Thread: He's leaving AGAIN!!

Analysis: Europe is next test for weakened Obama



By Matt Spetalnick

WASHINGTON | Mon Nov 15, 2010 2:07pm EST

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - If President Barack Obama is not yet convinced that his international star power has faded, his next round of transatlantic summitry should clear up any lingering doubts.

Coming off a marathon Asia trip where Obama often found himself rebuffed by fellow world leaders, he will head to Europe this week where the agenda will be clouded by a growing divide over economic strategy and a sense of neglect among traditional U.S. allies.

His challenge is to reassure European partners that, despite political weakness at home and embarrassing setbacks abroad, he remains committed to better cooperation on issues ranging from the war in Afghanistan to the fight against trade protectionism.

But it will not be easy for Obama, whose Democratic Party suffered heavy losses in this month's congressional elections, to dispel the impression that his stature has been diminished on the world stage. He will attend back-to-back NATO and European Union summits in Lisbon on Friday and Saturday.

"The tricky thing for Obama is to show the Europeans not only that he's still important to them but that they're still important to the U.S.," said Sally McNamara, a European affairs expert at the conservative Heritage Foundation in Washington...............

Obama may also have to deal with fallout from last week's Group of 20 summit in Seoul, where he faced a backlash over U.S. monetary easing policy, resistance to his push for hard targets on global balanced growth and reluctance to join in pressuring China over its currency.

Reflecting a growing estrangement over economic policy, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and British Prime Minister David Cameron have strongly opposed Obama's call for stimulating economic expansion with more government spending. They prefer to stress fiscal discipline.

German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble took the rhetoric to a new level earlier this month when he said the Federal Reserve's decision to pump $600 billion into the U.S. economy was "clueless." Germany, China and other big exporters see it as a backdoor way to cheapen the dollar and give U.S. goods a trade advantage."

Analysis: Europe is next test for weakened Obama | Reuters

After the total lashing he got last week why doesn't he send someone with some competence, at least Hillary has demonstrated that much. He's become an embarrassment.

Maybe he'll only have a 28 warship escort this time.

Originally Posted by The Voice of Reason

Maybe he'll only have a 28 warship escort this time.

Doesn't seem to matter how many or how few, he is still incompetent and is doing us more harm on his forays than good.

And he's clueless as the German diplomat observed.

He knows he only has 2 years before the American people say adios. Better enjoy acting like royalty while he can.

So the Europeans just total rebuked him but made a fool of him and he goes right back over so they can do it again?

Originally Posted by bla bla

That's cute but when Bush was in office what really happened was the Lefties
constantly squawked about how much time he spent at Crawford.

Can you imagine what we'd be hearing from the right if Obama kept going back and hanging out in Chicago? That'd be funny.