Before 9/11, Bush was playing a go-it-alone game with respect to world opinion. The US could stand alone, and -- since he'd been elected president 5-4 -- the US would do what Bush decided. After 9/11, Bush demanded that all the rest of the world join in his "Global War on Terror." There was some comment that this had taught him that the US did need the rest of the world, after all.
No! It taught him nothing. "American exceptionalism" in Bush's mind includes the idea that US needs -- interpreted as Bush's wants -- have to be on other nation's agenda, but their needs don't need to be on our agenda.
Details after the break.
One point that some Europeans mentioned at the time was that there already was an international effort to deal with terrorism, an effort of most of the developing world -- with the USA as a noticeable exception. Bush didn't have the USA join that; he started his own with himself calling all the shots.
The biggest long-term threat to the USA, along with the rest of the world, is global warming. A (much too small) beginning of dealing with that had been made by the international community with the Kyoto protocols. Bush kept the US out of that, proclaiming loud and long that he did not agree with scientists about the risks but knew -- which no economist seems to have claimed -- that conforming to the Kyoto protocols would ruin the US economy. (Ruioning the US economy was something Bush wanted to do in his own way.)
The Bush administration also ignored the Geneva conventions and other international treaties respecting the way that sovereign states deal with torture -- even though the USA is still signatory.
When Bush decided to invade Iraq, a good number of countries, most notably our oldest ally France, did not accept Bush's assurances that Saddam was hiding Weapons of Mass Destruction -- hiding them so successfully that international inspection teams on the spot couldn't find them. Neocons and Bush supporters denounced those countries. "Freedom fries." Reactionaries are still telling stories explaining that the French denied the evidence for WMD because of greed and cowardice; the fact that there were no WMD has hardly dimmed the drumbeat of libel.
When a right-wing coup appeared to have replaced the elected leader of Venezuela, the Bush administration immediately recognised the "new government." This led to what would have embarassed anyone else when the coup collapsed.
It's time to change that.
In general, the USA needs to resume cooperating with international bodies. We need to express clearly to our allies that we are interested in negotiating with them again and are ready to honor the agreements that we have previously negotiated.
