JOHN MARONE, KYIV
IS OBAMA AMERICA’S GORBACHEV?
U.S. President Barack Obama has been in office for less than a year, but he already looks destined to preside over the decline of his country’s extensive global influence.
In this sense, he is not unlike Mikhail Gorbachev, who closed the curtains on the Soviet Union to the applause of nearly everyone, save his own people.
Ironically, Mr. Obama has been more positively perceived as a global leader than possibly any other U.S. president before him. Apparently, due to his skin color and diverse ethnic heritage alone, it’s been assumed that Obama is capable of defusing international hostility, at least towards the world’s only superpower.
Africans are presumably proud to see one of their own on top, while Muslims might feel they’ve gained a sympathetic ear from the son of a fellow believer; however, Somali pirates continue to prey on commercial vessels, and Pakistan is beginning to look a lot like Afghanistan.
It was a stated policy goal of the Obama campaign to emphasize the war in Afghanistan, while withdrawing from the mistakes of Iraq. Now, the general that Mr. Obama himself appointed is calling for more troops to fight the Taliban, and the president is afraid of losing his credentials as a peacemaker.
Mr. Obama was, after all, recently awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace, as if the rest of the world also wanted to show that it was giving Mr. Obama the benefit of the doubt. The freshly elected U.S. president might have salvaged some respect for his judgment if he’d politely declined the prize. But, unfortunately, as was the case with Gorbachev, Obama is too busy enjoying all the attention.
Mr. Gorbachev at least reduced the world’s nuclear arsenal. So far, Obama has only given lots of hopeful speeches.
It’s at times charming to see the little things that Obama has brought to the White House, such as when he played beer buddy arbitrator in the much hyped up conflict between a white police officer and a black professor who was arrested in his own home.
But one expects a U.S president to spend his time tackling more serious issues, including mounting international problems with U.S. roots, such as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, or the world economic crisis.
It may come as a surprise to many an American citizen and policy maker, but much of the world doesn’t see relations between blacks and whites as the most pressing problem of our time.
Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, unfortunately, is in this regard very insular in his outlook. To him, Obama’s critics are motivated by racism. I suppose Mr. Carter, who was himself widely accused of damaging America’s foreign interests while president in the late 1970s, believes Obama deserves more benefit of the doubt.
Then again, what does one expect from a president who sends a boxer as an ambassador to Africa on the basis of his skin color?
It would be quite naïve, however, to believe that Obama got elected president because of his skin color. Instead, his race, religion, age, etc, were part of the campaign packaging strategy that the Democrats used to maximize votes.
Politicians are, of course, supposed to try and win over as broad a spectrum of voters as they can. The system breaks down when policy content takes a back seat to image. In the case of Obama, he doesn’t represent minorities, liberals and youth so much as he does trade unions, isolationists and the welfare state.
Americans going to the polls in November 2008 had good reason to be concerned about the state of their country. Many blamed George Bush Jr. for its ills. However, the threat of terrorism was alive, well and underestimated during the Clinton administration. As was the threat of a corporate culture bent on share value, and an educational system unwilling and unable to prepare the next generation for its transition into a high tech service economy.
Obama has met these challenges with lofty speeches and even loftier spending. Does the nation really need to be embroiled in a debate over health care during a global recession and two wars?
Like Gorbachev, Obama is pandering to the masses, as well as the international community, while ignoring the underlying economic reasons for his country’s ills. American manufacturing jobs have been in jeopardy for decades, and they aren’t going to be saved by billion–dollar bail outs coupled with a feel-good foreign policy.
America took a strong position on foreign policy, because it was the only country with the means and will to do so. It’s not unusual that a president such as George Bush should be unpopular, as the task at hand was not a pleasant one.
And, likewise, it’s not surprising that Obama should be so popular abroad; although, like Gorbachev, he might do well to remember what nation he is representing. Earning a pat on the back from the likes of Hugo Chavez is probably not the kind of international understanding that American voters desired when they decided to elect a first-term senator.
George Bush may be remembered fondly by historians after all. It’s historians, rather than the media, who write history. For example, Mr. Bush did a lot toward engaging India as a strategic counterweight to China. These efforts might be lost if Pakistan implodes in a civil war.
Obama cannot be blamed for America’s long standing economic problems, or the nation’s increasing inability to meet the international responsibilities it inherited after the fall of the Soviet Union. But he might draw lessons from the career of the last Soviet leader, who sought peace from a position of weakness, and prosperity without a plan.
John Marone, a columnist of Eurasian Home website, Kyiv, Ukraine
October 22, 2009
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