For someone growing up in, say, France or Brazil or Singapore in the second half of the 20th century, America would likely have been seen as a political and economic model that set the standards of freedom, progress and know-how for the rest of the world. "Like in America" meant that one's country was moving in the right direction.

Germans or Japanese or Mexicans would on occasion be critical of US foreign policy or hit the streets to demonstrate against this or that American president. But Washington, Congress and the US presidency nonetheless represented beacons of hope and islands of stability in an otherwise turbulent world. It used to be that when the US president spoke, the world would listen, as it looked up to, and sought reassurance from, the White House - which was occupied by larger-than-life figures like Abraham Lincoln, Franklin D Roosevelt, John F Kennedy or Ronald Reagan.

That may explain why many countries that regard themselves as long-time friends of America and people who have long admired its political or historical institutions, culture and ideals, whose hearts perhaps might even skip a beat in face of an image of the Capitol Dome, are fairly dismayed these days.