Sarah Mayersohn's GW Bush blogpost

Found: A Rare Positive Opinion of Bush from a non-American.

In Greg Sheridan?s editorial, ?I Come to Hail the Chief, Not Bury Him? in the Australian Times (11/13/2008), the editor acknowledges Bush?s faults, but emphasizes his strengths and actions in Asia, Africa, and Australia. Here is a excerpt:

?From Australia's point of view, Bush gave us every single thing we seriously wanted, from a free trade agreement to historically important new intelligence sharing arrangements. In July 2004 Bush sent a presidential directive to the CIA and the US Defence Department that mandated Australian access to US intelligence classified as "no forn", meaning not to be seen by foreign eyes. Similarly, selected Australian institutions were given direct access to US intelligence systems. Former prime minister John Howard ran the US relationship brilliantly and secured huge, long-term institutional advantages for Australia out of it.
More generally, Bush was always ready to take Australian interests into account. Almost certainly we will never again have as good a friend in the White House. His first administration contained a group of senior officials - Cheney, Rich Armitage, Paul Wolfowitz, Bob Zoellick - with very deep Australian connections, and a doctrine that put solid allies ahead of all others. Howard sensibly took maximum advantage of all that this offered.?

This column shatters the stereotypical belief that the world outside of United States are very unhappy with the Bush Administration. Sheridan provides a new perspective on Bush, from the Australian political point of view. Actually, he comes off as having the belief that the American president is also a leader to him. I think this is rather interesting considering that there had been huge international attention on the last few presidential elections, especially the 2008 election. It brings up the question of to what extent of the degree that foreign governments and/or populations view the American president in relation to their own politics and lives. Having seen this article, I now know that I must no longer assume that the rest of the world always look at Bush unfavorably.

-Sarah Mayersohn