“We’ll give the grandest Hardball Award to date to someone who is at the very top who’s proving he clearly belongs there and with the whole world watching. We begin with President Obama’s undoing of the global image cultivated by President Bush.” -- (
Hardball with Chris Matthews, MSNBC)
Every time U.S. President Barack Obama travels overseas – coverage of his visits rotate around a central theme in the U.S. media. That theme – thank you Mr. President for seducing foreign leaders and getting the world to love us once again.
Now there’s numbers out that support the media’s favorable coverage but it’s not as straightforward as the President would like, you see there is good news: Western Europe loves America. But also bad news: Muslim countries are generally unchanged in their spite for the States. (Images from
Pew Global Attitudes Project)
The Pew Global Attitudes Project conducted the survey involving more than 26,000 people in 24 countries. Now we’re taking a look at different media perspectives on what the results mean.
Jilly Badanes for
The Washington Times highlights a distinct bonus of increased popularity.
“Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright says the popularity will the give the U.S. a better chance of making progress on global security issues.”
But in an interview with
NPR, Pew Research Center president Andrew Kohut points out that Obama’s popularity has not thawed perception in certain Middle-Eastern countries.
"Views about the U.S. in many of these Muslim countries are very extreme…They are very hostile, and there's great distrust of the United States and that's why in six months, Obama couldn't turn it around the way he's turned it around in Western Europe."
The Toronto Star reporter Mitch Potter notes that while the Middle East numbers might not look promising, there are good signs for the States.
“…Obama proved more popular than Osama bin Laden in Muslim countries — a status that eluded predecessor Bush in every Pew survey since the project began seven years ago.”
Jokingly Potter adds the results mean,
“Americans can finally stop hiding behind the Canadian flag.”
Euronews tackles the story by examining the stark contrast between Obama’s popularity at home compared to overseas.
“Obama’s handling of the economy appears to be key to his fading popularity as Americans become more pessimistic about how long it will take for the economic downturn to end. But while the critics back home may be gaining ground, abroad confidence in America’s first black President is rising.” Mike Kellermann, a correspondent for Iran’s
Press TV, includes the viewpoint of former U.S. Senator John Danforth. Kellermann explains how Danforth believes good numbers are actually bad.
“Danforth, a former Republican Senator said the general improvement in the U.S. image aside from the Middle East is in his words a sign that Obama has become to passive in the so-called the ‘war on terror’. And he noted that even majorities in countries that see Obama as a vast improvement over Bush oppose Obama’s stepped up war in Afghanistan.”
Do you agree America’s image abroad has improved under President Obama? If you do, is that a good or bad thing considering U.S. foreign policy objectives?
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