PARIS — There is good news and bad news for President George W. Bush as he pursues his valedictory tour of Europe this week, according to a new worldwide study by the Pew Global Attitudes Project. On the one hand, the image of the United States has improved slightly in many countries over the past year. On the other, the new optimism appears to be driven largely by the fact that Bush will soon be leaving office. In addition, while the prospect of Bush’s departure and the excitement of the U.S. primary contest have helped the image of the United States, a worldwide surge in concern about slumping economic conditions and a widespread view that the U.S. economy is harming local economies may tarnish it. Survey respondents also tend to see the United States as the main offender in global warming, Pew said. ‘There has been no sea change in world views of the United States,’ Andrew Kohut, president of the Pew Research Center, said of the results, which were issued Thursday. ‘Europeans are still much more negative than they were at the beginning of the decade, and highly negative views prevail in the Muslim world. […]