When it comes to writing about foreign countries, anything will do so long as it's got some local 'flavour' and an angle. They pretty much pluck this shit out of the sky.
"When it came to militarism, Reagan talked tough, but Grenada was his only hot war; Bush has soldiers scattered across the Muslim world." - is this what others have said or his opinion?
The content of these pieces is always what the correspondent has seen in the last few days from walking around and looking out of his/her window, followed - if you're lucky - by a concluding paragraph that reaches for the supreme significance of it all. Basically, these people are paid to sit around and write about their lives. I don't think they even read books.
Simon
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