Same Old World Contempt, Different Term
The Washington Post reports that since winning his second term President Bush has tried raising his profile across the pond, and woo the U.S.'s many detractors in Europe into a somewhat more cordial posture toward American foreign policy. But the presidential charm offensive has left its targets strangely unmoved:
Seventy-two percent of Europeans disapprove of Bush's foreign policies, and 59 percent believe that U.S. leadership in global affairs is undesirable, according to the annual survey by the German Marshall Fund of the United States, a Washington-based organization that promotes transatlantic studies. Those numbers hardly budged from the fund's poll the year before.
In retrospect, we suppose the president probably should have refrained from saying he couldn't wait to hang out in Luxembourg once Trent Lott came into full possession of it.-- HOLLY MARTINS
So Much for Mending Fences in Europe [Washington Post]