When I got home from Virginia Beach yesterday I went through the various news reports that I’ve grown accustomed swimming through. This can literally take me upwards of 3 hours to complete. What I enjoy most about this little habit of mine is that I get to absorb news and opinions from all the nooks and crannies of the world.

Some stories come along with illustrations or images to help explain what the underlying issue of the article may be. The following article from the May 10th New York Times caught my eye –
Shaky Pakistan Is Seen as a Target of Plots by Al Qaeda – NYTimes.com. What I found interesting wasn’t necessarily Mark Mazzetti and Eric Schmitt’s analysis of the situation in Pakistan (attacks by Al Queda on Western countries are on the decline while a presence in Pakistan increases due in part to instability caused by the Taliban). On the contrary, what jumped out at me the most was the accompanying image:

Photo by K. M. Chaudary/Associated Press

According to the caption from the nytimes.com site “Supporters of a Pakistani religious group burned an effigy of President Obama at a rally on Sunday in Lahore, Pakistan.” Ok, great. Our Presidents have been burned in effigy in foreign lands numerous times in the past. What caught my attention though were the protest signs being bandied about. Look carefully:

“Go America Go”

Contextually, we Americans have normally used that phrase as a form of encouragement. We scream it at our horses on the track (Go, Secretariate! Go!), our sports teams (Go, Natinals! Go!), even to fictional cartoon characters racing impossibly engineered race cars (Go, Speed Racer! Go!). We even shout it as encouragement when one of us has bad diarrhea and we’re trying to make it to the bathroom before crapping our pants (Go, Puzzy! Go!).

“Go America Go”

You can see the problem I’m having with this image, can’t you? On the one hand I KNOW that we Americans are being demonized. On the other hand it seems as though they are very strongly encouraging us to keep going, balls to the wall, and do what we have been doing all along. So, are we being chastised and chased out of their country, their culture, their lives? Or are they, in fact, cheering us?

I’ll try and be optimistic about the whole thing and believe that we’re finally making friends at that end of the world.

“Go America Go”

“Ok! Thanks!“