TITLE SAYS: 'A CHECK OF $1.1 TRILLION FOR THE GLOBAL ECONOMY'

OBAMA SAYS: 'SHALL I SIGN HERE?' ….

MERKEL SAYS: … 'ON THE BACKS OF OUR CHILDREN'

NRC Handelsblad, The Netherlands

Seven Days of Obama: 'Saviors Do Not Exist'

"The reception was reminiscent of the enthusiasm with which Gorbachev was greeted in the Soviet satellite states in the late 1980s. Just as Gorbachev was the personification of an imminent liberation, Obama is now the embodiment of a new expectant multilateralism. … But, like Gorbachev, Obama has little time, as the economic leadership of the United States is in decline. … The American President offers perspective, yes, but not supernatural hope. Saviors do not exist."

EDITORIAL

Translated By Meta Mertens

April 7, 2009

The Netherlands - NRC Handelsblad - Original Article (Dutch)

On his seven-day tour, Obama has been either cheered or kissed. Even cliché-minded demonstrators didn’t assail the President personally, but took aim at abstractions like “globalization” and “imperialism.” The reception was reminiscent of the enthusiasm with which Gorbachev was greeted in the Soviet satellite states during the late 1980s.

Just as Gorbachev was the personification of an imminent liberation, Obama is now the embodiment of a new expectant multilateralism. This isn't just metaphor. In London, Obama mediated between China and France, who disagreed on the approach to tax havens. In Strasburg, he reconciled the Turks with [former Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh] Rasmussen to be the new secretary general of NATO. [Rasmussen defended the cartoonist who drew a series of cartoons lampooning the Prophet Muhammad]

But, like Gorbachev, Obama has little time, as the economic leadership of the United States is in decline. His plea for Turkey to be admitted to the E.U. was immediately dismissed by Sarkozy, who is and will remain against Turkish admission.

This was a small indication that behind the mask of enthusiasm, these relationships are less cooperative than it appears. Everywhere, Obama is being challenged. Shortly before he was to speak in Prague on disarmament, North Korea launched a missile. That failed. But a condemnation in the U.N. Security Council failed as well, due to opposition from China and Russia.    

Posted by WORLDMEETS.US

Obama himself seems well aware that control over the proliferation of nuclear weapons has been lost. But, as Obama said in the Czech Republic, the home to the anti-missile shield that the new President will build if Iran continues with its nuclear armament, “fatalism is a deadly adversary." He therefore announced that he would pressure the Senate in Washington to ratify the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, something the Senate refused to do in 1999. So today, America falls in the same category as countries like China, India, Pakistan North Korea, Iran and Israel.

This step demonstrates goodwill and is a positive signal. But the reality of the emerging world order is a complex one. Yesterday, Obama announced that this year he would host a kind of a multilateral nuclear summit in the U.S. And last week he and Russian President Medvedev agreed that the two countries would end the freeze in arms control talks, which since 2001 has caused the suspension of old treaties by both sides. However, the fate of a new round of nuclear disarmament is no longer in the hands of these two old nuclear powers. There's not only a power vacuum economically, but politically, and a new beginning that involves more balanced relationships has yet to be made.

Obama’s seven-day journey is not the genesis of a new world order. The tour marks a new direction that will sort itself out only in fits and starts.

The American President offers perspective, yes, but not supernatural hope. Saviors do not exist.

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[Posted by WORLDMEETS.US April 9, 1:29am]