Memo to Clinton: US ain't top dog

The US doesn't necessarily lead the pack in world affairs – something Hillary Clinton should remember on her Asian tour

Simon Tisdall
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 23 July 2009

"......Clinton's call for a "multi-partner" rather than a multi-polar world is the diplomatic equivalent of police brutality victim Rodney King's famous (and unsuccessful) plea for mutual tolerance at the height of the 1992 Los Angeles race riots. "People, I just want to say, you know, can we all get along?" asked King. Clinton's similar, less eloquent call for international amity and understanding may also have limited impact.......

.....Yet possibly the biggest obstacle to the "new mindset" partnerships Clinton envisaged in her Washington speech is of her own creation – her very old-fashioned assumption that, in all such arrangements, the US will naturally be top dog and pack leader. This is what Iranian conservatives term the "global arrogance". Memo to HC: it ain't necessarily so."