John, Barack and the Beach Boys

Obama is popular abroad. That comes as no surprise.

The Pew research center says that Obama's positive image abroad is cheering up mood about America, which Obama's campaign site has not missed, as it shows an ABC brief about it.

Last Tuesday the US Air Force may have accidentally killed a dozen Pakistani soldiers during a raid on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border against the Taliban, stirring anger among the Pakistani opinion against America and its war on terror. This kind of operation howevere is precisely the kind of intervention Obama has called for, rightly pointing out that Pakistan is a more serious theater than Iran and that action should be taken even without the concent of Islamabad. Afghanistan-Pakistan poses a much greater threat to world peace indeed, I believe, than Tehran.

Would Obama the unilateralist president still be as popular among Muslim Arabs? I think so, for public opinion in the Arab world is well aware that fundamentalism will bring no solution to their economic and social disarray, especially if at the same time they hear the US President paying more than lip service when addressing Palestine. I believe Obama's popularity is a major asset for America in that part of the world and that his election can bring about significant change in US-Arab relations.

As for unilateralism, which Europeans criticize so much, well it will still be with us, even with Obama. The difference is that put to good use, it may not hurt efforts to restore American leadership and make Washington's use of force acceptable.

All in all, the end matters more that the means. In 2001, US Allies supported the Bush administration's intervention in Afghanistan. For the first ever, NATO had actually declared article 5, by which the Alliance is autorized to defend a member under attack.

So perhaps John McCain was wrong on just one thing when he imitated the Beach Boys, singing "bomb bomb bomb Iran", it's the end of the song. Replace Iran with Taliban and the Arizona Senator would have got it right!

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