[Peace-discuss] Obama

[Morton K. Brussel]

A view of Obama from the French editor of Le Monde Diplomatique.
And now we read from the Pew polling outfit that he is in danger of  
losing the coming election to McCain. --mkb

Obama
By Serge Halimi
Barack Obama is a lucky man: young, of mixed race, thought likely to  
make it to the White House, to succeed one of the most unpopular  
presidents in US history. He appears better equipped than anyone else  
to “renew American leadership in the world” (1) – restore the US  
image and win acceptance and support for US action abroad, rendering  
it more effective.

That includes military action, notably in Afghanistan: “I will build  
a 21st-century military and 21st-century partnerships as strong as  
the anticommunist alliance that won the cold war to stay on the  
offensive everywhere from Djibouti to Kandahar” (2). To anyone who  
still supposes a multicultural president with a Kenyan father would  
signal the start of a new era with everyone holding hands, the  
Democratic candidate has already said that, with all respect to Pink  
Floyd and George McGovern, his foreign policy is actually a return to  
the “traditional bipartisan realistic policy of George Bush’s father,  
of John F Kennedy, of, in some ways, Ronald Reagan” (3).

Multilateralism is not on the agenda, but imperialism will be softer,  
subtler, more inclusive and perhaps not quite so murderous. But the  
eight-year embargo imposed by President Bill Clinton killed a lot of  
Iraqis.

Barack Obama is talented. His book, The Audacity of Hope, shows a  
mixture of historical acumen, cunning, political empathy with his  
opponents – he says he “understands their motives and recognises that  
they have values which he shares” – carefully balanced statements  
that say very little but go down well with almost everyone, humour,  
and conviction. Conviction tempered with a disturbing respect for  
Clinton who, he said, “had wrung out of the Democratic Party some of  
the excesses that had kept it from winning elections” (4). What  
excesses? Opposing the death penalty? Supporting welfare? Defending  
civil rights? Redistributing incomes?

Barack Obama is ambitious. But where will the legitimate ambition to  
win elections take him? The evidence of recent months suggests to the  
right. Not so far as to be interchangeable with Republican candidate,  
John McCain, or justify the jibe “six of one and half a dozen of the  
other”. But far enough from his progressive pronouncements early in  
the campaign and even further from what his most idealistic  
supporters thought he meant by them. “Yes we can” has become yes, we  
can criticise an extremely conservative Supreme Court when it  
prohibits the execution of rapists not found guilty of murder; yes,  
we can give a speech to the pro-Israel lobby, supporting the most  
inflexible positions taken by Ehud Olmert’s government; yes, we can  
automatically associate creativity with the private sector, complete  
Clinton’s and Tony Blair’s mission to redefine “progressive” and  
promote a class alliance in which managers and executives are the key  
players.

It gets worse. Emboldened by the massive contributions to his  
campaign fund, Obama has just dealt a serious, possibly fatal, blow  
to the system of public funding for election campaigns, announcing  
that he would be the first presidential candidate since Watergate to  
waive the fixed state payment ($84.1m in 2008) allocated to all the  
main contenders in return for an undertaking to limit their expenses  
to that amount. The role of money in politics is a major problem in  
the United States and yet Obama has indicated that he is not about to  
solve it. Elsewhere there is still some chance that he will not prove  
to be a disappointment and that the true friends of the American  
people can retain the audacity of hope.



More about Serge Halimi.
Translated by Barbara Wilson
(1) Barack Obama, “Renewing American Leadership”, Foreign Affairs,  
New York, July 2007.

(2) Ibid. This will mean increasing the defence budget and adding  
“65,000 soldiers to the army and 27,000 marines”.

(3) Speech at Greensburg, Pennsylvania, 28 March 2008.

(4) Barack Obama, The Audacity of 
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