Climate change is the top security concern in a poll conducted by the Washington-based Pew Research Center, followed by Islamist terrorism and cyber attacks while respondents in a growing number of countries worried about the power and influence of the United States.From Reuters no less.
Uncle Sam’s failure is unsurprising. As Lord Acton famously intoned: “Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” It doesn’t matter whether the intentions of Washington policymakers are good. The consequences of American policies have been bad, often disastrous."The road to hell is paved with good intentions."
Lawrence Freedman, emeritus professor at King’s College London [said], “the main concern is clearly not wanting to upset Russia more.”Au contraire. I suspect that the biggest reason — and one that no one in the US government will talk about above a whisper in a secure room — is that the US is one the verge of losing Europe and either the president has figured this out for himself or he is being told by his advisers.
The entire Russian government is included in the US Treasury’s ‘Kremlin List,’ which also features scores of influential businessmen. Moscow slammed the report, saying it virtually amounts to a breakdown of ties. — RT
The Kremlin has described the list as an attempt to interfere in the upcoming 2018 Russian presidential election.Sputnik International
The release of the so-called ‘Kremlin List’ by the US Treasury Department increases uncertainty in the Russian business environment and can affect interests of European investors and companies doing business or trading with Russia, the Association of European Businesses (AEB) said on Tuesday.
"The Association reiterates its calls on the Heads of States and Governments of the EU, the USA and Russia to refrain from actions, which can undermine the prospects of future economic cooperation, and find a common, mutually acceptable, solution of political problems in the spirit of peace and conciliation," the AEB said.
The United States has a major public relations problem in former Soviet countries. Not only in Russia, but in Azerbaijan, Kyrgyzstan, and even Ukraine, ordinary people see the U.S. as an arrogant, hegemonic superpower that meddles in the affairs of other countries in a cynical pursuit of its own interests — perceptions that dovetail with the Russian government’s official critiques of the United States, which may explain the success of these particular memes. At the same time, citizens of these countries respect and admire American economic power, technology, culture, and, to some extent, its political institutions. This dual-sided picture — often obscured by crude survey-based measures of views of America in post-Soviet nations — emerged from 18 focus groups we conducted in Russia, Azerbaijan, Kyrgyzstan, and Ukraine between April and August 2014.
To restore American soft power in the region, the United States should reduce direct support for civil society organizations in former Soviet countries and others that lack intrinsic demand for civic engagement. American financing of these organizations has played into the hands of authoritarian leaders who portray such backing as evidence of American interference, hurting the reputations of both the U.S. and the local NGOs that receive American funds. Instead, American policies should emphasize programs which spread and deepen knowledge and appreciation of American institutions — more exchanges of people, ideas, and cultural products….
The US is losing its status of world power, as the country has lately not been able to enforce its geopolitical interests in several regions and has had to retreat, according to German Media.
The descent of the United States as a world power started in Syria, Deutsche Wirtschafts Nachrichten reported.…
However, according to Deutsche Wirtschafts Nachrichten, the US is losing its status as a world power not only because of its failure in the foreign policy. Not less important is the fact that government has failed to lessen the gap between rich and poor and abandoned its own moral standards.Well, that may be somewhat of an exaggeration. but the US has taken some lumps lately, and the moral authority of the US in decline. The Obama administration has perpetuated mistakes of previous administrations, especially the Bush administration.
An unmistakable sense of unease has been growing in capitals around the world as the U.S. government from afar looks increasingly befuddled — shirking from a military confrontation in Syria, stymied at home by a gridlocked Congress and in danger of defaulting on sovereign debt, which could plunge the world's financial system into chaos.
While each of the factors may be unrelated to the direct exercise of U.S. foreign policy, taken together they give some allies the sense that Washington is not as firm as it used to be in its resolve and its financial capacity, providing an opening for China or Russia to fill the void, an Asian foreign minister told a group of journalists in New York this week....
"The paralysis of the American government, where a rump in Congress is holding the whole place to ransom, doesn't really jibe with the notion of the United States as a global leader," said Michael McKinley, an expert on global relations at the Australian National University....
Germany's influential newspaper Sueddeutsche Zeitung bemoaned the U.S. political chaos. ...What is clear, though, is that America is already politically bankrupt," it said....
...Cordesman said, [there is] "is a real concern about where is the U.S. going. There is a question of trust. And I think there is an increasing feeling that the United States is pulling back, and its internal politics are more isolationist so that they can't necessarily trust what U.S. officials say, even if the officials mean it."The Huffington Post — World
