global opinion

- thankfully, osama bin laden and terrorism have suffered a decline in support in parts of the muslim world. the findings of the report suggest terrorism and specifically suicide bombings meet more opposition lately, especially in countries which have suffered terrorists acts like indonesia, pakistan and morocco. i'm not sure about the wording of "confidence in bin laden", but the findings also touch on a belief in democracy.

- a few weeks back, pew conducted a survey of global opinion of the US. the results are rather mixed, with traditional allies dropping a bit while some others improve a bit over the last several years.
specifically, india had the highest positive opinion at 71%. this owes partially to the growing economic interdependence in the form of visas and dreaded business process outsourcing, but perhaps also to the tough foreign policy with regard to terrorism.