At the end of the Cold War, Zbigniew Brzezinski was concerned with what he called America's "permissive cornucopia," its pervasive preoccupation with self-gratification and the decline of moral standards.
Ten years later George Soros, one of globalization's strongest advocates, writes about his fear that market fundamentalism is leaving too much of the world behind.
The message from both men: If America seeks to maintain global authority, it will require the world's respect for the values it stands for. America's political, social, cultural and environmental policies must be deemed truly worthy of imitation.
The United States and Europe clashed last week on environmental issues. President Bush met with German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, who was acting as spokesman for the European Union's cold reaction to Washington's backing away from the Kyoto protocol agreements.
Italy's La Stampa called the meeting a "dialogue among the deaf." For Germany's Frankfurter Allgemeine, Washington's easy out of the environmental accords demonstrates an "increasingly isolationist attitude in the US."
France's Le Monde offered an editorial entitled, "Mr. Bush as the polluter," saying that it wasn't at all a question of isolationism, but rather a "brutal form of unilateralism," the diplomacy of like it or not, "That's the way it is."
Stockholm, which presently holds the rotating European presidency, denounced the "provocation from Washington concerning Kyoto." Swedish Commissioner Margot Wallstrom called the position of Bush " extremely worrying" and pronounced that in future talks with Washington she and her colleagues will not be interested in hearing about "solutions that are mere facades."
With no circumlocution, European ambassadors made their disappointment known to the US State Department.
The discontent went well beyond upsetting our European allies. The Japanese government expressed its "extreme annoyance" and China's foreign minister called Bush's attitude "irresponsible," stressing the importance that industrial nations set an example for the rest of the world.
The Kyoto Protocol was signed in 1997 by 155 nations. The accord obligates the signatories to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 5.2 percent by 2012, based on the levels recorded in 1990. The United States, representing 4% of the world population, is responsible for 25% of CO2 emissions, believed to be the main cause of global warming.
Bush's performance is a double-barreled double whammy. Not only
is he falling short on his campaign promises, he is also demonstrating
the refusal of his administration to esteem itself tied to any previous
accords signed by his predecessors.
.
On the one hand, this rocks the credibility of the word given by the
United States. On the other, by exonerating itself from the battle
against global warming, the US is holding itself up to the world as the
worst of all examples.
Bush says that he must act in behalf of America's national interests pointing toward the energy crisis in California. The rest of the world sees Americans overheating their homes, over air-conditioning their office buildings, and driving to and from the two in gas-guzzling over-sized SUVs while everyone else is being asked to make sacrifices.
The international community is in unison in displaying its contempt for what they call irresponsible behavior unworthy of the nation that pretends to exercise moral leadership over the rest of the world.
April 2001
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