A list of the most recent headlines posted by the global news aggregator, Watching America, shows that the Obama phenomenon is sending ripples far and fast. There’s enough global output that WA is continuing its multiple Obama feature with new content into the new week.
Current headlines include,
The Day That Martin Luther King Dreamed Of??(Germany)
Rejection of US Establishment (Germany)
America, Where Hope Never Dies (Australia)
Obama Magic Draws Crowds (Australia)
The big words, Hope, Dreams, Magic and even Martin Luther King, abound!
Watching America was launched during Bush’s presidency, and most of the content it has had to work with from around the world has (therefore) been negative toward the U.S., but almost without exception, the superficially anti-American news and views from Chile to China, Argentina to Australia, hav always been at their core, decidedly pro-American: op-eds that complain about the U.S. very rarely call for wholesale change in what America is, but rather, a return of America to itself – to its own, American, values. The world broadly agrees with Bush on that one: American values are human values.
Obama is lifting the lid on this heretofore latent global pro-Americanism. His skin color and lack of experience do not change the fact that Obama is the truly American choice to many of the pundits and commentators who are looking in at the ’08 election process from the outside – and that is why the world’s press is beginning to use such words as “Hopes” and “Dreams” as much as is the Obama campaign.
Robin Koerner is a British-born citizen of the USA, who currently serves as Academic Dean of the John Locke Institute. He holds graduate degrees in both Physics and the Philosophy of Science from the University of Cambridge (U.K.). He is also the founder of WatchingAmerica.com, an organization of over 100 volunteers that translates and posts in English views about the USA from all over the world.
Robin may be best known for having coined the term “Blue Republican” to refer to liberals and independents who joined the GOP to support Ron Paul’s bid for the presidency in 2012 (and, in so doing, launching the largest coalition that existed for that candidate).
Robin’s current work as a trainer and a consultant, and his book If You Can Keep It , focus on overcoming distrust and bridging ideological division to improve politics and lives. His current project, Humilitarian, promotes humility and civility as a basis for improved political discourse and outcomes.