American Exceptionalism!

Is the honeymoon over?


by Steven E. Masone


In Europe the election of Barack Obama has caused many detractors of the U.S. to rethink their anti-Americanism and skewed viewpoint of America. Most of the world are now taken aback by the exceptional and historical election of an African-American to the most powerful leadership position in the world. Many now see that Americans are not the "great Satan some of the Islamics fascists using the race card accuse us with.
"We can no longer say this is just hypocrisy," says Catherine Durandin at the Institute for International and Strategic Relations in Paris. "When Obama walked through the Rose Garden with President Bush, this was no smokescreen. It happened. In no other country in the world is such an election possible."
"The Americans were chosing not just a president, but an identity," says french writer Dominmique Moisi. "and that forces us to choose as well. Now we have to define ourselves without resort to anti-Americanism. That's something new."
Political philosopher Pierre Hassner at Sciences Po in Paris says, "The U.S. is exceptional no matter what it does. for now, the U.S. is more powerful, rich, and well-meaning than others, so can it be an ordinary power? If America were a great power like any other, people in Europe would be very sorry. They want it to be exceptional. I am a Jew who lived under Nazis and communists in Romania. So I say, "Thank God for America.'
While Americans saw "change' over "race', writer Francois Dupaire notes; In the teeming black suburbs of Africans and Arabs, Obama is "lived through as a compensatory myth," he finds. "deprived of any networks, not the sons and daughters of elites, they see the ascent of that son of an African immigrant...as the symbol of social mobility they do not experience."
Our friends in Europe have learned not to misunderstand that the "American Experiment" is not our form of government, rather the form of the pioneer spirit that is infused in the American Psyche, and a courage to meet every challenge with the moral fabric our forefathers instilled in us. Our enemies however continue to underestimate us to their own demise.
Now we see the honeymoon may be over as North Korea, Iran and other anti-American regimes are back to their ways of provocation and belligerent behavior attempting to cause the U.S. as much grief as possible. Hatred is so ingrained in these enemies of freedom it may never change, only the players. With the educated and civilized world we are now viewed differently except by those who hold to their jealousies and prejudices.


reprint 11-08-08 Linden Herald