The European Obama fantasy

Josef Joffe:

This author, a so-called expert on Europe and trans-Atlantic relations, has had more hits from big-time U.S. media in the last five days than in the last five years: Newsweek, CNN, NPR, Lehrer, Reuters, even Al-Jazeera English. They all wanted me to explain Germany's Obama fervor, of course, particularly as it related to his speech in the heart of Berlin, at the "Victory Column" that celebrates the military triumphs that launched Bismarck's Prussia-Germany on the road to Continental primacy.

The site selection is a nice touch for a man who is regarded throughout Germany as the Prince of Peace, as the polar opposite of the one-man axis of evil that George W. Bush is said to be. But what Barack Obama really is or isn't does not matter. Obamania is not about politics, but about desire, dreams, and projections. Obama is not so much a candidate as a canvas, a vast surface onto which Europeans (and half of the U.S. electorate) can paint their fondest fantasies. There hasn't been anything like it in Western politics since ... since ... Jack ("Ich bin ein Berliner") Kennedy, the president Barack Obama so self-consciously mimics, down to the tilt of his head and the inflection of his voice.

If he ran in Germany, Obama would carry the country by a landslide, with 67 percent of the vote. But there is no gold in them thar numbers, only disappointment. By vast margins, Germans and Europeans believe in Obama as the Savior & Redeemer who will deliver them from the last eight years of George W. It's like an exorcist fantasy: Once we can send Bush off into the desert, like the scapegoat of the Israelites, we will be able to love America again.

There are two problems buried in this fantasy. One, Barack Obama is possessed of a pliable identity that oscillates between Barry and Barack, between White and Black, between the Harvard Law Review and the Chicago slums, between a leftish voting record in the Senate and a right-of-center message on the stump. He is neither saint nor softie, but the most consummate power politician to come out of Chicago since Richard Daley the Elder. Following classical electoral ritual in the U.S., Obama has been moving steadily to the right, be it on the death penalty, gun control, or Iraq. Europeans haven't quite processed his pilgrimage to the center, and if they have, they seem not to care.

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There are many Americans with the same fantasy. I think Bush has been a far better President than Obama would be if elected. The European and liberal disdain is irrational. President Bush's policies have saved European lives too. The aggressive interrogation of Khalid Sheik Mohammad revealed ongoing plots in Europe and the US that were thwarted.

The European lawfare model for fighting terrorism has had repeated stumbles and failures. Most of their anti Bush sentiment is based on liberal paranoia.

If Obama is elected, the Europeans will quickly learn that he will still pursue US interest and they will not like all of those interest.