“In a 1992 speech to a group of religious broadcasters, then-President George H.W. Bush proclaimed that ‘we need a nation closer to the Waltons than to the Simpsons.’ He lost the election. ‘The Simpsons’ won.” But at a moment when the United States is in global disrepute, what explains the world’s immense affection for “an ignorant, doughnut-scarfing ‘Ugly American’ father and his mustard-tinged brood”?