The State Talk Express
For the first time, Barack Obama is traveling abroad as a Presidential candidate and, for the first time, the foreign travel of a major Presidential candidate is seen as having a significant bearing on how the world regards the United States.
So here we have, finally, a topic that belongs equally under our headings “Election 2008” and “Public Diplomacy and the 2008 Elections.”
More to the point, this trip may have equal and considerable influence on the election outcome and the course of foreign opinion regarding the United States.
Obama’s visit to Afghanistan today got him beyond Kabul to a sensitive eastern region and seems to have included substantive talks with local political leaders. Obama carefully notes that he is traveling as “a Senator….not the President,” avoiding potential criticism for usurping the President’s role. He praises the performance of U.S. military and will seek the views of military commanders on the ground, laying down another necessary political marker.
Then he goes on to Iraq, Jordan, Israel, Germany, France and the U.K. Exact timing and sequence is of course under wraps, but with this itinerary and the meetings and events attached to it, Obama can demonstrate a seriousness of purpose on issues where the American public until now has regarded John McCain as more competent – and where foreign publics regard the current American administration as inadequate.
Some U.S. commentators have speculated that Obama may rile the American public by seeming to be campaigning before non-voting foreign audiences. But would it be so bad for a candidate to leave a foreign country with its population feeling better toward the United States than before he arrived? So long as Obama does not appear to – God forbid – “pander” to foreign audiences or governments, he should do himself and the U.S. image overseas some good.
Substantively, Obama’s travels take place at a time when foreign policy issues in the election seem to be moving in his direction. In Iraq, the Maliki government has pretty much forced the Bush Administration to accept the idea of a kind of timetable for the reduction of the U.S. military presence. With Iran, the Administration allowed State Department Undersecretary for Political Affairs Bill Burns to attend a meeting in Geneva with a senior Iranian official.
Obama may not get to speak in front of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, as Reagan did, but I can say, having lived in Berlin during a fair portion of the current Administration, that Germans will express great interest and approval for Obama at whatever venue is ultimately selected. For Obama, it’s time for, if not “straight talk,” then “state talk.”