Dear Europeans: Obama Is Just Not That Into You

IBD Editorials ^ | October 16, 2009 | VICTOR DAVIS HANSON

[Kaslin]

Norway stunned the world by awarding the coveted Nobel Peace Prize to President Obama, who was nominated for the honor after being in office less than two weeks. But the award is in keeping with Europeans' behavior over these first nine months of Obama's presidency. They've gone gaga over the guy.

In return, however, their crush is not quite being reciprocated.

Obama did his best to avoid British Prime Minister Gordon Brown at the recent G-20 summit. The tabloids in Britain still whine about the tawdry gifts the cool Obama gave Brown when he came to Washington earlier this year.

French President Nicholas Sarkozy — ogled by the global press as a rock star before Obama replaced him — seems schizophrenic in his attitude toward the president — fawning over him one minute, exasperated with him the next. The press there calls the syndrome Sarkozy's "Obama complex."

At the U.N., he was so frustrated by Obama's soaring but empty rhetoric that he finally blurted out about Iran and North Korea: "President Obama dreams of a world without weapons . . . but right in front of us two countries are doing the exact opposite."

Sometimes this European exasperation goes deeper than just unrequited love. Obama promised the Russians he would not deploy a planned anti-missile system in the Czech Republic and Poland. Whether intended or not, that decision was seen as a snub. And it scared many in Eastern European — given their long, unhappy history with Russia.

[Kaslin]

[Iron Munro]

Obama will like them much better when they officially become EURABIA.

[stevem]

Maybe I misread things a while back, but didn’t the majority of Europeans want him to win?

[Kaslin]

Yes they did, but many are seeing him now as the empty suit we have known from the beginning that he is