“Beaten” and gloomy after the Republican drubbing Tuesday, Obama packs his bags and begins his “grand tour of Asia” (India, Indonesia, China, South Korea and Japan), which has been repeatedly delayed. The president took stock of things after the intimate psychoanalysis session Wednesday before the press and has decided to break out of the “shell” of the White House.
The polls say that his popularity abroad is considerably higher than it is in the U.S., although his first contact with the outside world for many months will serve to show the inevitable; the world is losing “faith” in his “transformative” power.
With the war in Afghanistan on fire, with Guantanamo prison still open and with the Middle East peace process stalled, the Muslim world's perception of Obama has fallen to a worrying low, especially in Pakistan, with the unique exception being Indonesia (his adopted land, where he will try to find inspiration these days).
Obama, who walked around the world like no other president during his first year, has made an act of contrition and decided to cloister himself in 2010. That's where it hurts ...
“There is an inherent danger in being in the White House and being in the bubble,” he admitted Wednesday in his confessions from the podium. His recent trips to the Gulf of Mexico and his desperate attempt to capture the "spirit" of the electoral campaign in the past two months did not serve to regain lost ground.
“Getting out of here is good for me, too,” he concluded. “I always come away from those interactions feeling so much more optimistic about this country.”
After two years, many Americans — including independents and moderates who voted for him — consider Obama to be an “elitist” and “distant” leader, uninvolved in the problems of ordinary people. The president reminded us Wednesday how he intends to resume a direct line to the average American by reading letters before going to bed. “Those letters that I read every night, some of them just break my heart. Some of them provide me encouragement and inspiration. But nobody is filming me reading those letters.”
Obama obviously has a “perception” problem, which was latent during the battle for health care reform and has been picked up on over the months. “What has happened to the great orator?” some ask. “What has happened to his skills as a communicator?”
“I think it’s important to point out as well that a couple of great communicators, Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton, were standing at this podium two years into their presidency getting very similar questions because the economy wasn’t working the way it needed to be [...]" Obama was comforted, thinking perhaps of a similar redemption by 2012.
But the scourge of the tea party has not only stirred the waters of the Republicans, who are already betting for the presidency. The progressive base, disenchanted with Obama for the “change” that has failed to materialize, is threatening to spur the president from the left to avoid a shift similar to that of Bill Clinton's in 1994.
Even now, 47 percent of Democrats think that Obama is not untouchable and that there should be other candidates in some hypothetical primaries. Hillary Clinton, meanwhile, is still playing the rebel, as if Tuesday's results were not in her favor.
Obama sale del "cascarón"
“Apaleado” y sombrío tras la zurra republicana del martes, Obama hace las maletas y emprende su “gran viaje asiático” (India, Indonesia, China, Corea del Sur, Jap'on) tantas veces demorado. El presidente se aplica el cuento, tras la intimista sesión de psicoanálisis del miércoles ante la prensa, y decide romper el “cascarón” de la Casa Blanca.
Los sondeos dicen que su popularidad en el extranjero es bastante superior a la que tiene en casa, aunque su primera toma de contacto con el exterior en muchos meses va a servir para demostrarle lo inevitable: el mundo está perdiendo la “fe” en su poder “transformador”.
Con la guerra de Afganistán al rojo vivo, con la prisión de Guantánamo aún abierta y con el proceso de paz en Oriente Medio empantanado, la percepción de Obama en el mundo musulmán ha caído preocupantemente, de un modo muy especial en Pakistán y con la única excepción de Indonesia (su tierra adoptiva, donde intentará encontrar inspiración estos días).
Obama, que se pateó el mundo como ningún otro presidente en su primer año de mandato, hizo acto de contrición y decidió enclaustrarse en el 2010. Ahí le duele…
“Hay un riesgo inherente a vivir en la Casa Blanca y estar en la burbuja”, admitió el miércoles, en sus confesiones desde el diván. Sus escapadas tardías al Golfo de México y su intento desesperado por capturar el “duende” de la campaña electoral en los dos últimos meses no le sirvieron para recuperar el terreno perdido.
“Salir fuera me sienta bien”, concluyó. “Porque cuando viajo y mantengo interacciones con la gente, siempre acabo sintiéndome más optimista sobre este país”.
Al cabo de dos años, muchos americanos –incluido los independientes y moderados que le votaron- cosideran a Obama como un líder “elitista” y “distante”, poco involucrado en los problemas de la gente corriente. El presidente recordó el miércoles cómo intenta retomar el hilo directo con el americano medio leyendo aleatoriamante el correo antes de irse a la cama: “Las cartas que leo todas las noches me parten el corazón. Muchas de ellas me dan aliento y me sirven de inspiración. Pero nadie me está filmando cuando leo esas cartas”.
Obama tiene, claramente, un problema de “percepción” que se fue larvando durante la batalla de la reforma sanitaria y que se ha ido acusando con los meses. “¿Qué ha sido del gran orador?”, se preguntan unos. “¿Qué ha ocurrido con sus dotes de comunicador?”.
“Pienso que es importante destacar cómo una pareja de grandes comunicadores, como Ronald Reagan y Bill Clinton, estuvieron en este mismo podio a los dos años de su mandato y respondiendo a preguntas parecidas, porque la economía no funcionaba”, se consoló Obama, pensando acaso en una redención similar de aquí al 2012.
Pero el látigo del Tea Party no sólo ha agitado las aguas de los republicanos, que ya hacen quinielas para las presidenciales. Las bases progresistas, desencantadas con Obama por el “cambio” que no ha llegado a cuajar, amenazan con espolear al presidente desde la izquierda para evitar un viraje similar al de Bill Clinton en 1994.
El 47% de los demócratas piensa incluso a estas alturas que Obama no es intocable y que debería haber otros candidatos en unas hipotéticas elecciones primarias. Hillary Clinton, entre tanto, sigue poniéndose el mundo por montera, como si los resultados del martes no fueran con ella.
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Right now, Japan faces challenges unprecedented in recent years. Its alliance with the U.S., which has been the measuring stick for diplomacy, has been shaken.
It is doubtful that the Trump administration faces a greater danger than that of dealing with the Jeffrey Epstein files, because this is a danger that grew from within.