WP: Kerry Is Widely Favored Abroad

[kskiska]

Hostility Toward Bush Revealed in Surveys and Interviews

PARIS, Sept. 28 -- From Canada to Mexico, from London and Paris to Jakarta and Beijing, President Bush is widely unpopular as a candidate for reelection, according to surveys and interviews conducted in 20 countries.

Sen. John F. Kerry appears to be the runaway favorite abroad, even though few people outside the United States know much about the Massachusetts Democrat or his positions on foreign policy questions.

"If foreigners could vote, there's no question what the result would be," said Guillaume Parmentier, director of the French Center on the United States. "Bush's image, even before the war in Iraq, was not good. The way he comports himself, the vocabulary he uses -- good versus evil, God and all that -- even his body language, most people think is not presidential." He added, "I've never seen such hostility."

Kerry's foreign fans say they like his attitude about consulting allies and respecting their views. To them, he seems worldly, with an African-born wife. He attended school in Geneva and speaks French. A first cousin of Kerry's, Brice Lalonde, is a Green Party mayor of a small town in western France.

more…
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A58041-2004Sep28.html

[knowbody0]

1. algiers

the french learned from their history. they have my respect

[yardwork]

2. They're ABB

which is what I was before but now I actually like and admire Kerry. He'll be a good president.

[Digit]

3. Meanwhile, the US media keeps saying nobody knows who he is just yet

Either those Europeans are alot quicker on the ball than we are or the mainstream media have a political agenda.

[LastDemStanding]

4. What good is that news for US citizens?

Wasn't the USA created for lack of interest abroad?

[Rose Siding]

5. But they face a system "that could prevent their votes from being counted"

snip>
Four years after overseas voting became a battleground in the presidential election in Florida, millions of civilians and soldiers living abroad still face a bewildering and unwieldy system of absentee balloting that could prevent their votes from being counted.

Election officials concede that tens of thousands of Americans overseas might not get ballots in time to cast votes. Late primaries and legal wrangling caused election offices in at least 8 of the 15 swing states to fail to mail absentee ballots by Sept. 19, a cutoff date officials say is necessary to ensure that they can be returned on time, a survey by The New York Times shows. In Florida in 2000, late-arriving ballots became a divisive issue when some were counted and others were disqualified.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/29/politics/campaign/29military.html?hp

[wellstone_democrat]

6. Hell, they'd support *me* before the Chimp

I truly believe that.