Obama is not in for an Easy Ride.

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Congress officially declares Obama next president

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Opinion can be, and is, fickle. That’s one of the reasons why things change so quickly in politics. And that’s what Barack Obama is going to learn very quickly, if he hasn’t done so already.

Do you remember those heady and long-time-gone days when Obama was the man who would save us from Bush? When it was all going to change? When, all over the world, he was hailed as the new Kennedy? Acclaimed as the man who would fix the world up again?

Yeah, well forget it. Recent and subtle changes in world opinion do not bode well for his Presidency.

Here in France, after a few weeks of giddy excitement and optimism (the French were even wondering aloud in the press how they could have their very own Obama too! Dream on...) the party’s over. The political left here has begun asking more and more pointed questions about his ability to resuscitate the brain-dead peace process in the Mideast, and this is because he is already considered as being no more than a pale carbon-copy of Bush. His declarations, and his silences, have been taken to mean that once in the White House he will finally turn out to be a flip-flopper.

The French right is skeptical too, not least of all because Gaullist elements (yes, they do still exist) are becoming wary of Nicolas Sarkozy’s rapprochment with the United States. I recently saw an interview with a right-wing political figure who fustigated Obama for not coming down more clearly on Gaza “Even if it means throwing the traditional American one-President-at-a-time custom out the window”. There are also concerns about what his economic policies might be.

In fact, the French are slowly beginning to realise that Obama is going to be the President of America, that he will act in America’s own interests first, and that he is not going to be some kind of philanthropic and generous do-gooder. Aw shucks!

It’s the same in the UK, as well as elsewhere in Europe. The initial euphoria has given way to mild skepticism and hard scrutiny of the slightest foreign policy opinion he may utter.

The Mideast is also going the same way. He who was considered as being a possible honest broker is now looked upon as being at the beck and call of American corporate and Hawkish interests, citing what is seen to be his lack of clarity on Israel. Israel, by the reverse side of the same token, is scurrying to get its Gaza offensive over with before he comes along and changes American foreign policy in the Palestinians’ favour. As for Iran and Al Quaida, he is already their latest version of the reincarnation of Satan.
I have been asking my Mideast correspondants how they see his upcoming Presidency, and most of the Palestine supporters see him as being not committed enough to Palestinian claims.

As for the Chinese, they see no reason whatsoever to hope that he is going to be their big buddy. India and Pakistan are keeping a keen eye on his stated objectives concerning a shift in the war on terror from Iraq to Afghanistan. What I have read from South America seems to indicate that various countries consider that he will be either a lackey or too inexperienced to be effective in the region.

All of this means that there is already a substantial amount of lurking suspicion about his motives and upcoming policies. He will be ambushed from day one. What was initial joy at his ousting of Bush and the Republicans is now being replaced by a deeper, a more visceral, a more dangerous, sentiment. That sentiment is bigger than all the hype surrounding Obama. That sentiment existed long before he was even in politics.

It’s called knee-jerk Anti-Americanism.