>of the candidates, one had only been outside of the USA three times in his life, referred to the inhabitants of Greece as ‘Greecians’, and did not know the names of the leaders of either Pakistan or India <
Well there are some of us, who find this really scary! My sister lives overseas, and made a point of getting set up for a mail in/absentee ballot, since this scared her. (we will let partisan politics go by and not mention the candidate)
>This got me thinking about the difference in attitude engendered by island-dwelling races, and the reflection that living on a small landmass may make a society paradoxically less insular in its core attitudes.<
I am not sure about this-- Japan has had very different attitudes to others than Great Britian.... and i don't know enough about Iceland or Cuba to speak about there attitudes.
