Globalization has thrust forward the U.S. capitalist model as never before, and many foreigners don't like everything they see. To them, America remains a land of gas-guzzling cars, selfish materialism, social inequities, and gun violence. Americans may be prospering, the critique goes, but their values are wrong. U.S. use of the death penalty is a hot topic in Europe, where it is condemned as barbaric. A Swiss newspaper, Blick , marked Bush's inauguration by running photos of 85 of the 152 people executed in Texas while he was governor.
Resentment also arises from the widening gulf between the haves and have-nots.
Many of the poor can see televised images of America's consumer wonders but are powerless to sample them. The world's love-hate affair with America produces ironic results, of course. In France, people flock to the 860-some McDonald's for burgers and fries, while Jos Bov , a militant sheep farmer, is a folk hero for attacking a McDonald's as a statement against cultural imperialism. Britney Spears, reigning diva of American teen pop culture, drew a quarter-million adoring fans to a concert in Rio de Janeiro, but they booed when she waved an American flag. In Beijing, some of the same students who pelted the U.S. Embassy with stones after the accidental bombing of China's Embassy in Belgrade, Yugoslavia, returned two weeks later to queue up for U.S. visas.