No kidding, a Muslim country that loves Bush

Who would have guessed.

As the New York Times reports, apparently surprising even itself:

His poll numbers may be in the basement, but when he zipped through this small, relentlessly pro-American nation on Sunday, President Bush was treated like a rock star.

Military cannons boomed a 21-gun salute in his honor. Thousands of people jammed Skanderbeg Square in downtown Tirana, wearing Uncle Sam top hats in the sweltering heat, hoping to glimpse the presidential motorcade. The superlatives flowed so freely that Mr. Bush looked a tad sheepish when Prime Minister Sali Berisha proclaimed him “the greatest and most distinguished guest we have ever had in all times.”

Nevertheless, the Times can't help but hide a net derision. The Albanians only love Bush, suggests the Times because:

He told the Albanians what they wanted to hear — that he supported their effort to join NATO and wanted independence soon for Kosovo, a largely ethnic Albanian breakaway province of Serbia — without making any fresh commitments.

“At some point in time, sooner rather than later, you’ve got to say, ‘Enough is enough — Kosovo is independent,’ ” Mr. Bush said. He said any plan to extend talks on Kosovo, like the one proposed recently by President Nicolas Sarkozy of France, must end with “certain independence.”

As the Times continued:

This largely Muslim country, population 3.6 million, is just the kind of nation Mr. Bush likes best: a nascent democracy whose history includes a dramatic break with totalitarian rule. . .

The country, one of the poorest in the region, has just issued three postage stamps bearing Mr. Bush’s likeness, and a street in front of the Parliament building has been renamed for him. At the mosque in the center of town, Uncle Sam hats were stacked in a window seat in the prayer room.

Even the war in Iraq is popular here.

“U.S.A. have the right and responsibility for all the world to protect the freedom,” said Ilir Lamçe, 37, a financial analyst who was among those waiting for Mr. Bush, using English to express the views of many. “This is the right war.”

Who would have thunk. I wonder if the Fort Dix plotters, the mostly illegal Kosovo Albanian immigrants resident in New Jersey, would have embarked on their terrorist mission had they been raised and educated in Albania as opposed to, er, New Jersey.