But Stewart is simply practicing the America bashing that has become fashionable all around the world. Rarely does a week go by that an anti-American protest doesn't sprout up somewhere around the globe. Just this week protestors made ruckuses in South Korea and Haiti. Next week, it could be Mexico City or Beijing. It is appropriate to be downright anti-American.
Many nations complain that America is an empire.
But America, with a few complicated exceptions, never had any colonies. The one place that could claim to be a colony, Puerto Rico, has been offered several chances to vote for either independence or statehood. Puerto Rico likes being a colony. Perhaps what bothers so many former empires like France, Belgium or Britain is that we never wanted what they killed millions to keep. Nevertheless, critical nations claim that America is a different, more pernicious kind of empire - a cultural and economic bully.