And the answer is "D, All of the above."
I've seen so many of these same things as I've traveled the world. I love Mike G's comment about McDonald's in Budapest tasting like freedom, and it's so true -- and also true that the common people didn't have places to dine out under Communism.
And the clean bathroom thing is true -- and not just clean, but Western style toilets, so you don't have to crouch over a hole in the ground, as one must do in much of Asia.
One thing only briefly mentioned -- ice cubes. I've learned, after years of traveling, to drink everything at a range from cool to luke warm, but most Americans start to vibrate after a while without ice cubes. Even I found ice welcome when I was in Hong Kong in the summer one time.
And the loving a place because it's American -- absolutely. I can remember showing two South African students around Chicago one weekend, and they took a few pictures of the museums and a couple of photos from the top of the Hancock Building, but when I took them to Ed Debevic's, oh my, did they go through film -- the juke box, the waiter, them with the waiter, the counter with all the meat, the soda fountain, them with the juke box, them in a booth with sodas -- it was exactly what they had expected America to be.
One McDonald's story that is a little off the topic but kind of related was, during my first trip to Hong Kong, I was traveling with a woman who hadn't been out of the U.S. before, and so she was a little more needy of escaping the whirl of Asia than I was, and we headed for McDonald's a couple of times. On our second trip, we had the wonderful experience of becoming party of the homework of an adorable group of Chinese children. They had been told to find an American and interview him or her and try to get a photo with their American. So these kids had been lurking at McDonald's for a couple of hours, hoping an American would come in (there, as elsewhere, the clientele was pan-global), and when my friend and I walked in, we were surrounded. We got our photos shot with all the kids, we answered questions (I think practicing their English was the point of the exercise), we helped them spell things, we asked them questions. It was great.
And it sounds as though most of those in this thread who do go to McDonald's for the food have spent long periods of time overseas. It is amazing how good something familiar tastes when one has been away for a long time. It has been a long time since I spent that much time abroad, but I was visiting a friend in Japan last year (teaching English, has been there for five years), and she found McDonald's to be the perfect place to relax and speak English and plug into her own culture again while I was with her. At first, I was a little horrified to be eating at McDonald's in Japan, but her pleasure made it worthwhile (and I ate plenty of Japanese food, too).
I will say that, in most places, McDonald's does a great job of trying to fit in. I can remember seeing the golden arches in Salzburg, Austria, but they were tiny and set in one of the ornate wrought-iron decorative brackets that all the traditional stores used. And in Marrakech recently, I saw a McDonald's made of mud brick with a dome -- and golden arches. I didn't eat at either place, but I still thought it was fun seeing how they tried to blend in.