U.S. Race Captures World’s Eye, and Holds It: "A great democracy functioning" at basic level

[DeepModem Mom]

NYT: U.S. Race Captures World’s Eye, and Holds It
By ALAN COWELL
Published: January 26, 2008

DAVOS, Switzerland — To look at the reams of coverage in newspapers outside the United States or to follow the hours of television news broadcasts, you might conclude that foreigners had a vote in selecting an American presidential candidate — or, at least, deserved one, so great is America’s influence on their lives. From Berlin to London to Jakarta, the destinies of Democratic and Republican contenders in Iowa or New Hampshire, or Nevada or South Carolina, have become news in a way that most political commentators cannot recall. It is as if outsiders are pining for change in America as much as some American presidential candidates are promising it.

The personalities of the Democratic contest in particular — the potential harbinger of America’s first African-American or female president — have fascinated outsiders as much as, if not more than, the candidates’ policies on Iraq, immigration or global finances.

And there is a palpable sense that, while democratic systems seem clunky and uninspiring to voters in many parts of the Western world, America offers a potential model for reinvigoration. “It is in many ways an uplifting sight to see a great democracy functioning at that most basic of levels,” said Lord McNally, the leader of the small opposition Liberal Democrats in Britain’s House of Lords. “Even with all the money, the publicity, the power of television, the person who wants to be the most powerful man or woman in the world still has to get down and talk in small town halls and stop people on the street and stand on soapboxes.”

It was, perhaps, the first upset result in Iowa, with the triumph there of Barack Obama, that electrified interest, closely followed by Hillary Rodham Clinton’s victory in New Hampshire. In Berlin, newspaper columnists started calling Mr. Obama the “new John F. Kennedy” — no small accolade in a city that reserves a special place for an American leader who, at the height of the cold war, told a divided populace that he, too, was a Berliner. “The black American has become a new Kennedy,” proclaimed the tabloid Bild....

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Much of the fervid absorption in the primaries and caucuses — accessible as never before on 24-hour satellite and cable television channels like CNN and Fox News — seems inspired by a hope that the American electoral process will end an era of foreign policy dominance by neoconservatives....

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/26/world/26abroad.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&ref=todayspaper&pagewanted=all

[DJ13]

1. Im not getting my hopes up

[DeepModem Mom]

2. OMG, that is a reality check! Maybe some folks have learned a lesson. nt

[knowledgeispwr]

3. I've noticed it as well, reading foreign spanish-language press

The world (at least the Spanish-speaking world) is definitely interested. I do like the fact our system allows at least some of the voters to choose the nominees for president.

Often times in other systems, only party insiders or the leaving incumbent president/prime minister chooses his successor to run.

Clearly, our way isn't perfect, and has plenty to criticize, but it isn't terrible.

[DeepModem Mom]

4. Someone reported to me that the NH primary was being reported on big-screen TVs in public places...

in Italy.