We have a lot of overseas friends in all five continents.

Here is a message we received today from a friend in Europe that we have traveled with quite a few times before:

As regards to travel to the U.S., this administration makes us feel unwelcome with a hostile undertone. I’ve canceled my upcoming Florida trip. Let me say that I am a big fan of transatlantic cooperation. I love the America I used to know, and I am aware that many/most Americans didn’t vote for this shit show, but until decency, truthfulness, reliability and democracy is restored, I’ll be on the fence watching.

This is not the only person I have received such comments from. We were both in Asia and Europe within the last six weeks, and everyone talks this way. On top of all that, the draconian cuts inflicted on the U.S. Park Service, causing uncertainty and lack of control at America’s National Parks, will result in massive lack of tourism this year. Our National Parks are one of the world’s most attractive sets of destinations, and people save for many years for a trip to Yellowstone, Yosemite or the Grand Canyon. Our National Park System is the best in the world. It brings in $55 billion in revenue a year and costs only $3 billion. The whole thing makes no sense to me. The only person who would order such a thing is someone who manages a casino, basically a money machine, to bankruptcy. Tourists right now don’t even know if they will be able to get into the park when they arrive. It’s just not worth it to a lot of foreigners.

The problem is that stability is not restored by rescinding an Executive Order. Decency is earned over years, or even decades. You don’t get a reputation of decency back just because you had an election. And reliability is destroyed for a generation, at least. The word of the United States mattered. Now, you cannot trust that word. Ask the Afghan interpreters who were abandoned or deported. Ask the foreign students with the wrong skin color who disappeared from their colleges this spring.

The summer tourist season will be adversely affected, and everyone and every company that feeds it will suffer this year.