[R-G] Our Obama Problem: A View From Europe

[Anthony Fenton]

Weekend Edition
November 7 / 9, 2008
A View From Europe
Our Obama Problem

By JEAN BRICMONT

http://counterpunch.com/bricmont11072008.html

There are two factors to take into account in order to judge an  
election : what voters express by their vote and what the elected  
candidate is likely to do. In the case of the US presidential  
election, it would have been very depressing if the US population had  
elected McCain, after eight years of Bush. In fact, it is somewhat  
surprising that he still managed to get 48% of the popular vote, and  
that the Republican candidate did so well in states like Louisiana  
(remember Katrina ?).

In that sense, the Left should welcome the Obama victory, not so much  
because he is “African-American”, but because people who vote for him  
probably express a desire for change, and, in general, for progressive  
change : less war, a more balanced economic policy, and a more  
friendly attitude with respect to the environment.

But the question of what the candidate will do is an entirely  
different matter. That depends on what he wants to do and what he can  
do. An American president has lots of power, but he is not a dictator  
and even a dictator would have to take into account relationships of  
forces. What Obama wants to do is not totally clear, but it is certain  
that he will not oppose the powers that be (Wall Street, big  
corporations, the pro-Israel lobby, etc.) that allowed him to win. He  
has at least demonstrated that much during  the campaign.

Of course, Obama has also to take onto account the pressure from  
below. But that is where the main problem arises : which pressure ? If  
some Americans are irritated by the Obamania in the United States,  
they would be even more so if they looked at what goes on abroad,  
especially in Europe. There is nothing I find more depressing than to  
see youth in the French banlieues being “mobilized” for Obama, along  
with all of social democracy, show business and (enlightened)  
Zionists. I even saw some of those youths saying they will send a  
bullet-proof vest to Obama because they think that America will never  
allow an African-American to be president, as if somebody supported by  
Warren Buffett and, in fact, by most of the establishment, was a  
threat to America and in need of their help.

In other words, the Obama problem is his extreme popularity in Europe,  
which is based both on his skin colour and on his “image”. Because  
people don’t understand how much race relations in the United States  
have actually changed, they see Obama’s election as a sort of absolute  
miracle and, since the media present him as a strong alternative to  
Bush, and hardly report, for example, his plans to send more troops to  
Afghanistan, they think that he is far more progressive than he  
actually is.

Of course, given the disastrous state of the Left worldwide, people  
desperately want to believe in something positive happening somewhere,  
and that only reinforces the illusions about Obama.

Besides, there is hardly any Right in Europe that is anti-Obama. In  
fact the Right and most of current social-democracy love Obama because  
he will let them be openly pro-American again. Because the United  
States is less egalitarian (in an economic sense) than Europe, the  
social wage is smaller, there are weaker unions and fewer worker’s  
rights, the European elite views the United States as some sort of  
capitalist paradise. The problem with Bush is that he was so brutal,  
arrogant, inefficient and stupid that it became increasingly difficult  
for them to openly express their admiration for the United States. But  
now, everything changes -- by shifting the attention from social  
issues to ‘’race’’ , they can turn the tables around and make the  
United States look like THE progressive country of the West. The very  
pro-American, “New Left”, French daily Libération has already  
suggested that the election of Obama is a lesson in democracy for  
France. Curiously, they cite long voting lines as evidence for this,  
while of course such lines in non-Western countries are taken as a  
sign of inefficiency or, worse, of the government’s intention  to  
dissuade people from voting.

A final problem is that Obama’s critics will automatically be  
suspected of racism. Already being “anti-American” is identified by  
Zionists with being antisemitic, so with a African-American president,  
we can expect the worst of both worlds.

The question therefore is, how much will Obama be able to get away  
with, if and when his foreign policy clashes with the expectations of  
his leftist European supporters ? Because of the strength of the  
illusions, it is of course very difficult to combat them before he has  
done anything. The only hope is that people will take him, not at his  
word, because he has not promised anything, but at what they think his  
word is, and will react furiously when he betrays their (unfounded)  
hopes. Only that can prevent the United States from escalating its  
wars in Afghanistan, Iraq or elsewhere.

But the deepest problem is that, sixty years after the end of WW2,  
Europeans still see themselves as somehow dependent on the United  
States. For their elites, the reasons are clear and understandable,  
but the rest of us, including a big part of the Left, still put too  
much of our hopes in expecting the US population to elect a “good  
prince”, as they have just done with Obama. We should determine our  
foreign policy, and our social model irrespective of  American choices  
and we should not be afraid of talking with other countries, like  
Russia, China or Iran without worrying what Uncle Sam thinks.  
Europeans often view the United States as a model of democracy, but  
there can’t be anything more undemocratic than for us to determine our  
policies in a way that depends on elections in which we do not  
participate.

The US population elects its president, not the Master of the  
Universe. This seems to be understood nowadays in Russia, Asia, Latin  
America and the Muslim world. Only in Europe do we still need to  
decolonize our minds.

Jean Bricmont teaches physics in Belgium and is  a member of the  
Brussels Tribunal. His new book, Humanitarian  Imperialism, is  
published by Monthly Review Press. He can  be reached at bricmont at fyma.ucl.ac.be 
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