I've been seeing more and more talk of how global opinions of the US have really taken a hit in the last year. With that in mind, do y'all think as quickly as it went down it can recover?
It can recover fast, but it will take a long time to recover fully. Even if the next administration is more...sane and stable, when you go back to the negotiating table around the world the other parties will be wary of future US administrations that are as bad or worse than Trump's. Why trust your word on things, why even trust any new legally binding international obligations, when they may just get trampled in the next few years? I think this will be lessened if Trump only has a single term ("oh, they recognized the mistake and corrected") vs a second term ("oh no, there is wide spread support for his behaviour and future administrations can tap into that sentiment to gain power") will dictate how America is viewed by other governments and who is willing to still play ball instead of starting a new game without you.
As a western European, most of it is associated with the current president and administration. Almost every European liked Obama and supported his international leadership.
I think it's fair to say that Obama was much more trusted in Europe than either Bush or Trump. When you break it down by country the story is more complex, but the poster did admit to being western European.
My own experience is that nobody cared about Obama (and the ones that came before him) but the media are trying their hardest to report any negative news about Trump.
Yes. The US has always been a little 'special' in the club ob western nations, in many respects. That was always cause for a certain level of mistrust, which is actually healthy. But in the broad, I would say the general perception amoung the other western nations was still overall positive. Now some (by far not all) aspects on the 'plus' side have been put in question, while on the 'minus' side, not a lot improved. But I don't see it so black and white. Another leader or even Trump himself could turn it around, if they were interested.
The breakdown of the (hidden) alliance the US media had with American politics to now open hostility could make that harder, because it is visible worldwide. Again, the media could turn it around, if it wanted to. But it feels unlikely, they will with Trump. So the best chance for reconciliation between the fourth power and the government is a democratic win in the upcoming election.
Fair or not fair, it seems from an outside perspective that if Trump wins again, all hell could break lose in the US. There could be a civil war anarchy vs. authority.
I think there are some things amoung Trumps policies, that if people were a little more honest have been attractive even to the left of some or even most of the other western nations, like putting more value on local labor.
The problem is less about opinions and more a concern that a 'lapse' on US part to care for democracy and freedom worldwide (even if it might not always have been genuine in the past either), openly speaking more positive about some more authoritarian leaders than democratic leaders, etc. could have the more long lasting negative effect on the world.
Ultimately everything is about results. World leaders would be happy to ignore Trumps behavior if everything was under control. Unfortunately everything clearly is not under control.
Realistically, the US should not be debating whether its response was the worst in the world, or merely e.g. the 10th worst in the world. Both are shocking outcomes for such a highly-developed economy.
The US has, for the most part, extensive resources with which a global pandemic can be managed. It has money, people, manufacturing capability, research centres, and medical facilities. But the country has catastrophically mismanaged this challenge, and this is almost entirely for political reasons. Over 100k people are dead – it's a bad outcome, and we should be looking at why that bad outcome happened and what can be done to fix it.
I live in the UK – another country which has also badly mismanaged this pandemic. The reasons are a little bit different, but it does seem pretty startlingly obvious to be that the underlying problem is the same – you cannot solve a real-world problem by pretending it does not exist. The UK failed its response because it spent too much time on political management and lying to itself, and not enough time on dealing with problems and being honest about them. The same applies to the US, and it's honestly absolutely breathtaking the number of perspectives I have seen that want to apologise for this.
The U.S. currently ranks #12 out of 200 in terms of infections per capita, far higher than any western democracy--even those that have done significantly more testing per capita. Yes, it is pretty close to the worst response in the world: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries
Countries with more deaths per capita than the US, in order:
Belgium, UK, Spain, Italy, Sweden, France
At the rate we're going, that may change eventually, but when you compare the general discussion of, say, the US vs. Sweden, it's obvious there is an absurd amount of bias, both from the US domestic media and others.
I think people are too judgmental. My point is just that people are biased about the facts, not that I accept the underlying belief that a lower death rate means virtue or intelligence.
This is 95% the media, and 5% actual change. And 50% trump saying stupid things.
Basically: The US has not actually changed, but the Media really really really hates Trump, and Trump really knows how to say stupid things, which gives them lots of ammo.
They would do well to ignore most of what he says, but they can't help it: He sells lots of clicks.
Out here in the real world the US is not actually doing bad, the US response to the virus is not actually really bad (it's inline with other countries see: https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/data/mortality ).
This is basically just media desperate for clicks to sell ads. And they don't care about the collateral damage. (See my other post in this thread for more details about how this NYT article is a perfect example of the media badly representing things.)
Only 8 countries in the world have a worse value than the US for per capita deaths. That's the data you're providing to support your statement that we're not doing badly? Should a country this rich be ranked at the bottom of the world in mortality?