Foreign trip was Obama's Tom Dewey moment

A friend from my school days in Zurich, still living in Switzerland, emailed me about Barack Obama’s recent trip to Europe. He summed up perfectly the prevailing reaction from Europeans about the Democrat nominee for president: “Oh, how wonderful it is [sic] to have a man of the world as America’s president!”

Leaving aside the now-familiar (if in this case unintended) presumptuousness that Obama supporters routinely exhibit, this simple statement validates how desperate the Europeans are for an “anti-Bush” – someone erudite, cultured, elegant in manner, and above all else, eager to embrace diplomacy in all its multilateral glory. Obama’s Berlin speech, while short of an “Ich bin ein Berliner” moment, was tailor made for a Europe that seeks an America in its own image – idealistic, nuanced and profoundly non-confrontational.

Unfortunately for the Obama campaign, however, the European trip, highlighted by his speech to 200,000 adoring Berliners in Germany, seems to have fallen flat here in America. In a USA Today/Gallup poll conducted just after the completion of the trip, Obama’s lead among likely voters evaporated in a 9 point swing, with McCain surging to a 4% lead over Obama -- reversing a pre-trip deficit of 5%.

Significantly, in separate questions, the poll shows that support for the view that he can handle the job of commander-in-chief, that he will do a good job on fighting terrorism and that he is capable of handling the war in Iraq all dropped as well. By these measures, Obama’s trip through the Middle East and Europe, which was designed to show that he was up to the job of dealing with foreign policy issues, must be seen as something of a failure. Many analysts, including The Weekly Standard’s Bill Kristol, believe that Obama’s speech in Germany and his overall trip abroad may prove to be a negative tipping point in the election – something akin to a “Dukakis in the tank” moment.

Euro Skepticism

There are several reasons why Obama’s trip, so celebrated in Europe, backfired here in America. Many Americans remain skeptical of European values, motivations and judgment -- particularly on issues related to security and the war on terror. As one American recently said to me, “I’ll always love Paris and London as a place to visit; but if the Euros are for something, I generally think I should be against it.” The roots of this go deeper than just the lingering resentment many Americans still feel over French, German and Spanish opposition to the Iraq War. Though France’s President Sarkozy and German Chancellor Merkel have worked to repair some of damage done by their predecessors, many Americans nonetheless feel that Europe can’t be counted on when needed.

The issue of Iran is a case in point: in a recent poll conducted by the BBC, over 60% of Americans favor strong economic sanctions or military action against Iran’s nuclear program, compared to only 34% in the U.K. and 37% in Germany. Europeans are far more likely to have faith in multilateral institutions and negotiations than do most Americans – a particularly important distinction given Obama’s stated willingness to meet with Iranian president Ahmadinejad without preconditions.

In addition, other polling seems to reinforce the notion that Americans, though clearly invested in a strong Atlantic Alliance, understand that there remain divisions with Europe. A recent poll by GlobeScan sponsored by the British Council found that “on average Americans characterize their views of Europeans as cooler than a friend but warmer than a casual acquaintance”.

Americans have generally lukewarm views of France (48% positive, 31% negative, 15% neutral), Spain (47% positive, 16% negative, 26% neutral) and Poland (41% positive, 15% negative, 30% neutral). Views of Turkey lean slightly negative (29% positive, 35% negative, 23% neutral). Only opinion of the UK (72% positive) and Germany (62%) were above 50%. Not exactly a love fest.

The Audacity of Hubris

This Euro-skepticism may provide some context to the Obama trip, but it is not in itself dispositive. The Obama campaign designed the trip as something of a pre-election “victory tour”, with all the elements of a state visit. The candidate spent time with heads-of-state, conducted presidential-style news conferences and soaked up the adulation of throngs of Europeans who came to catch a glimpse of him. It was covered by a fawning global media that literally gushed with his every appearance. In a sign of just how (self) important Obama saw his trip to Berlin, the campaign originally considered giving the speech from the Brandenburg Gate – the site two historic presidential speeches: JFK’s “Ich bin ein Berliner” in 1963 and Ronald Reagan’s “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall” speech of 1987. Both of these speeches were given by actual sitting presidents who had proven their bona fides in the Cold War, not by a presidential candidate who hasn’t even become the official nominee of his party. Apparently, only after German Chancellor Merkel called the request “inappropriate” did the Obama campaign relent, finding another location for the speech.

Obama’s desire to speak at the Brandenburg Gate smacks of hubris, but it paled in comparison to his actions while in Berlin. His now infamous decision to cancel his visit with the wounded troops at the Ramstein and Landstuhl Medical Centers because he couldn’t turn it into a campaign event, was a PR disaster of the first order – particularly since he decided to work out at the gym at the Ritz Carlton instead. For a candidate that has stumbled badly among Clinton supporters in the heartland, and who famously made the “cling to religion and guns” remark in reference to them, Obama still doesn’t seem to understand that Americans dislike elitism. Not visiting U.S. troops wounded in battle because he couldn’t get any campaign mileage from it says to the American people that he doesn’t appreciate the sacrifices of ordinary Americans in uniform, and that consequently, he may not be fit to be commander-in-chief.

Another Dewey?

Finally, Obama’s European and Middle East tour had an air of presumptuousness about it. He flew in with his entourage as if he had already won the election, meeting with General Petraeus in Iraq and making it clear that, though the general opposed a withdrawal timetable, he as the future commander-in-chief knew best. The media coverage, which a majority of Americans now feel has been unfairly biased in Obama’s favor, was nothing short of fawning. His trip was a state visit in everything but name, even providing daily schedules that looked like carbon-copies of the schedules provided when George Bush travels abroad.

It is obviously news to the Democrats -- who are already redecorating the Oval Office -- but there is still an election to win in November. Americans are famous for rooting for the underdog – a position that John McCain has already won from in the Republican primaries earlier this year. The more the campaign, aided by the media, acts as if Obama’s victory is inevitable, the more they run the risk of appearing arrogant in the eyes of many voters. Many of the voters that Obama must win to achieve victory in this election still need to be wooed, convinced that Obama is worthy of their vote. They don’t want to be talked down to, taken for granted or dismissed. These voters aren't going to vote for him simply because he's black, or because he talks about "hope". In the end it will come down to real issues -- like national security, energy policy, the economy, taxes -- and Obama must have real answers. “Change" just won't cut it.

It might be wise for the Obama campaign to remember the story of Tom Dewey. Running in the 1948 election against an unpopular incumbent president (Harry Truman), Dewey ran well ahead the entire election. After 16 years of Democrat Party rule, it was widely seen to be a Republican year – it was time for change. The post-war economy was stagnant, the Soviet Union was ascendant, and the country was struggling with rebuilding Europe and Japan. Truman was seen to be competent but dull. Dewey, on the other hand, was the dashing Governor of New York, well-spoken, well-educated. A thoroughly modern man. The media was so convinced of a Dewey victory, that the Chicago Tribune went to press with that famous headline, “Dewey Beats Truman”, before all the votes were counted.

You already know the rest of the story.

Andrews does a Tocqueville

When we French need insights into American society, we can profitably peruse French historian Alexis de Tocqueville’s 1835 classic, Democracy in America. If Coloradans, and all Americans for that matter, need to find out more about moral, economic, and sociological trends in Europe today before they make a choice in November’s American presidential and congressional elections, they can confidently expect guidance from former Colorado Senate President John Andrews’ discerning comments on the subject following his recent trip there. In his latest Denver Post column, John points out at least nine European idiosyncrasies which accurately encapsulate the Old Continent’s chronic deficiencies:

- Weariness - Restricted outlook - Fewer children - Secularism - Sluggish economies - Heavy taxes - Burdensome bureaucracies - Weak defenses - Diminished freedom and responsibility

These perversions have one thing in common: The kind of big-government welfarism that Barack Obama is ominously advocating for America as the Democrat Party’s presumptive presidential nominee.

America would ultimately be sinning against Providence if it were to follow Old Europe’s lead down the primrose path to the kind of despotism Tocqueville so perceptively warned democratic nations against a century and a half ago. As Mr. Andrews so lyrically and ringingly puts it in his column, “ A torn and tired world needs the sword of [American] vigilance and the flame of [American] idealism.”

Note: “Paoli” is the pen name, er, nom de plume, of our French correspondent. Monsieur is a close student of European and US politics, a onetime exchange student in Colorado and a well-wisher to us Americans. He informs us the original Pasquale Paoli, 1725-1807, was the George Washington of Corsica.

Iraq bugout negates Obama's professed support for Israel

One of the first speeches Barack Obama gave after becoming the presumptive nominee of the Democrat Party was to AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. In this speech, delivered on June 4, he began the difficult transformation of going from left-wing dove to progressive hawk. It is axiomatic that every nominee of both parties plays to his partisan base in the primaries and then tacks back to the "center" for the general election. In the case of Barack Obama, who has had tremendous success pandering to the lefties of his party, this tack will have to be something close to a sharp right turn. It will be exceedingly difficult for Obama to do -- something that was made abundantly clear in his speech to AIPAC. For Obama to be a credible Commander in Chief that is interested in protecting America's interests in the Middle East, he will have to become a close friend and abiding ally of Israel. Why? Because even with the nascent democracy in Iraq, Israel remains both the only thriving capitalist democracy in the Arab world and our only true politico-military ally. The U.S.-Israel alliance has been the cornerstone of our Mideast foreign policy since the late 1960s, and American Jews remain a powerful (if reliably Democrat) voting block. The speech to AIPAC was Obama's chance to show his bona fides in his support for Israel. Not surprisingly, the speech centered on the growing threat of Iran in the region.

Why Iran? Because Iran remains the single most pressing security threat to both Israel and Iraq. The mullahs have been proactively building a nuclear bomb and the missile technology to deliver it, and with a range that is capable of striking both Baghdad and Jerusalem. They have been sending weapons into Iraq with impunity, and those weapons have been used to kill both American soldiers and Iraqi civilians with lethal effectiveness. They actively support Hezbollah which has been fighting the Israeli army along the Lebanon border and which has been indiscriminately firing rockets into Israel. In short, Iran -- even without nuclear weapons -- is fighting an active war against both the U.S. and Israel in the region.

So, how did Obama do at AIPAC? If you are a fan of more diplomacy, Obama did very well indeed. Obama began with a strong statement that sounded well, hawkish:

"The Iranian regime supports violent extremists and challenges us across the region. It pursues a nuclear capability that could spark a dangerous arms race, and raise the prospect of a transfer of nuclear know-how to terrorists. Its president denies the holocaust and threatens to wipe Israel off the map. The danger from Iran is grave, it is real, and my goal will be to eliminate this threat".

So far, so good. Unfortunately, what followed this was plenty of grist for the idealists in the audience. Obama's approach to this "grave" threat of Iran is -- you guessed it -- an "aggressive, principled diplomacy without self-defeating preconditions":

"We will open up lines of communication, build an agenda, coordinate closely with our allies, and evaluate the potential for progress. (I am) willing to lead a tough and principled diplomacy with the appropriate Iranian leader at a time and place of my choosing, if -- and only if -- it can advance the interests of the United States."

And what would Obama say to the "appropriate Iranian leader"? He'd apparently offer up (again) the same carrots that the Bush Administration and the Europeans have been dangling for the past four years: lifting of sanctions and political and economic integration with the international community.

Has Barack Obama been asleep for the past few decades? Yes, I know, sitting in the Reverend Wright's church for 20 years can certainly numb the mind. But this is an incredibly naive response and a testament to his inexperience. He just -- to coin a phrase -- "doesn't get it". The Iranian regime is a revolutionary government. By definition revolutionary regimes don't seek accommodation with the existing order, they seek its destruction. The mullahs in Iran seek not just the destruction of Israel but a return to the caliphate -- an Islamic social and political order that is 100% antithetical to the existing "international community". It is, thus, no surprise that the Iranians are not interested in all the myriad concessions that the Europeans and Condoleeza Rice have been offering. What they are seeking isn't negotiable.

Of course, Obama has his own non-negotiables, namely in leaving Iraq as quickly as possible -- even in the face of the obvious success of the surge, the recent declaration by CIA Director Hayden that we are approaching a "near strategic defeat" of Al Qaeda there, and the growing clout of the Maliki government. At AIPAC, Obama again called for the "responsible phased redeployment of our troops from Iraq", though he neglected to explain just how this would help Israel. Presumably, in Obama's view of the world, the retreat from Iraq would somehow signal the Iranians that we really "mean business" and represent a force to be reckoned with. Huh? As Mathew Continetti writes in the Weekly Standard, this policy would

"Erase the security and political gains the United States and its Iraqi allies have made in the last 18 months. It would lead to more violence, not less, and to a weaker Iraqi government, not a stronger one. It would breathe new life into the radicals -- many sponsored by the Iranian regime -- who seek a failed state in Iraq. And Tehran would quickly move to fill any power vacuum that the Americans left behind in Iraq."

Beyond the obvious fact that this would hurt America and help Iran, it would actually be devastating to Israel. I know that this position is not "en vogue" among American Jews, who lean heavily left, but the best thing that America could do to protect and support Israel is to win decisively in Iraq. The total defeat of Al Qaeda and of the radical Shiite forces there, the expulsion of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, the presence of a stable democracy in the heart of the Middle East -- are all part and parcel to Israel's security. In contrast, our retreat and ultimate defeat in Iraq -- and the attendant fall of the Iraqi government -- will lead to a devastating vacuum in the region that will further threaten Israel.

American Jews should understand clearly this: If you support Israel, you should be wary of a candidate pushing the tired line of diplomacy with a regime that doesn't negotiate. And you need to vote for victory in Iraq in November.

Ugly Americans R Not Us

Italians, Germans, and British welcomed me and Donna cordially as we traveled through Rome, Florence, Frankfurt, Munich, London, and Bristol the past couple of weeks. Obviously, of course, Americans spending tourist dollars are always pretty well received over there no matter whether NATO relations are warm or chilly, especially when it takes a wad of dollars to acquire the euro or pound as at present. I was reminded, though, how much more there is to bind us together with our cousins across the Atlantic than there is to divide us. Merkel leading Germany and Brown leading the UK are solid allies of the US in resisting Islamic jihadism, as the latter proved last week by staking his job on a close vote for extended detention of terror suspects -- the same day Bush and Congress were unable to get Supreme Court backing for related policies over here.

Weekend headlines after our return to Denver on June 13 had the American President and French President Sarkozy speaking with one voice to warn Iran on nuclear weapons. Before going to Paris, Bush was in Rome (arriving there just as we left), where Prime Minister Berlusconi, another of the right-leaning, pro-US leaders now steering Europe, said at an official ceremony:

Italians... will never forget that this is a country that has sacrificed many lives to save us from totalitarianism, communism, fascism, Nazism, and this is a country that has given us back our dignity and has ensured freedom and well-being for all Italians.

President Bush is an ally who has always helped our country have strong relations with the United States.... I also wish to thank him for all the efforts which he has undertaken during his administration in order to safeguard democracy and freedom.

I thank you very much, Mr. President, for your friendship between the two of us, on a personal level, your friendship shown to our country, and I thank you for the very courageous role that you have always taken as the leader of the most important country in the world, which is able to determine peace and freedom throughout the world.

Don't know much about history

I'm sure that Barack Obama's recent comments defending his pledge to meet "without precondition" with rogue leaders like Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad were comforting to the MoveOn.org and Huffington Post crowd. It reaffirms the commonly held belief on the left that there are few issues that can't be solved through diplomacy and dialogue -- even with those who profess to seek your annihilation. In such idealism one finds such enduring myths of the "Middle East Peace Process", the on-going negotiations over Darfur and the persistent efforts of the IAEA and the UN to rein in the Iranian nuclear program. But fear not: Like many intellectuals who believe in the power of their ideas, Obama is convinced that he can bring terrorists like Ahmadinejad over from the dark side. Unfortunately, for those of us who understand the nature of this kind of evil, such misplaced confidence is yet another example of the risks inherent in an Obama presidency. It is also a depressing sign of his misreading of history, which is replete with examples of the false expectations of diplomacy with dictators and despots. It reminds me a bit of how Lyndon Johnson was convinced that if he could just sit down with Ho Chi Minh and offer him a huge public works program on the order of a "WPA for Vietnam", he could get the North to stop the generational struggle for independence and unification. LBJ was convinced that there wasn't anyone he couldn't cajole into a deal, believing that every man has his price. Little did he understand what motivated Ho and his fellow nationalists. It wasn't negotiable.

Of course, what Ahmadinejad seeks is also non-negotiable: the destruction of Israel, the pursuit of nuclear weapons, a destabilized Iraq, an exporting of terrorism to do damage against American interests. And, of course, like most Islamic fundamentalists, he wishes to do so from a nation that abuses its women, gays and other apostates with brutal repression. Much like Hitler, Ahmadinejad has a vision of the world that doesn't allow for diversity, and is based on a belief system that the ends -- however evil -- are always justified by the means. And for those idealists out there, that includes the use of nuclear, biological and chemical weapons.

It is difficult to understand what a President Obama would have to say to an Ahmadinejad that might possibly make a difference in these beliefs, or in the path down which he has chosen to take Iran. Does he think that the Iranian leadership doesn't really want to destroy Israel? Or they aren't really interested in killing American soldiers in Iraq? Or that they are only using the threat of nuclear weapons so that the world will listen to their myriad grievances against the West? Perhaps he believes, like LBJ, that everyone has their price. If we dangle more carrots, perhaps they will play nice. It has to be that simple, right?

Obama seems to think so, and he has been consistent in saying so. He has taken a tremendous beating by John McCain (and Hillary Clinton) for his "naive" willingness to meet openly with Ahmadinejad, Chavez, Assad, Kim and other despots around the world. And yet he persists in his claim that it is both a good and necessary thing to do. He often trots out the example of Kennedy meeting Khruschev in Vienna in 1961 as validation of his strategy. And yet, this again is a poor reading of history: Kennedy's meeting with Khruschev was an abject failure, putting the young president on his heels and leading indirectly to the Cuban Missile Crisis -- where Khruschev sought to press a perceived advantage. This perception was fueled by Kennedy's poor preparation in the meetings and the ability for Khruschev to bombastically dominate the discussions -- convincing Kruschev that Kennedy could be bullied. Kennedy was thus upstaged in Vienna and put on the defensive; he responded by showing that he wasn't to be underestimated by upping the ante in Vietnam. Historians now roundly agree that the Vienna meeting with Khruschev was among the more ill-advised decisions of the Kennedy presidency.

Barack Obama is, of course, no Jack Kennedy -- which only serves to make these examples even more alarming. Kennedy was a right-wing conservative by the standards of today's Democrat party, and together with his brother Bobby, had no compunction against using force in defense of American interests and ideals. Obama, on the other hand, proudly waves the banner of non-aggression that so animates the left-wing today. While JFK was willing to stand firm in the face of Soviet aggression in Cuba and a perceived communist threat in Vietnam, it is difficult to imagine Obama having the courage to defy the base of his party that is so central to his support. Obama sees the world in shades of gray, the way most of the Democrat party does. Such a view isn't well suited to the struggle between good and evil.

The response by Obama to criticism over his willingness to meet with the heads of terrorist states tracks closely to his anger over President Bush's statements on appeasement on his recent trip to Israel. Though Bush didn't name him specifically, Obama was enraged that the president would dare trot out the "politics of fear" to brand him as weak on the fight against terrorism.