(Sorry that this post rambles – it will give you a sense of how my mind works.) So – in no less than three ways, in three days, I’ve encountered a strange and alien gloom. A bright, funny Turkish woman I spoke to recently told me she is filled with great fear for the future of her country. She sees the party currently in power, AKP, as Islamists set upon remaking this secular democratic republic into Saudi Arabia, or , or Iran, or some combination of both. (I am not a fan of AKP, but I find some of their critics tend to paint with too broad a brush. Unlike the Iranian revolutionaries or Hezbollah or other folks who they’ve been compared to, they are patient, have a lot of internal division and rivalries, have a lot of powerful enemies, and have at least some agenda items that don’t quite fit the Islamist vision – getting into the EU and bringing the country’s human rights policies into line with Europe.) What’s more, she doesn’t see any opposition party as a significant improvement; they all to her look like various corrupt, unethical power-hungry factions.

Ace of Spades analyzes the situation with Iran, and finds the most likely scenario is Iran wiping out New York, Washington, Boston and Los Angeles in simultaneous nuclear blasts before the American people are stirred to take action against that nation. And I’m sure we’re familiar with the gloom amongst our friends on the left regarding Iraq. One of my favorite lefty readers regularly points to bad news from Iraq and concludes, there’s no point in staying, the situation will never get better, we had better cut our losses and get out. I’m tempted to agree – as I suspect anyone who hears the bad news – and yet pulling out would immediately bring about a) bin Laden and Zawahiri citing this as an example that Americans are weak, beatable, and that Allah is on their side; b) Iraq becoming a sectarian bloodbath that makes the current violence look like a tea party; c) Turkey invading northern Iraq; d) Islamists turning their focus and resources to driving us out of Afghanistan, and/or a coup in Pakistan to seize that country’s nuclear arsenal. Oh yeah, and oil would hit $225 a barrel.

Anyway – the common theme is gloom – the problems are intractable, there is no hope or light at the end of the tunnel; we are powerless in the face of this problem. I even admit succumbing to it a bit. I have a letter to the editor in Commentary magazine, noting that I increasingly suspect “public diplomacy” efforts to combat anti-Americanism are futile.

Anti-Americanism is, to me, something of a “pathetically impotent whiny loser” detector. I’ve encountered plenty of it in my travels here, in Europe and the Middle East. We Americans are the universal scapegoat. Not making enough money? Blame American corporations. Lack of opportunities? America, working with the Jews. Your military’s weak? Sabotage from the Mossad. Hit by a tsunami? Must have been triggered by an American underwater nuclear test. Bad weather? American pollution is causing global warming. Stub your toe? Cheney and the neocons moved the table into your way. The world is divided into two kinds of people: Those who believe they control their destinies, and take responsibility accordingly; and those who believe that it’s in the hands of fate, chance, or somebody else. There are plenty of the latter, both in America and abroad. Few of us want to acknowledge that the reason we’re not happy is because we’re lazy, or have made bad choices, or we drink too much, or don’t plan ahead, or that, in one way or another, we fail ourselves. We would much rather have some sinister external force to blame – be it blaming Mommy and Daddy, or society at large, or powerful conspiracies holding us back.

For many people around the world, America is their bogey man – except he doesn’t scare them, he reassures them. Their problems aren’t their fault. They can sit in the tea house all day in Egypt and bitch, complain, and spin conspiracy theories, or enjoy their 35 hour work week in France. Anyway – I find it tough to deal with this gloom. If I’m not quite an optimist, I always think that a solution can be achieved. (Certainly, the surest way to ensure a solution won’t be found is to deem the problem is unsolvable). Hell, if you want an example of incurable optimism, let’s talk football. I’m a Jets fan, and even in the face of what everyone predicts is a crappy season, I’m thinking, “If Pennington’s shoulder holds up, and he’s as good as people say he’s been this year in camp, and if Barlow can keep his mouth shut with the Hitler comments and just find holes and run through them, and if the new guys on the offensive line live up to the hype, and if Jerricho Cotchery is the rising star that he sounds like at WR, and if Laverneus Coles remains solid, and if they find somebody to just take up a lot of space at NT, and if they find a good fourth linebacker, and if the small army of talented young guys in the defensive backfield play smart… then we might just have a good year.”

I wonder if the American public is reaching this “we throw up our hands, the problem is intractable, we give up” stage, or whether this attitude is just more common on the blogs.