How do you deal with lousy poll numbers and negative opinions about the U.S. oveseas? Delete and ignore them, apparently. From WaPo:
Killing the Messenger? Has the United States government decided that Americans don't care about what the world thinks of their country? You might get that impression from the State Department's Web site.
Last week the department stopped posting surveys of how the international press is covering significant developments in U.S. foreign policy. Based on reporting from U.S. embassies around the world, the surveys quoted newspaper and broadcast reports in just about every language.
It wasn't exactly scintillating reading, and the surveys didn't generate much buzz beyond qualifying for the the Librarians' Internet Index of "Web sites you can trust." But the information, posted regularly since 1998, constituted a comprehensive documentary record of the impact of U.S. foreign policy on global public opinion.
In recent months, the surveys had covered media reaction to President Bush's appearance at the Latin American summit, the Iraqi constitutional referendum, and the six party talks on North Korea's nuclear program. In past years, the surveys detailed world reaction to the Sept. 11 attacks, the Abu Ghraib photographs, the U.N. oil-for-food scandal, and the effort to provide aid to victims of the South Asia tsunami.
No more. The Web address of the Office of Media Reaction -- usinfo.state.gov/products/medreac.htm -- now yields a "page not found" error. The archive of past surveys is also unavailable. The page states, "The USINFO website is undergoing significant design changes." There's a link to the surveys from the main State Department press page, but it's dead.
The changes involve more than just the "design," according to a State Department official who spoke on the condition he not be identified.
"The USINFO.state.gov Web site is directed, by law, at foreign audiences. It doesn't make sense for us to put up what foreign newspapers are saying," he said.
The official said that the move was not ordered by Karen Hughes, the new Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs.
The Post points out that the idea to begin culling and posting the international poll results was a Clinton administration initiative, which may explain why its not so popular with the Bushies. But it sure took them long enough to notice that they didn't want it. Something tells me the fact that the decision has been made now, when serious questions over the U.S. use of secret CIA rendition flights and murky prisons have set European public and political opinion on fire (and mucked up Condi Rice's Europe trip), is no coincidence.
The inescapable fact, as serial Pew polls have shown, is that the image of the U.S. around the world has cratered since this president took office, most accutely since he led us into a clearly unnecessary war in Iraq -- against the apparently better judgment of the rest of the planet (with the exception of Jose Maria Asnar, John Howard in Australia and Tony Blair). As the June Pew assessment pointed out: "the United States remains broadly disliked in most countries surveyed, and the opinion of the American people is not as positive as it once was. The magnitude of America's image problem is such that even popular U.S. policies have done little to repair it."
And as long as the U.S. continues to fight the idea of withdrawing from Iraq, and continues to undermine -- and to help major oil companies to try and thwart -- Kyoto style climate change pacts (even as we insist on fighting 16th century battles over Biblical creation and whether the holiday season is exclusive to Jesus,) America's once-enviable reputation will continue to wallow in the mud, just where Mr. Bush, Mr. Cheney and their gang of ideologues has dragged it.
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done = "No"
%>
Tell a friend
<%
Else
if request.form("done") = "Yes" then
'sets variables
dim email, sendmail
email = request.form("email")
Set sendmail = Server.CreateObject("CDONTS.NewMail")
'put the webmaster address here
sendmail.From = "webmaster@aspbasics.com"
'The mail is sent to the address entered in the previous page.
sendmail.To = email
'Enter the subject of your mail here
sendmail.Subject = "Check out this website"
'send a specific page or send a site url
dim url
'url = Request.ServerVariables("HTTP_REFERER")
url = "http://www.aspbasics.net"
'This is the content of the message.
sendmail.Body = "Site recommendation from a friend!" & _
vbCrlf & vbCrlf & "A friend has sent you this email and thought you would should check out this site." & _
vbCrlf & url & vbCrlf
'this sets mail priority.... 0=low 1=normal 2=high
sendmail.Importance = 1
sendmail.Send 'Send the email!
response.redirect Request.ServerVariables("HTTP_REFERER")
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End if
%>
"[T]he practice of arbitrary imprisonments, have been, in all ages, the favorite and most formidable instruments of tyranny.' Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 84, August, 1788
