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Originally Posted by August
Most of us, if we take the time to think about it, figure you'll eventually come up with a majority consensus and that's really the only thing we want to hear.
The reason for this, I think, is that most Americans, throughout our history and even now in the world society of the 21st century (AD), deep down still believe that America is the best country in the world to live in, so who really cares what the Germans, or the French, or even the British, are arguing about amongst themselves this month? Nothing personal about this you understand, just we feel its not our business what you say at your own kitchen tables about your own fellow citizens.
Europeans in particular seem, at least from this side of the pond, to be the exact opposite. You have opinions, strong opinions, on nearly everything we do.
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The part of the quote I highlighted in bold face is in large part why people in other countries take an interest in US policies and politics; that attitude is present in your discourse and in your foreign policy, and it makes people take notice because the implication seems to be that Americans can do no wrong, that their actions are always well meaning and benevolent, and that whatever they propose should be accepted on fiat because the US knows best and its politicians never lie, and never mislead.
The Iraq war is the perfect example of this. Public opinion outside the US was almost universally and unanimously opposed to it, yet to the US this was irrelevant; many Americans declared these countries "anti-American", and the U.S. government acted on the basis that it knew what was best for them, and these countries had better get their act together and start acting as such.
Take the case of France, for example. France is a democracy, and a sovereign nation; as such its government's prime responsibility is to the French citizens who elected it and whose interests it has as its first priority. France, along with Germany, the UK, and Russia all hold the same power within the UNSC; of these 5 permanent members, only two - the US and UK - supported a second resolution against Iraq, one that would explicitly authorize the use of force against Iraq and thereby allow the US to tap the full resources of the UN, political, economic, and militarily (through its member states) for the war; only 2 of the 5 countries supported the case for war, yet it was felt in the US, and still is, that the other 3 members were obligated to go along with the wishes of the US as though these other permanent members were merely client states rather than equal partners with their own constituencies and their own national interests. It mattered not, for instance, that there was overwhelming opposition in France to this war, that the French people did not buy into the case made for this war by the US government, or that just like the US and every other country, France has to put its own interests first and that to act so blatantly against the overwhelming majority of its electorate would be the antithesis to the principles of democracy that the US claims to cherish.
And what was the US reaction? Boycots, freedom fries, and a sudden interest in any economic dealings France may have had with Iraq (that Iraq was once once a US client state it had supported during the Iran-Iraq war and continued its relationship even afterward was of no consequence, of course).
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So, regardless of your personal feelings please treat our President with the respect we'd show the leader of your country were she to come over here for an official state visit.
Not because she is a Christian-National-Green-Socialist-Democrat or whatever you people are calling your parties this week, :p but because she, as the elected head of your nation is a representative and a symbol of German people, a strange far away people from the old world who, like the British, were once our enemies but are now our friends and allies.
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Ah yes, the double standard. When Chretien, our former Canadian PM, turned down the invitation to participate in Iraq, his state visit was abruptly cancelled by the US whose President suddenly had other things to do (like go fishing or play golf); that this was done while Canada was fighting alongside the US in Afghanistan was particularly notable, even if you overlook the fact that we do more trade together than any two other countries in the world, share the world's largest undefended border, and have a long history of fighting side by side that continues to this day. None of that mattered though, not the relationship, the history, or the wishes of the Canadian people whose PM had only acceded to; instead it was more important to snub the Canadian PM for having the nerve to not do the bidding of the US President.