Majority of Americans think US should mind its own business overseas

The American government's interventionist foreign policies are wrong-headed, counter-productive and just plain stupid. Ron Paul told you so. Walt told you so. But the Bushes, pater et filius, the Clintons and Hussein Obama told you the opposite. Who ya gonna believe?

To judge by the results of the last election -- was it only a year ago? -- the Merkin people believed the politicians and the establishment. But today comes a sign that the scales are finally falling off the eyes of Joe the Plumber.

Today, for the first time in almost four decades of polling, a study by the Pew Research Center (in association with the Council on Foreign Relations) suggests that the majority of Americans believe the US plays a less important and powerful role in the world than it did ten years ago.

As the chart at the right shows, most people now believe America should “mind its own business internationally”.

The findings of the Pew poll suggest Americans think their country is now less respected abroad, bucking a trend in which Americans believed their reputation had recovered since the Prez Obama was elected. Funny how giving him a Nobel prize for doing nothing except being black would give that impression. But the penny has dropped, and impressions of how the US is perceived under Obama are now, broadly, as negative as they were in the final days of the administration of Bush the Younger.

Although there is a growing desire for the development of stronger trade and business links abroad, it seems that Americans want their leaders to adopt a less interventionist approach to solving the world's political and social problems. It's time, many people think, to stop trying to be the world's policeman and concentrate on fixing the many things that are broken in the Land of the Free Lunch.

But will America's political leaders listen? Is the Pope Catholic? [The answer to both questions is meant to be "NO". Ed.]