Tikkabik

Market research company Harris Interactive did a poll recently that shows that if western Europeans were allowed to vote in the U.S. presidential elections, Kerry would lead Bush by a 6 to 1 majority. I'm sure this won't earn Europe any points with the Republican faithful or Zell "Kerry would let Paris decide when America needs defending" Miller, but it is pretty telling.

If you're a regular reader of this blog you know where I stand on this by now: I'm not exactly a bleeding-heart liberal, but I think George W Bush is a menace and I want him out this November even if it means replacing him with someone who will probably do a mediocre job at best -- it's that whole "lesser of two evils" thing I'm willing to live with. And I'm happy to see thousands of Europeans agreeing with me.

I'm not suggesting the United States needs Europe's public approval to elect a president, or that we should take cues from European politics. Europe has its own set of problems and issues that need to be dealt with, ones that aren't getting dealt with very effectively by its own elected officials. Meanwhile Russian troops acting against their own government's orders are raping and murdering Chechans, Chechans are doing their best to get back at Russians, hundreds of thousands of Sudanese are being murdered, and lots of other bad, bad things are happening in just about every spot on the globe. The whole world is pretty screwed up.

But I can't remember a time since perhaps Reagan than an American leader has so thoroughly polarized an entire continent's population against us, and I'm willing to bet that if HI did this poll in Asia they'd see similar results. But it's a globalized world, now, baby -- it's not us against the commies anymore. Looking at it from a purely practical and perhaps slightly mercenary standpoint, I firmly belive that pissing off a large group of consumers who buy our nation's products and use our services probably isn't the smartest long-term strategy. Even if they continue to consume American things, it's ratcheting up an attitude towards American cultural, economic and military imperialism that is bound to bite us in the ass sooner or later, and hard.

"Not only do most European adults prefer Kerry over Bush, they also believe (by 62% to 16%) that Kerry will defeat Bush. These results suggest that most Europeans have not been following the U.S. elections very closely, as Kerry has not enjoyed a large lead in any American poll, and most polls have shown the race to be close or have given President Bush the lead," said the research company.

Interesting. But they probably have a much greater awareness of American politics than a similar sample group of Americans would have about politics in Great Britain, France, Germany, Spain or Italy, where this poll was taken.

Or perhaps Europeans just have more faith in the American voters than they deserve, if current polls here in the States are any indication.