American Flowers

We were sitting here trying, as usual, to figure out how today’s America, saddled with the burdens of inadvertent empire, could conduct itself in the world so Americans are happy about how we’re doing and the rest of the world might actually either approve or have a hard time disapproving of our behavior. We finally hit on an answer that’s so moronic we knew right away it has real potential.
We behave as if we’re the American Umpire, that is, we call the balls and strikes in the global games based on the principle we’ve all grown up with, can understand, and most of the world even admires: fair play.
And, being the ump, we expect the players to respond with good sportsmanship, no matter which way the calls go.
Needless to say, part of this easily understandable and highly commendable modus operandi requires us to call the balls and strikes fairly on ourselves, too, even when Uncle Sam strikes out.