The bourgeois news wire service summed it up this way: "The poll, which was carried out in May and June, will make depressing reading for U.S. officials charged with improving the country's image. It surveyed people from Australia, Brazil, Canada, Britain, France, Israel, Indonesia, Jordan, South Korea, Russia and the United States.
"Asked who was the more dangerous to world peace and stability, the United States was rated higher than al-Qaida by respondents in both Jordan (71 percent) and Indonesia (66 percent).
"It was also rated more dangerous than Iran by people in Jordan, Indonesia, Russia, South Korea and Brazil, and more menacing than Syria by respondents in all countries except Australia, Israel and the United States.
Israel beat Canada and Britain to win the dubious accolade of 'most pro-American country.'"(2)
Au$tralia, I$rael and the united $tates all have the fact of being settler dominated imperialist countries. The petty-bourgeoisie in those countries has the particular hatred of oppressed peoples driven not just by super-exploitation but also the particularities of genocide to seize land.
The International Herald Tribune also summarized an even more pointed finding from an earlier poll done by the Pew Research Center: "In fact, feelings are so intense in the Islamic world that Osama bin Laden was chosen by five Muslim publics - in Indonesia, Jordan, Morocco, Pakistan and the Palestinian Authority - as one of the three political leaders they would most trust to 'do the right thing' in world affairs."(3)
The widespread support of Osama Bin Laden in the Third World is an example of false consciousness, because Osama Bin Laden does not claim to be for the average exploited and super-exploited persyn of the Third World and more importantly his analysis and strategy are lacking. However, we gather from the showing of Osama Bin Laden in the polls that the people want to see a strong stand against u.$. imperialism. It's the perfect example of "false consciousness," because we can see what the Third World people want, even as they fail in pinpointing how they will accomplish it. Any strong leader appearing to be anti-U.$. would obtain the same support.
In contrast, the support for Bush in I$rael and the united $tates is not "false consciousneess," because it is enemy consciousness. Marxists use the term "false consciousness" to refer to those situations where a class does not adopt an ideology in its own interests and instead adopts that of another class because it has been duped. In I$rael and the united $tates, a settler petty-bourgeoisie has consciously taken up an ideology of land-grabbing oppression. It's not a case where some I$raeli and Amerikkkan "exploited" are unconsciously taking up the ideology of exploiters. The I$raeli$ and Amerikkkans are very active in their support for predatory wars.
An example of this is that the Amerikkkan lives in a country dependent on the world for oil. For this reason, polls show that Amerikkkans did not care when "weapons of mass destruction" (WMD) did not show up in Iraq as promised during the war itself. They still supported the war.
Slate author Michael Kinsley put it this way on June 19th: "According to a Harris poll out Wednesday, a majority of Americans still think the Bush administration was telling the truth before the war when it said it had hard evidence of WMD. A Knight Ridder poll released last weekend reports that a third of the populace believes that the weapons have been discovered. A Fox News poll last week found that almost half of Americans feel that the administration was "intentionally misleading" about Iraq's weapons, but more than two-thirds think the war was justified anyway. A Gallup Poll released Wednesday concludes that almost 9 out of 10 Americans still think Saddam had or was close to having WMD."(4)
Bush may very well end up in hot water over the WMD, but it won't be because Amerikkkans do not want to oppress Iraqis. If Bush ends up in hot water, it will be because Amerikkkans deem it unseemly for him to lie to Amerikkkans and because they figure out that the premature press accounts announcing the discovery of WMD in Iraq had been wrong.
The fall in oil prices set a recent record according to USA Today: "America imported $11.21 billion in petroleum in April, a drop of 10.4% from March. However, all the improvement came in lower costs, as the volume of crude oil climbed to the second highest level on record. But the average price of a barrel of crude oil declined $4.25 to $26.02, reflecting a fall in global oil prices as fears of supply disruptions eased with the successful conclusion of the U.S.-led war in Iraq.
"It was the biggest one-month drop in crude oil prices since a $4.59 decline from January to February of 1991, as America's success in driving Iraq out of Kuwait eased oil supply concerns during the Persian Gulf War."(5) Neither Osama Bin Laden nor the Third World generally have gotten what they wanted vis-a-vis the united $tates, and that is why a claim of "false consciousness" may be true. In contrast, the Amerikkkan public is willing to lie with Bush to the rest of the world about WMD in Iraq, but it fought for and got what it wanted with regard to oil.
Notes:
1. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/2994924.stm
2. http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=20030618-060033-9862r
3. http://www.iht.com/articles/98482.html
4. http://slate.msn.com/id/2084602/
5. http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/trade/2003-06-13-deficit_x.htm ; see also, http://csmweb2.emcweb.com/2003/0221/p01s01-usec.html