US arrogance driving it deeper into world isolation

There are many new realities which the United States needs to take cognizance of if it is to retain some of its clout in a world leading up to 9/11. After the terrorist attacks on that fateful date in 2001, US prestige went into a tailspin.

But worse than the unfamiliar situation it found itself in, the US also found itself virtually leaderless, its president, George W. Bush, reduced to a constant butt of jokes in all television talk shows.

Perhaps at no time in its history has the US sunk so low in the esteem of the world. And yet this nosedive in US prestige is only partly due to the September 11 attacks and the bumbling ways of Bush.

A greater part of the blame should rest on the arrogance of the US itself, on its self-righteous belief that it is the only voice that should be heard around the world, that what it wants the rest of the globe can only follow.

For many many years, the world agonized helplessly under this situation, unable to do anything on account of the fact that there was no pragmatic and realistic way to raise a voice against the richest and most powerful nation in the world.

But all that changed with 9/11. The terrorist attacks showed in no uncertain terms that the US can be hit and hit bad. Worse, it has also been proven that after getting hit, the mighty US can get rattled and disoriented.

And so, while the real enemy was in Afghanistan, the US, under the bull-headed direction of Bush, launched a war on Iraq against the wishes of the United Nations and for reasons that were eventually proven to be a big fat lie.

Yet all was not lost for the US. Despite a growing number of increasingly audacious new and old enemies, the US could still find some measure of comfort in the steadfastness of a few traditional friends.

These traditional friends included real powers such as Britain, and mere tag-alongs such as the Philippines. But because there was a leadership vacuum in Washington, even these allies soon found the US to be a real heavy baggage to tote around.

First to crack was Britain, whose prime minister, Tony Blair, was increasingly under question at home about how far his country was going to stay the course that led nowhere. The Philippines had long restricted itself to paying mere lip service to the war effort.

Nevertheless, there was still some usefulness to be derived from such friendships, especially if it is already apparent that they remain to be the only friendships the US can still find some meaning in.

Outside of the categories of friendship represented by Britain on the one end and by the Philippines on the other, the world is increasingly getting more and more hostile toward the US. Yet the arrogance of the US has not waned.

Recently, the US Senate has started investigating the so-called extrajudicial killings in the Philippines. The killings are, of course, one big lowdown shame. But the US investigating us? What arrogance! And what hypocrisy! We are not a US colony, remember?

There are far more urgent and realistic things that the US can spend its precious time investigating than the Philippines. It has no business poking its dirty fingers into our pie. Why doesn't the US investigate its war on Iraq instead.

The US cannot forever clean up after the stink of others unless it starts cleaning up its own stink in the first place. The world is no longer a US stage. Every alley upon which the US now treads hides a potential enemy. And it is losing the friends who could have watched its back.