For Americans heading to Davos, recent visits to the World Economic Forum have represented a stark reminder of how much our national stock has dropped in global esteem.

Three years ago participants from other lands sent an unmistakable message: “We are furious at you for your invasion of Iraq.” Two years ago, they said: “Now we are not only angry about Iraq but also about the fact that you actually re-elected George W. Bush.”

And last year: “We are tired of waiting; we’re giving up and moving on without you.”

One hesitates to think what the message will be this coming week in Davos. A veteran correspondent for a European newspaper perhaps offered a preview in a recent phone conversation. “I have travelled all over the States and Europe and believe that America is the worst-governed nation of any advanced country,” he told me. “I also believe that under Bush, America has reached the zenith of its power. It’s downhill from here.”

By now, a good many Americans who participate at Davos nod their heads in weary resignation at some of these criticisms.

The vast majority of my countrymen are disillusioned and angry about the prosecution of the war in Iraq and we worry that the Bush Administration may stumble into a conflict with Iran.

Concerns also grow that for too many years we have failed to address looming threats such as climate change, an excessive reliance upon oil, a deteriorating healthcare system, the retirement of baby- boomers and a weak public school system. We know all these things and are frustrated at the lack of collective progress.

Yet it would be a serious mistake for the rest of the world — or, indeed, for Americans — to begin writing off the United States as world leader and as a benevolent force for good.

We have lost our way more than once in the past and have found it again. Americans are no wiser or nobler than anyone else; we have demonstrated repeatedly how easy it is for us to make wrong choices.

But somewhere in our national DNA, we have been blessed with a capacity gradually to wake up to our mistakes, put them out on the table for everyone to see and then correct them.

Some nations grow calcified, stuck in the routines of the past; America has always been young at heart, with its face toward the future. Each time we have gone off into trouble, someone also seems to arise from our citizenry with fresh, visionary leadership that helps us out.

Think of the founders in Philadelphia; think of Abraham Lincoln and Franklin Roosevelt. Otto von Bismarck once said: “God looks after fools, drunkards and the United States of America.” There may be something to that.

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