Americans in Ireland go on the stump for Obama

THE first primaries for the US presidential election are upon us, and the world is eager to learn who might become the next leader of the free world.

America’s image overseas has plummeted in recent years. According to research conducted in 2005 by the Pew Council on international political attitudes, the world has shown great dissatisfaction with US leadership. Big majorities related that their views of the US had become less favourable because of the re-election of George W Bush, with 77% in Germany, 75% in Canada, 74% in France and 62% in Britain showing such attitudes. In most countries surveyed, support for the US is almost half of what it was in 1999/2000.

When citizens of various countries were asked to indicate favourable or unfavourable attitudes towards five specific nations — the US, Germany, France, Japan and China — the British, French, Germans, Spanish, Dutch and Russians all gave their lowest marks to the US.

For those of us who love America and believe in its potential for change, such information is saddening. ‘US Expatriates for Obama in Ireland’ is one of the many groups that has been established both in the US and globally in support of the presidential candidacy of Senator Barack Obama of Illinois.

Supporters feel that Obama is perhaps the only candidate in the election who can reorder America’s priorities at home and rebuild its image abroad.

Obama first came to public attention at the Democratic convention in 2004 and later in 2006 when he was receiving significant media publicity for his book, The Audacity of Hope.

He immediately struck the public as someone who was both intelligent and articulate, humble yet erudite, and capable of seeing all angles to complicated national and international problems.

As he has demonstrated subsequently in meetings in the early primary states of Iowa and North Carolina, he has a gift of oratory which is highly reminiscent of Dr Martin Luther King who managed to change America for good and who caused a whole wave of movements across the world in support of basic human rights from Northern Ireland to New Zealand.

As Obama said in a speech in North Carolina last month: “Renewing that spirit starts with service. Make no mistake: our destiny as Americans is tied up with one another. If we are less respected in the world, then you will be less safe. If we keep paying dictators to fill up our gas tanks, then those oceans are going to rise. If we can’t give our kids a world-class education, then our economy is going to fall behind … And that’s how it should be. It is time to recapture that sense of a common purpose: I am my brother’s keeper, I am my sister’s keeper. ”

The world is sorely in need of such new political leadership for the new millennium, and the role of the American presidency is key in all of this. Someone of Barack Obama’s stature could create a wonderful wave of hope and optimism in a world racked by wars and suffering injustices of poverty and hunger. An initial meeting of US Expatriates for Obama in Ireland is taking place in Hayes’s pub in Monegall, the town of Obama’s Irish ancestry, tomorrow at 3pm. We ask all US expatriates who are considering supporting Obama to come and join us.

Cormac O’Duffy

Lacken

New Ross

Co Wexford

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