other countries.
My two cents. I won't add further, as I feel this thread is strongly
breaking the list ettiquette, no matter how polite we can try to put our
words.
Real Disclaimer: I have not official education in English. I have tried
to write as polite as possible, being a sensitive topic and all that.
Anything considered offensive may be considered an error of composition
and the offended party may try to pursue a free beer if any time we met.
Jon Glass escribió:
> On Wed, Sep 3, 2008 at 1:31 AM, matthiasm <mm@matthiasm.com> wrote:
>
>
>> Folks in Europe were anti-Bush four years ago, but when he was re-
>> elected, 80% of Europeans(*) lost much of their sympathy with the
>> U.S. . Apathy may be a reason, but not an excuse.
>>
>
> I hate to say this, but this really relates, if you will just read to
> the end. But I hold no stock on this attitude. There is much less
> "Bush-hatred" than is reported. In fact, it has been during Bush's
> second term that there has been a resurgence of more conservative
> leadership in Europe (Sarkozy anyone), but more importantly, to the
> point under discussion (ignorance). When I ask euro Bush-haters why
> they hate Bush so much, their answers reveal a great ignorance of the
> issues at hand, and show a lack of knowledge of current events, and
> even recent Middle-East history. In other words, they hate Bush
> because their media has told them to, and out of ignorance. I don't
> mind if someone hates Bush, and knows _why_ they hate Bush, and can
> give me a well-reasoned answer, but most people who hate him, hate him
> for the wrong reasons, or out of ignorance. That disappoints me.
>
>
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Received on Wed Sep 3 18:41:43 2008
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