Barack Obama at Berlin’s Victory Column. He came, he saw, he conquered. By last night at the latest, Barack Obama has signalled his intention to be a global president, with a global freedom of personal action.
At times his audience of 200,000 appeared not to have truly understood what he was saying. It formed a sea of respect, not one which interrupted his words all too often with applause of decided political approval. After all, the political spectrum in Germany which most unconditionally welcomed Obama as a phenomenon, was the same faction which outrightly rejected Obamas only explicit and controversial policy demand, namely that Germany send more soldiers to Afghanistan.
But no matter.
Back at home in America the speech was more latently, but still heavily controversial. Both Obama’s most avid supporters and most vehement critics speculated that such a rapprochement with the old continent would make Obama yet more exotic to Joe Sixpack voters at home than he is already anyway. John McCain, as in the past, questioned Obamas ability to be a truly American president, complaining also that Barack Obama is best when he is talking about Barack Obama.
But that is to misunderstand the phenomenon. It is the world wide appeal of the simple brand Obama,—Obama being Obama—, which is increasingly becoming McCain’s intractable problem. In his promise to become the first global president, Barack Obama is not promising to be the champion of small town America, or postwar Berlin, or war- torn Baghdad for that matter. What this means is anybody’s guess, but it is certainly aimed at achieving the maximum freedom of action and ideology once he has reached the White House.
It is the old style politicians who question Obama’s Americanness. Old style politics within old style political parties required that candidates spend their lives cultivating trust and loyalties in elaborate political machines which could eventually, when their turn came, bring them to the White House.
But thanks to the internet and the support of mainstream media, Obama has been able to turn the party establishment upside down, leaving it more dependent on him than he on it. He did this not by concentrating on the old bastions such as the states New York or California, both of which he lost to Clinton. He did so by winning 200 odd delegates which he needed in small , Republican leaning states like Idaho. He won by expanding the territory of the traditional Democratic Party into realms which were hardly likely to vote for Democrats in November.
This, too, is the logic of the Berlin speech: the extension of Obamas reach to places which don’t vote, but create leverage in some other way.
Obama took real risks last night by speaking in such a fraternal way, in his words as “one citizen to citizens of the world,” indeed in the language of the French Revolution. Did he overplay his hand as the change candidate last night? As he almost did with Hillary Clinton, when he came close to symbolising the very dynamic, globalized change in markets and living conditions from which unskilled American workers were actually seeking protection? It’s not impossible.
But obviously Barack Obama thinks that in the world of new politics, every expansion of his personal base is worth undertaking, every crowd whether in Iowa, Idaho, or Berlin worthy of being addressed. No matter how soft the support on particular issues may be. In his world, a great deal of soft support is better than hard support which limits his options.
The faces in yesterdays audience were placid, less driven by particular issues, but satisfied to be part of a multitude for diffuse change. In their words they are part of a “tsunami” for change. They came, they saw, they went home.
