blogger interrupted

The Times of London, reports on Barack’s upcoming visit to the UK.

In London a week tomorrow, the last leg of the trip, where Mr Obama is likely to spend less than a day, he will meet Gordon Brown at 10 Downing Street and then David Cameron, and will briefly shake hands with a few campaign contributors.

His British visit comes amid anxieties in Whitehall about how strong a commitment to the “special relationship” a President Obama would make. There have been signs that he views France and Germany as more at the heart of Europe, rather than Britain, a country he has only fleetingly visited twice. There is also a sense that Mr Brown has been eclipsed in American eyes by Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor, and President Sarkozy of France. 

Angela Merkel is a Conservative.  Gordon Brown is Labour.  When Barack is president, Gordon Brown will move upward in whatever pecking order that may be.  And by the way, there is nothing more presidential than shaking hands in front of the door at No. 10.  More from the Times, Hysteria alert.

But there is something else in the enthusiasm for the Illinois senator that should not be lightly disdained by Americans, even those of a conservative mind.

As even his opponent, John McCain, graciously put it this week, it suggests there is still something about America that can inspire the rest of the world. I’ve never really bought the argument that the hostility of the past eight years was simply anti-Bush, rather than, anti-American sentiment. And I still don’t believe it. What people dislike about President Bush is what they think they know about America - its ignorance, its arrogance, its narrow-mindedness - all caricatures duly fed by the media coverage of the country and its culture and its politics. But there was, it’s true, always the other side to the ambivalence of the world’s thoughts about America. The rise of Senator Obama is a reminder of what the rest of the world still admires - sometimes very grudgingly - about America: a constant capacity to renew itself. 

Is it so bad if the world loves us again?

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