Ok, I’m going to take a stab at this crap that’s been floating around about how much the Europeans love Barack.
First, he laid the foundations for this adulation(or so he thinks) when he made that statement that Americans can’t say more than Merci Beaucoups and are really the fricking idiots of the known world. (BTW, if you only have time to learn one phrase in a foreign language, Thank You Very Much is highly recommended.) Well, as it turns out, I work with Europeans. In fact my whole department is international. Out of 25 of us, there are only *three* Americans. And we have LOTS of international teleconferences. Our business is conducted in two languages, English and French. I am just as likely to receive email in French as English and when I call a colleague in Europe, I am likely to get the voicemail prompts in French, German or Italian. We deal with it, teach ourselves, learn to read French (not that hard actually) or get a tutor.
But it doesn’t much matter anyway because all verbal transactions are done in English. And there is a very good reason for this that just points to Obama’s elitist stupidity in the most glaring fashion- half of my department is CHINESE. They speak Mandarin or Shanghaiese. None of our European colleagues speak those languages but we all speak English. So, English it is. And Europeans know better than anyone that Americans are no longer number one in the world. It is the Chinese that hold that title. They are very happy to point that out to me whenever my American superiorty makes a reappearance.
Secondly, The Europeans are “in love” with Obama for one reason and one reason only- He’s not Bush. In fact, they hate Republicans as much as we do. They blame the neocons for the disasters of the last eight years and if it weren’t Obama, they’d be GENUINELY happy for Hillary.
Yeah, really. Most of my European colleagues were pulling for Hillary. They’ll settle for Obama and they are apalled that anyone would vote for McCain but they really *liked* Hillary. My boss applied for her citizenship earlier this year in anticipation of voting for Hillary and is disappointed that she may not be able to. The Eurpoeans blanch when I tell them I am not voting for Obama but once I explain what the DNC was up to, they completely understand.
So, there you have it. They are in love with the anti-Republican. You could replace him with Alfred E. Newman and as long as “What me worry?” was a Democrat, they’d be ecstatic. There is nothing intrinsically special about Obama that makes them happy.
Filed under: Presidential Election 2008 | Tagged: Chinese, Europeans, Obama |
The Confluence 
Yes!!! The US press has been going a little crazy about how the rest of the world loves Obama. Erm, they LOVE Hillary too. They LOVED – absolutely ADORED – Bill Clinton, because Bill was a smart, itelligent, genuinely friendly people’s person. And men and women around the world were & are in love with Hillary.
The rest of the world laughs at Bush, every single day. And if we pick Obama as our president, they will laugh at us for the next four years too.
Obama wouldn’t last long as a European politician.
Their media isn’t sycophantic and neither are the crowds.
Oooooh, I was First to comment!!!
myiq – You said it! CF: Sarkozy.
By the way, RD, tres bien fait. J’etait specialiste en francais a l’universite. 🙂
I’m a European myself and I Loveeee the Clintons and a lot of my friends love them too. Throughout the primaries I was pulling fhard or Hillary. I’ve stayed up late in order to view the debates and the elecetion results! I personally think that the US media kinda overstates the love Europeans have for Obama! None of my friends were pulling for him and it’s not like we’re talking about him all day long…
Riverdaughter I think you’re totally correct by stating that Europeans love Obama because he ain’t Bush whom a lot of European just hate. However, I think it is important to mention that a lot of my friends and even a left politician from my country talked about the fact that even McCain would be a huge improvement!
RD, BH0 already is Alfred E Neuman…or was that GWBush? I can’t tell the diff anymore. From readings, esp. the UK press (Guardian et al.), the British left were really in love with BH0. Good to know it’s just the Anti-Republican symbol that they’re really rooting for, but I wish they’d pay closer attention to the blatant subversion of democratic processes and stupidities of the DNC and BH0 campaign this election cycle!
English is spoken where I work and Hindi is next. If found the same situation as RD. A number of guys recently got their citizenship and were looking forward to voting for Hillary. They don’t know what to make of Obama and don’t understand his appeal in this country. I told them he is the Sanjaya candidate.
Love Obama? Personally I think it’s the ABBTB syndrome. (Any Body’s Better than Bush.) And I agree with them about that.
However, shouldn’t we be aiming a little higher than better than Bush, given that he’s goshawful?
Not all Chinese people speak Mandarin. In my IT Dept, we have Cantonese speakers as well as Mandarin speakers. English is a language of convenience for them.
There are more than five dialects in China although Mandarin is the official language.
PUMA
I don’t think europeans pay as close attention as we think. I lived in Spain for three years, and they follow us politics pretty much like we do here. They have a very superficial view–dems good, repubs bad. I’ve seen in the spanish press that they are sucking up to obama pretty hard, but I think it is the novelty (he doesn’t look like a us president) and europeans are prone to speak more openly about race than americans. it’s “cool” that there will be a black president. Spanish people especially are very non-pc when it comes to race and much of what they say and print in their press would probably be considered “racist” here….but it is interesting to watch. I was in Paris on 9/11 and after having lived in europe and dealt with snobiness toward americans, and then seeing that melt away into compassion and comraderie was an amazing thing. I was there for an entire year after that and watched Bush very quickly piss all that good will away. No wonder they’re feeling “anybody but bush”
My moms recently returned from a conference and trip to Finland, Sweden, and Norway. The conference attendees were a mix of North Americans (lots of Canadians) and Europeans. Not a single non-US person they spoke to was an Obamaniac, and the vast majority were surprised and deeply disappointed that Hillary hadn’t won the nomination. They LOVE the Clintons and felt deeply invested in the idea of the US finally being led by a woman. The moms spent a lot of time trying to explain the bizarre way Dems conduct their nominating process — proportional allocation, caucuses, open & closed primaries, etc. The Europeans were shocked at how fundamentally undemocratic it is. Based on this admittedly brief, limited experience, the moms feel that, per usual, Obama is getting the benefit of a whole lot of hype about how excited Europeans supposedly are about Him.
I will add, that the novelty of a woman president is not that great there since most european countries have had a long tradition of powerful female politicians…including spain whose defense minister and deputy prime minister are women
OT — but interesting read:
http://politicallydrunk.blogspot.com/2008/07/obama-donor-base-shrivels-campaign.html
did I screw up? post disappeared —
politicallydrunk.blogspot.com/2008/07/obama-donor-base-shrivels-campaign.html
ahh there it is… its OT but interesting
Okay, knock off the frog talk. It affects me just like it does to Gomez Addams.
myiq – LOL!
At least you’re not Jamie Lee Curtis in “A Fish Called Wanda.” 😉
GCH:
I don’t know about Espana but the Germans follow our politics very closely. The English pay attention to us just like parents of an unruly teenager (they still think of us as their colonies) and the French put our political news on the funny pages.
Genuinely leftist Europeans do not love Obama. We can tell a closet conservative at three thousand miles. It’s significant that many of his most fervent admirers are in the right wing Murdoch press. Moreover, his right wing demonisation of black fathers struck a chord with our own right wing and was echoed by David Cameron (Tory leader) in a speech earlier this week, where he extolled “family values” – so beloved of social reactionaries.
Indigogrrl:
Sounds like “shrinkage” to me.
yup – he dove in and the water’s cold
I think the germans are different. Because of their history they are much more sensitive to political machinations. most other europeans, whether they admit or not, are hooked on american pop culture and I think us politics for them is just another aspect of that pop culture.
IndigoGrrrl – Interesting indeed! I poked around the site and found this.
Apparently Hillary is more of a man than Barack.
HAHAHAHAHAHA….I can’t stop laughing….
Actually, I think it’s pretty brilliant that English is a worthwhile language for the world to know over a language spoken in only small areas of the world. English is the language of the British Isles, Canada, America, Australia, New Zealand, and other countries that are part of the Commonwealth. As I understood it years ago (it is probably still true), pilots and air traffic controllers must speak english to keep the skies safer.
Two years of foreign language is a requirement to graduate from high school in this country, so every graduate has at least that much of some language outside english. Obama get some dispensation at his elite school?
He just keeps showing us how truly out of touch he is with real lives of real people. He’s the only moron in the whole scenario.
and of course i always thought of the english as “american lite”…I think most other europeans would agree he he (no offense to the brits)
madamab
ROFLMAO — (wipes tears) OMG thats priceless!
GCH:
Most of the world considers us to be a bunch of arrogant hicks with too much power and not enough sense.
They spend waaaay more time studying us than we do them.
catch y’all tonight …
effed around all day and got nuthin’ done but bloggin”
must work…pay bills…feed small child….
myiq, I totally agree. my point was that europeans in general pay about as much attention to our politics as we do. Americans pay as much attention to european politics as they do to paint drying on the wall….
GrapeApe –
Yup!
I expect him to marvel over the barcode readers in the supermarket soon. 😉 ***
***for those old enough to remember Poppy Bush’s clueless remarks
madamab:
Who would have believed a year ago that the candidate who is a whiny b*tch isn’t Hillary?
“any ten year-old kid in my neighborhood in inner-city Cleveland would prefer that Hillary Clinton escort them to the corner Seven Eleven than Barack Obama.”
Yeah!
GCH:
The world pays attention to what we do because it affects them as much as us.
Like it or not, we’re still the big dog on the block.
myiq2xu –
water==>monitor
OMG! I see why you are so popular with the cocktail crew around here. 🙂
Like Indigogrrl I must go…see you all a bit later!
Rock on, PUMAs!
Hello Fellow PUMAs
I thought I would share this youtube video. I KNOW you will appreciate it. It goes along with riverdaughter’s post.
Arrogant, Elitist, Obama embarrassed of America:
One thing I know, is that if the Spanish knew the real Obama they would be repulsed. They are a first generation democracy, and in many ways one of the most “progressive” countries in the world. I remember visiting the parliament and seeing the bullet holes that were left there after the coup in 1981 to remind them how fragile democracy is.
Also, congrats on the documentary filming!
–kat in your hat
That story about Poppy Bush and the supermarket scanner is a myth.
But it lives on because it has truthiness. It is easy to believe it’s true because he was so detached from the lives of real people.
It’s like the story about MO ranting about “whitey.” She may not have ever said that, but her personality makes the story credible.
I thought the real story about poppy is that he had no idea how much a gallon of milk cost. I remember how deeply that resonated.
Chinese are now number one? By what standard? Population? Despite all of the hype surrounding them right now, the US is still a much larger, much more advanced country, with a much higher standard of living, more developed legal system, finance system, infrastructure, etc. China is a large country, and it’s been growing fast (but so have many countries, and largely because the absolutely horrid policies they had before left a huge amount of room for growth), but it has a long way to go. And history has shown us that the road to growth is a bumpy one.
The US will continue being number one in most things for a long time. And for those areas where it’s not number one, very few will have the Chinese as number one.
Just my two cents.
look at the pictures of the latest commenters…a roaring puppy, puma and clown 🙂
gary: I remember it as being a loaf of bread…
Myiq2xu: I saw a clip of Poppa Bush with the supermarket scanner. He looked a little unfazed by the thing. They showed the clip on VH1 once.
That’s why the rac*st accusations against Bill and Hillary caught her campaign (and her supporters) off-guard.
They were so preposterous we couldn’t imagine anyone taking them seriously.
But the CDS crowd will believe anything negative about the Clintons.
No … they don’t all love him. I’ve had many discussions about this when I call friends & family in the UK. Those I’ve spoken to really didn’t know that much about Obama … there’s just a general sense of relief that Bush is on the way out.
Politics is a hell of a lot more exciting over here, though. I don’t remember ever getting this interested about voting in the UK. I always just used to vote along party lines (Labour). Now that I’m a former Democrat, I’ll never be that lazy with my votes again.
If he gets off the plane in each country to the sounds of “Hail to the Chief” I am purchasing my own straight jacket as there will be no telling what I will do. This charade is like a movie script.
SophieL: I thought it was a bag of pork rinds.
Part of it is an unfortunate result of security.
I doubt Bill or Hillary has driven a car in close to 20 years. They couldn’t shop without an entourage either. Besides, their time is too valuable for mundane stuff like that.
But it becomes easy to lose touch with the rest of us.
Well Germany doesn’t love him. I think Merkel wants to kick his ass. HA!
Chatham: I’m just telling you how the Europeans sees the rest of the world and they are very happy to knock us down a peg and tell us that China is now number one. And despite the pockets if poverty and standard of living in China, I happen to agree with the frogs. We’re probably not #1 anymore.
Arrrrrrrrrrrrgrrrrrrrr@#$!!!
I smell a relative from MABlue who will be spam-blocked very soon:
Lemme go calm down with a very cold beer.
Bush and his policies have overshadowed our place in the world. But more people prefer to emigrate to the US rather than China. At least for now.
Chatham:
I see China following a similar path as Japan and South Korea.
Rapid industrialization, economic growth and the national accumulation of wealth.
But then the people quit wanting to sacrifice for the future and start wanting to enjoy the benefits now.
riverdaughter-
Just in case you missed this pew servey:
One reason people want to emigrate here is the United States is something unique in human history.
Immigants can become Americans. Their children and grandchildren will identify with our culture and history rather than their original homelands.
Move to China and you’ll never be “Chinese.” Neither will your descendants.
I think Europeans will find Obama’s self-adulation very distasteful. Who knows, the US Media is DRIVING the story that Europe LOOOOVES him, but I think here will be a backlash to his preponderance. (crossing my fingers!)
Well, I’m a democrat living abroad, right now I”m in Canada and my son is in Asia “China” and I’m going to tell you that I’ve been living out of the country for quite a while now.
Everyone I know has been saying for the last few years that the hoped to god Hillary would run for president! They loved Bill Clinton, thought the U.S. was totally NUTS to blow up the Monica thing instead of focusing on what a great PRESIDENT he was. They laughed at the U.S. press for talking about that so much and thought they were a bunch of knuckle draggers who would rather talk about a dress instead of what a good job the president did. They felt safer, and more trusting when Bill was in there and felt Hillary was even smarter than Bill.
Everyone I know thinks Hillary was treated in a disgraceful manner in the press. One girl I know in China said they never saw a woman in their media treated that badly, not even in China!!
So come on U.S. press continue to make fools of yourselves and sell a fake story about how in “love” everyone around the world is with Obama. He’s going to be in Germany giving his speech in front of a great phallic symbol. Our press will be there drooling out their words of “love” and in pubs all over Canada and Europe people will talk about the backward Americans and how they “arent’ ready” to elect an experienced female that THEY happen to believe would make a president they felt they trusted too.
The democrats abroad have been asking me for money…time for me to set up my PUMAS abroad delegation!!
myiq2xu-
Perhaps. I think China, much more massive and unstable, will have a longer slog towards industrialization, personally. Also remember, Japan was being thought of as number #1 20 years ago, and rhought of as a greater threat by many in the US than the Soviet Union. Now the world’s second largest economy gets little mention in the press, it seems.
riverdaughter –
Ah, I see what you’re saying. I’d disagree with them though. It’s not just pockets of poverty, it’s the vast majority of the population (amongst other other problematic factors there). Many countries in the developing world are catching up, but it will take some years for them to get here (our level of wealth/development/international clout/etc). I personally think we’re going to see a much more dramatic shift than just the “rise of China”, but one that’s slow in the making.
Did I just wake up in a parallel universe? First, the Democratic Party allows non-democrats to pick the nominee; now this nominee wants him elected by the American voters because non-Americans like him?
*twitch*
Add 13 Europeans from my side – pulling hard for Hillary
get the popcorn and drinks ready
lets just enjoy the show
its going to be fuuuuuuunhillary is my hero
puma
@Chen Zen
Something tells me Pew didn’t take a poll in Israel
Need some PUMA love here.
http://thevote.abc13.com/2008/07/puma-passion.htm
I’m an Anglo-American living in Italy (just outside Florence).
Most Italians have never heard of Barack Obama-which is WHY I suppose he’s not coming here.
Hillary was supported by the whole of the center left, (including the Communists) who knew and liked her from personally meeting her over the years.
They liked her “formazione”, which means schooling, studies, job resume, but also religion, family-things like that.
The far left rainbow coalition (no-globals, communist splinter groups, greens) likes Obama whom they find romantic (and are intrigued by his middle name) but they underwent a massive defeat in this Spring’s election and are still busy discussing what went wrong.
The Right and Berlusconi prefer Bush (and McCain).
Papers and TV here don’t talk much about American Primaries, they usually weigh in a lot closer to November, and get detailed in January. Not to say that nothing is said -just the odd mention here and there.
Personally I find it quite tacky that a Presumptive Presidential candidate should come over to Europe and expect Presidential treatment. It’s an embarassment for governments who don’t quite know how to treat him -after all the other side might win, or could complain about unwarranted interference.
felizarte, great point. He couldn’t win the Democratic primaries, and he can’t win the American general elections. Therefore, bring in the outsiders each time.
And the US press is hardly one to know about what ANY person in ANY other part of the world is thinking. Hey, they don’t even know what people right here are thinking/saying/feeling. So I wouldn’t take them too seriously anyway.
When is Obama leaving? If only he would stay in Europe.
Must go to the hairdresser. See ya’ll later.
bboomer — I’m with you, the longer he’s away the better.
Hey everyone, ‘member the fuss everyone made against Hillary’s victory in Puerto Rico, just because ‘they can’t vote in the GE’?
But somehow the fact that Europe likes Obama is amazingly relevant!
Although I suppose, when your first experience with foreign policy is living in Indonesia as a child, the next rung up IS a rock concert in Germany.
Someone was asking about the Dean Bus Tour stops,
go to this web site for more information:
http://www.democrats.org/page/-/bus/RegisterChange.html
Okay RD – I have a bone to pick.
I just saw that little peep squeak Kos on MSNBC. I am pretty sure Brook could have taken him.
What is that moron doing in charge of our lives?
PUMA$ Who Donate Rule!
” … any ten year-old kid in my neighborhood in inner-city Cleveland would prefer that Hillary Clinton escort them to the corner Seven Eleven than Barack Obama.”
That’s just the problem, though, isn’t it. The boyz want desperately to be free of Momma. And for reasons I’m not sure I want to examine too closely, Hillary is Momma. Blech.
Laurie, Why can’t the Italian govt. deal with the corruption that has caused the horrible garbage problem in Naples?
“People around the world who have been paying attention to the American election express more confidence in Barack Obama than in John McCain to do the right thing regarding world affairs. McCain is rated lower than Obama in every country surveyed … ”
That’s because they hate Bush, and they know that McCain is nominally in the same party as Bush. Unfortunately, voters in the U.S. may conflate the two for precisely the same reason.
Ann, where are you getting your information? I have been in these European countries talking to people and what I heard was they wanted Hillary Clinton to run for president.
Whether they are more for Obama now than McCain is interesting. They’ve been told repeatedly by the American press that Obama is the nominee already rather than the presumptive nominee till the convention. There has been no U.S. press on the ridiculous way Hillary was shoved out early on. Never has there been a hue and cry for someone to get out of a race that close even when they were winning.
I believe if the European press had the full story and soon they will, they will be far more honest in their reporting than the U.S. has been. It might be the only way the U.S. press and the DNC get called to account but, it’s going to all come out and it won’t be pretty.
They do hate Bush, and they may be for Obama as someone they now believe is a “given” alternative to Bush.
But I will promise you that the Europeans believe that the U.S. is backward and reactionary a lot of the time. Their press will relish showing exactly how misogyny won out. They will play up how the U.S. and the democratic party bent rules so they could select an unqualified male over a more qualified woman. The headlines will be about how other countries including India never treated a female candidate the way the backward U.S. treated Hillary.
Watch for it…it’s already started to happen. I cannot wait. They will pounce on this as a way to show how much more progressive they all are. Europeans are no great lovers of Americans anyway and if Obama is elected they will need a good reason to point out how flawed and provincial we are. It’s just too damned bad the MSM and the DNC have given them so much to work with….too bad for Obama anyway.
it’s going to bite him in the butt in the Euro press.
who gives a flying poop what Europeans think? they’ve let us defend them from terrorists though.
Oh, Ann I failed to notice those quotes…lol. I’ve got drops in my eyes today, should have waited till they wore off a bit more.
Actually I care what the Europeans think, it’s too small a world these days not to. We may defend them from “terrorism” but, the Brits have done a lot for us too.
Leaving Europe then..there are a hell of a lot of Canadians on the ground in Afghanistan, as well as Euro troops too. But the Canadians are there in large numbers. Terrorism is something that every country is concerned with and some have been paying for a long time. London gave a lot of support and great ideas for how the U.S. could be better protected given what they have lived with for years and years now.
Too small a planet to be insular about what anybody thinks these days. That’s dangerous ground.
That aside, seeing how the Euros will vet Obama is going to be something I take great pleasure in. Our own press isn’t going to tell the truth about him until they see that not everyone around the world is afraid to write the truth. They won’t be. The sooner they get on it, the better.
I wish our media was more like the British. They are “in-your-face” to politicians instead of “lick-your-boots.”
Maybe we could trade Obama for a couple of BBC’s best?
This Swede is all for Hillary and so are my friends. Most people here who knows a bit more of what’s going on do, though I think people in general just prefer any Dem.
As for languages I am only fluent in Swedish and English. I read and understand, but don’t speak, Norwegian and Danish fluently, and can read and speak some French and Spanish – enough to get by as a tourist at least.
I still think it is a silly subject for Obama to knitpick Americans on. Especially as a means to communicate with Europeans. People ought rather to study Spanish because the neighbours speak it.
I’m really relieved to hear this. I could not understand what was going on. Now love Hillary, well don’t we all……..
ya kinda wonder if Oblahblah has ever read about the campaigns of McGovern and Dukakis. If he had even a superficial understanding of why they lost, he wouldn’t be doing all this.
example: telling Hispanics that upholding immigration law is terrorism…to get their votes …
many spoofs on his visit to Iraq coming.
http://www.redstate.com/static/redstate/doc/2008/07/18/OBAMA_TRAVEL_PACKET.doc
madamab, moi aussi j’ai fait mes etudes de lettres en francais, j’en ai beaucoup oublie par la suite.. J’ai quelques amis a moi qui parlent chinois, d’une part je regrette de ne pas avoir fait cela.
riverdaughter, ton boulot pour l’entreprise internationale, ca a l’air tres sympa, y a personne qui parle francais ici ou je bosse, on n’a pas besoin d’autre langues pour le travail.. malheureusement. Ca me manque.
I am going to check into what the French media has to say about Obama’s grand tour, later when I have time.. I recall there being a lot of interest back in 2000 and 2004 but that’s because everyone thought Bush was insane and couldn’t figure out why in the world we were trying to elect him. As for languages I am considering myself studying more Spanish for the reason you say, B, there are so many here where I live who speak it, I think it would be quite useful.
Another possible reason Europeans love Obama… tabloid media is very popular there. Obama is very much a tabloid product here….
Some think media is going to go after Obama there. I think it may be challenging for them. He is traveling with his own media. They are the ones who have access to him. He may well control the media access to him there just like he does here.
If you missed Lou Dobbs, they mocked his visit and his 300 foreign policy advisors… There was a two-fer crack about ‘his Hampton’s advisor’…. mocked the number of advisors and made him elitest at the same time.
lizinsandi– I am an ugly American and I agree with you. The French elected that guy who left the mother of his children for Mick Jaeger’s ex… pls do not lecture us about sex. The world still revolves around the US, no matter how much it bothers them. If they love o so much they can keep him. China and India should be the focus of the world’s attention and they are wisely keeping their opinions to themselves.
You know RD, at this point I’m going for whoever looks like Nationalism and not Hitlerama redux ala Brandenburg Platzfest channeled via Versailles und le Sun King saviorama…
After what Bush just tried to pull? Hey guess what! LOOK AT OUR HILLARY GO RD & EVERYONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
WE LOVE YOU HILLARY! ALL THE PUMAS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/Vote2008/Story?id=5405561&page=1
look at HER! She is the best thing to happen to the Dems since FDR! She is the ONE we love, not that fool that all the dumb democrats put in place while they tried to destroy her before our eyes. Look at her working for US!
Anyway, we know why she is loved, (as women) — but, she is loved by almost everyone except cult followers who are so stupid they don’t even know what they are looking at.
He is so creepy RD. God. This country is going down the tubes. We have got to get back on our feet, cuz RD—you are correct in this post about who says what to you, and it’s wrong. I want our girl scout girlhoods back, girlfriend, for Brook’s sake!
hugs,
me!
I’m an outsider but am overjoyed to see dynamic democracy in full swing in the US of A with the No Deal Coalition – Hillary needs to be our Leader of the Free World and a lot of us out here are watching and listening very closely to the whole process …. and not just a little frustrated at being powerless! I can assure you there would be heaps and heaps of would-be PUMAS out here in complete unison with you all!
I personally have watched the whole sordid actions of the DNC since January – watched the May 31 debarcle live on-line …….. and researched BO’s background pretty thoroughly! If all those outside of the US had followed my research there is no way they would plump for BO – and I believe that McCain would get the gurnsey for trustworthiness for the next 4 years – if PUMA et al aren’t successful in promoting Hills to the top job this time!
This also has a lot to do with the US media pretending Obama is Nelson Mandela, like his election will mean so much to the world. Obama isn’t Mandela, he’s not coming out of 30 years in prison or living under apartheid, the rest of the world doesn’t care all that much as long as Bush is gone.
rd-
First time posting but felt compelled to . My d(who went to 5 schools before finding an independent school she graduated from) is now a student at Princeton. She’s a french major and has spent part of the last three summers in France, Switzerland and Germany. As to Europe’s so-called love of Obama my d told me people in Germany and Switzerland were very favorable to Hillary. (She’s fluent in french bc we put her in a full immersion school in kindergarten so, particularly in France & Switzerland, she can converse well.) The French detest Bush , as you said,and are elitist, in my d’s view. About speaking their language and generally thinking Americans are uncultured, etc. Not all, of course ,but noticeably so to d.
While in Germany my d was sitting in a cafe with a professor and some celebrated artist. The German artist went into a rant about how no Americans can speak any language but English and that Germans knew many languages. My d spoke up bc she’s learning German and to progress in the language she’d approach Germans in Munich and Berlin for directions(even if she knew where she was going) just to practice her oral skills. D found numerous Germans who did not speak English at all. She told this artist that who became miffed. Anyway , Obama is feeding into that. D personally spoke with close friends in Switzerland and they were totally disappointed Hillary wasn’t the nominee.Notwithstanding Campbell Brown’s sweeping generalization about European’s ardor for Obama.
I sincerely hope you find the right independent school for your daughter. I know how difficult it was for my d until she got in off the waiting list in the middle of 8th grade.Things have worked out well for her. Her strong interests in languages and pursuit of vocal music carried her through. We took her to a local college where she was tutored in french outside of school and she ultimately pursued her singing nationally through National Foundation of the Arts. We have a family friend who excels like your daughter in math. She entered all these math competitions and is now doing a summer program at Stanford prior to her junior year in high school. These kids are so interesting, original and deserve an intellectually fertile environment in which to grow. It takes great persistence on their parents’ behalf to see to it that they get it. Wish you all the luck.
If you are talking about Europe then remember there are big differences between Britain and continental Europe, between former Western and Eastern blocs, and then Ireland different again.
As to the British press, they have a severe case of Clinton Derangement Syndrome coupled with plently of misogyny and the belief that if they have a new best black friend then they are no longer racist. They have been pushing the Obama saviour line and the general public take it all on board. This may shift over the coming months, it will be interesting to watch
I only read a different perspective from American feminist and genuine progressive blogs. (Not that I ever liked Obama, from day one I didn’t)
i am disappointed in PUMA as well. Mark at democrat in exile
http://www.democratinexile.com/
has been doing brilliant work on democrat primary reform and PUMA radio won’t interview him and will not post about it on their blogs.
I can never get anyone at PUMA PAC to respond so now I am asking you to help us Democrats organize to force congressional hearings on Dem primary reform. PUMA Democrats Hillary supporters including Mark, invited to speak at said hearings.
Mark has done an analysis of the various plans offered by Democrats as appeasement without real change and he has profiled the Dem leadership’s sham legislation on his blog.
These are the main points of reform we want included in democrat primary reform.
No reform is complete unless:
caucuses are eliminated,
republican crossover voting is eliminated,
the (super) delegate system is eliminated and
every vote counts, the convention delegates voting for the candidate who won the popular vote in their state by a majority of the votes counted.
I want Mark interviewed on PUMA radio to discuss the primary reform PUMA demands.
There is no other segment of PUMA working on primary reform that we can find.
It is a shame because primary reform would engage democrats. Right now it is clear that as democrats drop away only McCain supporters remain in PUMA. The media will soon expose that fact. The PUMA actions to date have lacked substance and been mainly designed to generate publicity. They have failed to do so because the actions are seen as stunts lacking power.
Mark is organizing calls to Sen. Feinstein reminding her of her promise to hold hearings on why the rank and file are calling the primaries corrupted. Now that the nomination for her man is fixed she refuses to hold the hearings.
A PUMA campaign for primary reform hearings would lend substance to the organization. There could be a series of actions targeting the democratic party bosses, demanding hearings, holding mock hearings, a petition, etc, that would gain the media attention that the PUMA elite crave and legitimize the organization.
But PUMA is drunk on their early success and foolish. So be it.
I agree.
greenconsciousness: blogtalkradio is like blogs in general. The barrier to starting your own show is very low. There is no reason why you have to depend on PUMA to be heard. I suspect their reluctance to interview is based on a couple of things:
1.) Your take on the primary system is widely shared. In fact, there have been several bloggers who have gone into quite a bit of detail on the subject. If *I* were planning a show on the primary system, I would interview anglachel, a political science guru at http://anglachelg.blogspot.com. Look through her archives to about march or april. She has a post on reforming the primaries that makes anyone else’s righteous rants on the subject look like temper tantrums. Her proposals are very detailed and extremely well thought out.
2.) I may be wrong here but you appear to be a fan of the Green party. PUMAs are not Greens. They are Democrats or former Democrats. We’re not interested in Green party dynamics. Sorry. Your candidates so far have been a little fringey. Nader and McKinney come to mind. Going to the Greens would be little different than voting for Obama. In Obama’s case, the ideologues are zealously screaming for CHANGE!, whatever that’s supposed to mean, while with the Greens, the ideologues are zealously screaming for dumping everything in the current system that many Americans now rely on, like corporations for jobs and gas powered engines and stuff like that. The point of the PUMA movement is that change doesn’t happen by ideology alone. The ideologues can’t simply grab the reins of power and impose their vision of the world on the rest of us. They have to be able to work hard and sometimes with their enemies. I don’t see that either the Greens or Obamarama have abandoned their belief in magical thinking. I object to parties composed of people who demand an unattainable degree of purity from human beings. I’m a rational person. I think most PUMAs are.
So, there you have it. If you feel miffed at the PUMAs because they won’t invite you to talk on their radio programs, start your own. If you can’t find an audience, don’t blame the PUMAs. Maybe we just don’t like the message.
I wonder what the European presidents and prime ministers , the ones that Obama would be working with if he ever became president, really think about having an American presidential candidate making a show of his political pull in their turf. I don’t know, but I don’t hink they’re going to like it one bit. I’ve traveled extensively through Europe and people everywhere hate Bush and his interventionist policies, especially the war. But I don’t think European leaders would be very keen on this neophyte showing off his influence in their turf. I’m sure that no American president would like it if a European president came to this country to show off how much clout he/she may have. This could really backfire for Obama. They’re not too keen on Messiahs who give mesmerizing speeches to huge crowds in Europe. They’ve already had two: Mussolini and Hitler.
I am German and I have been lurking here for quite some while because I for one follow US politics very closely because I lived in US for quite some time and am still frequently traveling there on business or to visit friends and familiy I have there.
As for the Germans and BO, most of the Germans do not even know who that guy is. If you would simply ask random people on the street “Who is Barack Obama?” you will most of the times either get a shrug and sometimes even “Isn’t he an Iraqi politician?” Frankly, most Germans do not care about that guy at all. Have you ever heard of Kurt Beck? Anyone?
“Educated” people on the left like the idea of an AA president and that combined with the fact that they do not know anything about McCain except that they believe that he is Bush III makes them favor BO Conservatives in Germany are very likely favoring McCain.
Germans in general do care zilch about US domestic politics (and be honest folks you do not care about the German health care or social security system either) with the exception of economical policies which might affect us but are if at all only interested in the effect the respective new US president has on US foreign policy. And when it comes to the day-to-day foreign policy Germans have made the experience that with respect to that it often makes very little difference from a German perspective who the US president is (perhaps with the exception of the Iraq war, though unfortunately we will never know what would have happened if a Democrat had been president). And no matter whether BO or McCain is going to “ask” us again to either send troops to Iraq or more troops to Afghanistan the German people will be overwhelmingly against that idea.
BTW Bill and Hillary Clinton are still very popular in Germany. I have had the honor meeting her a couple of years ago and I blieve that she would make a formidable president. She is smart and she’s got pluck. And it would be interesting to see how she and our Chancellor get along.
Before I come to the end of my little rant I can report that more and more critical press coverage is coming out about Obama, though it should be noted that there has not been that much coverage of BO specifically at all in the past. Just yesterday the Financial Times Deutschland (FTD) featured an interesting editorial saying that the whole Obama concept, the whole Obama movementand the attention it is receiving from some parts of the German public has nothing to do with democracy and they also pointed out that it is disturbing that all that attention is directed at a person who wants to become president who has never in his life taken responsibility for anything and whose only accomplishment is that he won the party election (yes, yes, I know, not yet). For those who want to read it: http://www.ftd.de/meinung/kommentare/:Leitartikel%20Warten%20Heilsbringer%20Obama/387208.html
What is really interesting that so many people here on this blog seem to be annoyed with the “European view/opinion” regarding BO. Aside from the fact that the European “enthusiasm” with respect to BO is absolutely exaggerated, you are the ones who will decide whether he becomes president or not, whether thousands of German idiots are going to watch BO making a speach (not to mention the concert) in front of the Siegessäule or not. It will not be our fault should he end up moving into the WH. You do not like that idea, yeah well you are not alone. Try harder and do something against it! And please stop whining about the Germans, the French, the Italians or Europeans in general only because you are frustrated with the election process in your party/country.
I wish you success in getting rid of BO. Cheers, C.
This is a different Carol. I am not the lurker or the German.
I do agree with her that we need to rid ourselves of BO!
PUMA$ Who Donate Rule!
German Carol, You last paragrapgh somehow didn’t make sense because we all wholeheartedly agree that the Obama Campaign and the US media is building hjis European trip like the second coming of Christ.
I wholeheartledy agree that it is disrespectful and tastless to watlz into another country, pick a national symbol, create a outdoor rally just to have the photo op in front of said national symbol. No foreign presumed candidate has done that here in the US, that we’ve heard of. It’s uncalled for, it presumptuous, rude and arrogant.
I know we can try harder, Carol, but many of us don’t want to go to jail or be harassed like the more outspoken PUMA lead members are. People are being physically and electronically stalked, death threats have been sent to them, phone numbers/home addresses are published so that Obama supporters can “attackj” the person, that is just sick mob mentality. I’m terrified of that!
But I must say for the small time we’ve formed PUMA/Just Say No Deal, we’ve done pretty fantastic since we have no multimillionares funding us like Move-On.
I didn’t read any one whining about any of the people you mentioned here.
I can say this: I hope the European press kicks Barack’s pompous behind and shows what the US media won’t because they sold out the tents of journalism for $$$$$.
Oops-I made a mistake. Today I went to a pool with an old friend of mine, and talking about this and that, I mentioned the US election. She’s from Milan, a single mother-her girls are now 30, and live next door to her, and grandmother. Dyed in the wool feminist.
And yes, she had heard of Barack Obama. Ohhhh, I went. Yes she said , a clean, elegant, young man who was anti-war. She liked him but had always wondered why he hadn’t been assassinated yet.
I was curious-where had she been getting her news from? It turned out she hadn’t been well over the last 4 months, and had bought a subscription to cable-tv (sky), and had been watching CNN!!! (Along with lots of films).
I must add she is literally the only person I know who knew anything about Obama. Tho she did say she has some friends who are awareof him, and will let them know what I told her about him….
The Europeans can keep Obama as far as I am concerned. He can ruin, oops, I mean run their continent for a while. I am sure he can probably boot some head of state out and take over that position and can surely come up with a birth certificate from whatever country he takes over. Gosh, why don’t he just stay over there and keep Michelle there too.
IS OBAMA RUNNING FOR PRESIDENT OF GERMANY? DID HE LEARN TO SPEAK GERMAN BEFORE HE WENT THERE? I WOULD THINK THE GERMANS HAVE HEARD HIS SONG BEFORE….BY ADOLPH HITLER.BY THE WAY HE IS RAISING MONEY OVERSEAS AND ISNT THAT ILLEGAL? I HOPE SOMEONE IS CHECKING INTO THIS.
b mathews.. Idon’t know if he’s raising money abroad, but he sure is spending it. even if I were an obama supporter I would be questioning the way my campaign donations were being spent.