Losing Austria

I saw this last week and then got busy with other things, but I still want to touch on this even though it's old news. Obviously when President Bush visits others countries he is going to draw thousands of protesters, hell he gets that at home. I did find this paragraph from a MSNBC.com article rather disturbing though. From MSNBC.com:

But it’s not just the American president feeling the brunt of unpopularity here in Vienna. When a group of reporters attempted to hail a cab outside the Hilton Vienna hotel (where the White House press corps is staying) on Tuesday night, one driver waved the group off with a string of anti-American expletives. Calling Bush a modern-day “Hitler,” the driver told the reporters they were “nasty Americans” and said he wouldn’t permit them to step foot into his car.

I've traveled to Austria in 1996, and the one thing that amazed me about the place is how congenial the people were to Americans. In fact, out of the many foreign countries I've traveled to, I've never been treated better as an American than in Austria. At the time I traveled there people had told me this, but once I got there it was unreal how much Austrians loved Americans. Just sitting in a sidewalk cafe would draw attention to me when people found out I was from the USA. It's probably the closest I've ever come to being able to experience what minor celebrities (very minor) go through when they travel.

If things like the taxi cab incident are starting to happen, and since the story mentioned this, it might not be isolated event, that's a really bad thing. It means the Austrian people are starting to hate the American people for the actions of the American government. Somewhat understandable I guess, as we did elect the jackass twice, supposedly. The bottom line is that if we have lost the Austrian people, we've lost the world, and that can take a very long time to rehabilitate.