George Bush Jr. belongs that peculiar school of American politician who doesn’t understand the rest of the world, isn’t curious about it, and doesn’t give a damn about the possibility that they might like to do things a bit differently out “there”.
Why does Europe even care? All the better if the evil American imperialists decide to stay out of things and mind their own business, right? The trouble is, that’s just not possible, nor likely. Bush’s attitude is that the rest of the world is not worth knowing, but it is certainly worth exploiting. American corporations throw a lot of weight around even when the U.S. government and military does not. And when the interests of Coca Cola are at stake, you can bet Bush Jr. will get interested in hurry. But he won’t get interested enough to try to learn anything. He’ll only get interested enough to figure out just how much weight American can throw around out there in order to get their way. Trade impediments? Let’s cut off their credit at the World Bank. Regulations to protect indigenous cultural expressions? Demand that they be removed so American trinkets can be sold at cut-rate prices! Laws preventing tobacco advertising aimed at children? Hell, that discriminates against R. J. Reynolds! Threaten to jack up their interest rates!
Bush will oppose every effort to make America play by the same rules as everyone else. Clinton could not persuade Congress to sign international agreements on land mines and chemical weapons and exploitation of the world’s oceans. Clinton couldn’t persuade the Republicans to show the slightest concern over global warming.
The only mitigating circumstance in sight is that the Republicans must be aware of the danger of losing both houses of Congress in the next election two years from now. Bush can’t afford to antagonize everyone no matter what Tom Delay thinks.
And another thought… had Gore won, you can bet the Republicans would already have picked out their Special Prosecutors and Investigative Committee chairs. It doesn’t matter whether there is anything to investigate or not: something could always be found.