With a little help from his friends

Thursday, 24th September 2009

Meanwhile, Lynch's Foreign Policy co-blogger David Rothkopf says the man in the White House needs more help from the outside:

While Barack Obama may have looked statesmanlike at the U.N. podium... he is still just an employee of the American people who works in a system of robust checks and balances. (Which is just a nice way of saying he has a Congressional albatross around his neck, a screwed-up political climate and a skittish constituency that is ill-informed on many vital international issues.)
...As a consequence, he will need the international community to help him at home as much as they seek America's help with their issues. In short: without some early international wins, the world may see the promise of this new era in foreign policy fade quickly away. This is a hard lesson for foreign leaders to grasp. I have been in meetings in which they requested the United States "make" the Congress do one thing or another. Some simply can't or won't understand how our system works...
It has even been a hard lesson for Obama himself to grasp. I recently asked a very senior White House official, a long-time unabashed Obama loyalist, what the lesson has been toughest to learn since coming to the White House from the campaign. The individual thought for a moment and said, "Well, he was out of Washington for almost two years while he was campaigning. I think coming to grips with the culture of this town and how hard it is to change it has been the biggest surprise for [Obama]." If it has been that hard for a guy as savvy as Obama to come to grips with, it is easy to imagine how hard it is for the rest of the world.