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-- After holding its own for a half in its return to the Copa America, the United States could only watch Argentina fly by the rest of the way. Hernan Crespo scored twice, Pablo Aimar and Carlos Tevez added late goals and Argentina routed a youthful U.S. team 4-1 Thursday night in South America's championship.

Eddie Johnson put the U.S. ahead with a penalty kick in the ninth minute, but Crespo scored in the 11th and 64th minutes for fifth-ranked Argentina. Aimar connected in the 78th minute and Tevez scored in the 85th, six minutes after entering.

"We knew we were big underdogs coming into this game," U.S. goalkeeper Kasey Keller said. "They've got a world All-Star team and we have a group of kids getting their first caps. It was a little difficult, but I was very happy with the way we played for the first 60-65 minutes."

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LAGOS, Nigeria — Uncle Sam has some African fans.

As first lady Laura Bush tours the world's poorest continent, a new report charting global attitudes shows America's image sagging around the globe — but not in Africa.

"The American society is a model of success that is a dream to Ivorian youth," says Mohamed Diarra, a 30-year-old in Ivory Coast, where some 88 percent of the population holds a favorable view of the United States — the highest in the world according to Pew Global Attitudes report released this week.

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MARACAIBO, Venezuela - Missing most of its top players, the United States got spanked in its Copa America opener.

Hernan Crespo scored twice, Pablo Aimar and Carlos Tevez added late goals and Argentina routed a youthful United States team 4-1 Thursday night in South America's championship.

Eddie Johnson put the U.S. ahead with a penalty kick in the ninth minute, but Crespo scored in the 11th and 64th minutes for fifth-ranked Argentina, which increasingly outplayed the Americans as the game progressed. Aimar connected in the 78th minute and Tevez scored in the 85th, just after entering the game.

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Music from all over the world floods into New York City year round, but especially in summertime. That?s when outdoor stages supplement clubs and theaters, and free concert series can introduce audiences to music with lower commercial profiles.

This summer?s world music concerts include return visits by superstars who will have expatriate fans singing along with hits, like the Brazilian songwriter Carlinhos Brown, who is at the Nokia Theater tonight, and the Mexican rock superstars Caf? Tacuba, at Central Park SummerStage on July 14. And because it seems that everyone wants to be heard in New York City, this summer also brings a rare event like the July 21 SummerStage concert of music by 12 acts from Sudan, which is now torn by civil war and genocide.

Not so long ago, world music ? the usefully vague marketing category, not the music itself ? romanced isolation. A new album or a concert promised a rare chance to share what people half a world away were dancing to all night long, or a ceremony formerly closed to outsiders or sounds shaped through generations of a particular family or a village. Of course, the fact that the music had traveled at all was the beginning of the end of that isolation, for both the musicians and their new audiences.

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Hernan Crespo scored twice, Pablo Aimar and Carlos Tevez added late goals and Argentina routed a youthful United States team, 4-1, at the Copa Am?rica in Maracaibo, Venezuela.Eddie Johnson put the United States ahead with a penalty kick in the ninth minute, but Crespo scored in the 11th and 64th minutes for Argentina, which increasingly outplayed the Americans. The loss was the first for the United States since a 2-1 defeat to Ghana on June 22 last year in Germany, which eliminated the Americans from the World Cup. In the opener of the doubleheader, Paraguay beat Colombia, 5-0.

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