The US gets to use McDonalds and Disney.

You're picking examples which make it very easy for me to, again, respond "does the world need to have McDonalds and EuroDisney?" Just because we've created things that have an appeal abroad, we're imperialists?

Part of the problem is that we here in Europe see (from our perspective at least), the US making some of the same foreign policy decisions/mistakes that we did when we were empire-building. How can we tell the difference?

Well I'm trying to see how you can relate the use of McDonalds and Disney to the acquisition of, say, India.

Don't get me wrong. I like America. I like all of the Americans that I've met -- both in person, and on the BBS. But, face it, your government comes across as arrogant, and misconstruing our criticism of US policy as criticism of US citizens is entirely missing the point.

This is my favorite part of this whole argument. Instead of illustrating things with apples-to-apples comparisons, everything I've been getting in response to my questions has been "well, the U.S. comes off as arrogant." I think Bush and most of his administration are complete dopes. Did Bill Clinton's administration also come off as arrogant across the pond? Or is this "arrogance" tied to the policies and not the actual people making them? How long have these "arrogant policies" existed? And can you people please cite one or several that are within the last 100 years and doesn't involve McDonalds, Starbucks, Border's, or Disney?!?