September 12, 2008

Seeing U.S. Politics Through Foreign Eyes

By KARIN FISCHER

At last month's Democratic convention, Jed Layton, a student at the University of Utah, joined a student from Shantou University, in China, to watch a typically American political exercise: Joseph R. Biden Jr., the party's vice-presidential nominee, delivering an attack on John McCain, the Republican candidate for the presidency.

The Chinese student, Mr. Layton recalled, was aghast. "How can he say all these things and not get in trouble?" she asked Mr. Layton, a sophomore studying