Crimson Autograph

I'm watching CNN's discussion of Europe's view on the Presidential election, View From Europe, and I'm REALLY angry.

I'm livid because of something said by an American journalist working in Germany, somebody who ought to at least have some perspective and historical knowledge. He's just said "not all Muslims are terrorists, but it seems like most terrorists are Muslim". This gets to the heart of something that seriously annoys me about a lot of American comment and policy.

The IRA, ETA, UNITA, Sendero Luminosa, and any mumber of other terrorist groups are or were NOT Muslim. They just didn't attack the USA. It's that self centred and unthinking dismissal of the entire rest of the world that upsets me. It isn't terrorism if it's Britons, Spaniards, Angolans, Peruvians or anyone else gets killed. It is only terrorism if Americans are the victims. If it doesn't directly impact on the USA it didn't happen.

Now there are Britons who are equally parochial and ignorant. However the difference is that they are generally seen as either cranks or morons. A few may manage to get work writing for the Sun, the Daily Mail or the Spectator, a small number make it into Parliament, but they are a tiny and frequently despised minority. In the USA it seems to be a respectable way to be amongst the intellectual elite.

I don't mind that John Doe in Power Cable Nebraska is barely aware of anything that happens outside of the USA. He's not setting US foreign policy or the news agenda. What scares me is that the people who decide how the USA interacts with the rest of the world have a quite astounding level of ignorance.