At the same time many had problems with U.S. foreign policy, which tended to be colonial and often sided with dictators and autocrats for clearly selfish interests. The U.S. bias toward Israel, despite its unjust occupation of Palestine, relations with China despite its abysmal human rights record and some of the Latin American right-wing rulers are cited as examples.

Then came September 11 and the anti-Islam and anti-Arab sentiment that spread throughout the U.S. While there were some elements of the country that stood up to the profiling and the hate speech, they were not the majority. The war in Iraq produced much more intense anti-Americanism, even though until then people around the world had continued to differentiate between the American people and their government’s policies.

But the reelection of President Bush despite the ongoing war really confused the rest of the world, which had expected that the good people of America wouldn't be that easily duped into supporting the war. Since then, anti-Americanism has extended to antagonism toward the American people.

The most recent congressional elections and the activities of Nancy Pelosi and the new Democratic-controlled Congress are slightly helping to reverse this trend, but it takes longer to build than to destroy.