Danny Schechter - ColdType

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scamming them – and there is truth to the charge – but surely
they had a responsibility to do due diligence and realize that
their money was underwriting sleazy practices that has led to
a foreclosure crisis affecting millions of families?
Instead many outlets politicized the problem, with the media
rarely acknowledging their laziness and superficial coverage.
Soeren Kern, a senior analyst for Transatlantic Relations at the
Madrid-based Grupo de Estudios Estratégicos strategic studies
group, wrote: “While much of the initial reaction emanating
from Europe was self-congratulatory gloating to the effect
that Europe’s ‘superior’ economic model made it immune to
the kind of problems plaguing the United States, the fact that
this has now proven to be false has unleashed an entirely predictable
populist reaction; European leaders of all ideological
stripes are now busy blaming the United States for the financial
problems in their home countries, as if anti-Americanism
will somehow shield them from the political fall-out from the
trouble that lies ahead. Many Europeans are calling for an end
to American global economic dominance, with, of course, a
correspondingly greater regulatory role for Europe.
“Some of the most virulent anti-Americanism stems, as
usual, from Germany, where media soothsayers have had a
field day prophesying America’s imminent downfall. The
weekly news magazine Der Spiegel, for example, has a cover
showing the Statue of Liberty’s torch, extinguished, with the
headline: ‘The Price of Arrogance’. The cover of the Die Zeit
newspaper shows a Bald Eagle plunging to Earth, feathers flying,
with a flag of the European Union clutched in one of its
talons. Another Die Zeit article titled ‘USA: Can the Superpower
Learn to Step Down?’ asks: ‘How can the land of victory
and optimism adapt to life after the imperial moment?’ And
so on. German politicians have joined in the America-bashing
too. Finance Minister Peer Steinbrück predicts that ‘the U.S.
will lose its superpower status in the world financial system.’
(He also said ‘the financial crisis [is] above all an American