One for Barack

How on earth did a place like Iowa manage to anoint Barack Obama as their favourite Democrat yesterday? Mike Huckabee for the Republicans I can understand — he's a regular religious fella who plays bass guitar and cracks jokes, doesn't believe in evolution, opposes abortion and gay rights, and strongly supports the Iraq war. That's the kind of guy Iowa understands. But Obama is a liberal, for heaven's sake.

Still, if it gives America the sense that this guy might actually be electable, then Iowa will have done the world a service. The president of the US is pretty much the president of the world, as we have all been reminded by George Bush, so America's choice next November is of more than passing interest to the planet. Personally, I'm sceptical about the amount of change Obama would actually manage if he reached the White House: but at the moment he is the least compromised by the Washington establishment (but how long would it take Washington to break him in?).

Americans have a hefty list of domestic issues to deal with, but the rest of the world desperately needs an American president with some common sense. Someone who can stop this lunatic war in Iraq and fight "terrorism" without creating ten new terrorists for each one taken down. Someone who wouldn't rush to applaud Mwai Kabaki for winning a rigged election in Kenya. Someone who is not afraid of the Israelis and thus can lean on them and produce a settlement in Palestine. Someone with a bit of principle and honesty and integrity, someone who wouldn't let outfits like Blackwater loose in Iraq, someone who could understand climate change, someone not in thrall to Big Oil or Christian fundamentalism or other hidden owners. Someone not obsessed with gays and abortions, someone who sees some sense in gun control. Someone who doesn't see the world in terms of empire. Someone who is not a bully. Someone who will dismantle the crazy 45-year confrontation with Cuba. Someone who doesn't wear cowboy hats.

Nobody on the Republican side is going to meet those specifications. Of the Democrats (since Dennis Kucinich isn't going to get nominated), Hillary is suspect because she supported the Iraq war and won't come out firmly against it even now; and because she's trying to persuade us that eight years in the White House with Bill constitutes the "experience" required to run the world. In fact, none of the candidates has any serious foreign policy experience, unless watching Bill fire off cruise missiles to divert attention from Monica Lewinksy constitutes foreign policy experience. John Edwards too originally supported the Iraq war, though he has had the sense to change his mind. But he still reminds me of a smooth-talking rich investment banker — what is it about Edwards that makes him look and sound so phoney? (And Hillary so hard and phoney?)

Obama? He sounds as if he's so wonderful that he'll be all things to all men and all women. You look at him and wonder, can he really make it? If he does, could he sustain it? He looks kind of fragile. In Washington, would he be a pushover, would he get fat and pompous, would he be allowed to implement any liberal ideas? How long would it take the wolves to tear him to bits?

But if you want change, Obama — so far — seems the one who's up for it. The best of a dubious lot.