Thanks for all the compliments, the thoughtful posts and further reading.  I'll try to do a diary on the books I mentioned.

A couple of thoughts inspired by posts: on the history of foreign policy splits, Robert MacNamara makes the point that the US had little or no real support in Europe for the Vietnam war.  In "The Fog of War" film, he uses this example to buttress one of his "lessons": that if the US can't persuade its allies to support a policy, it should rethink the policy.

On shifting attention to Asia and the Middle East: partly catch-up, since the US was terribly ignorant of those areas, and remains ignorant especially of history and historical impact on the present.  They totally misunderstood Vietnam (again, as MacNamara admits),and this time around completely ignored the history of Iraq and the region in general.  But of course the major reason for a shift of interest is economic self-interest, particularly of corporate sponsors, regarding resources (MIddle East) and trade and markets in Asia, etc. Europe became a competitor for those markets and resources.

On the information gap from Europe: in addition to what's been mentioned, we have the changes in US news media: more money put into advertising, marketing and supposedly viewer or reader-friendly glitz (and into profits), and less in offshore bureaus and reporters.  Certainly the end of the Cold War with USSR dropped the priority of reporting on Europe, but something else: the major figures in broadcast journalism as it grew, and the major foreign policy columnists in newspapers and news magazines, mostly began their careers reporting from Europe during WWII and shortly thereafter.  Now even younger reporters like Peter Jennings, who spent years reporting from outside the US, are gone or going.

But with all that contributing, I do believe that the major reason for American ignorance of today's Europe and the EU model is political and economic self interest of Rabid Right Republicans and their corporate sponsors.  

I'll certainly be checking out what's going on here at this site.  Maybe I can even pick up some pointers on how an ignorant American can make a living in Europe these days.            

"The end of all intelligent analysis is to clear the way for synthesis." H.G. Wells "It's not dark yet, but it's getting there." Bob Dylan