Planet Obama: View From Abroad, by Mike Gold – Brainiac On Banjo #103

January 26, 2009 Mike Gold 5 Comments

People tend to feel a bit more patriotic when outside of their country. This isn’t necessarily a defensive response, and it isn’t necessarily a “look at these people; man, have we got it good” response. It’s more of a nesting attitude.

So viewing the inauguration of Barack Obama from the point of view of an American in London is interesting. Lucky for me, I knew one such American – our lovely and clever daughter Adriane, who just happened to be in London on inauguration day with her friend Joanne to attend one of those Rockabilly weekenders. Adriane and Joanne made certain they were in a pub with a television (which is not as common as it is in the States) at 4:30 PM local time on Tuesday, January 20th to watch history happen.

The television enjoyed a degree of attention, but by no means did the pub come to a halt. The two young Americans sat in the corner in line-of-sight and found themselves moved to tears when the Oath was administered and President Obama gave his speech. So were a lot of Americans who were watching the affair Stateside, including her parents, but I digress. The locals at the pub cheered Obama’s elevation.

After the swearing in ceremony – and am I the only vengeful American who felt Obama’s predecessor deserved a swearing out ceremony? – Adriane went to the bar to order a round. A local girl said “oh, you two must be Americans.” Adriane copped the plea with pride, something that might have been just a touch tougher to do an hour before. “How do you know?” she asked.

“Because you were crying at the swearing in,” she said. (I paraphrase.)

“That’s because you can see change coming,” Adriane responded. “In your system, you can get rid of somebody you don’t like. We’re stuck with what we’ve got,” implying getting rid of BushCheney was like taking a massive diuretic.

The pub crowd were enthusiastic about the change in administration, and seemed quite impressed with Obama’s speech. This was reinforced the following day as the London newspapers did the same sort of special edition coverage we saw here in the States, the same sort of teevee hubbub we endured on this side of the Atlantic.

Adriane and Joanne were told the parliamentary system really would not allow such a charismatic prime minister, but, as noted, it wouldn’t tolerate a George W. Bush either. Aside from Winston Churchill, of course.

And that’s what we need right now, a leader with the eloquence and the drive of a Winston Churchill to rally international resources to pull our global ass out of the fire and do a make-good on the past eight years of devastation. Given the President’s actions since Tuesday and the people he has selected to do the heavy lifting, we might have lucked out this time around.

Just in the nick of time, too.

Mike Gold’s Weird Scenes Inside The Gold Mind blatherings can be heard on The Point podcasts, available right here at www.michaeldavisworld.com, on iTunes, and wherever better podcasts are cast.