The U.S. Election: Whoever wins needs luck
Back here in Europe, we read and listen to reports on the U.S. election and little do we understand.
We see one candidate, Mr. Obama, the sitting president doing very little. Sure, he gives speeches, sure he makes decisions, but its all rather low key and doesn’t much concern us. So, where is the vision? Which America will we have to live with the next presidential term?
Make no mistake about it. The U.S. is the most important country on Earth. The most powerful, by far – more powerful than Putin-land and China together and more trendsetting than Europe, Africa and Asia put together.
But, but, what is Mitt Romney going to do with the country – and the world?
Wish I could say, but I can’t. Looked upon from afar (and Sweden really is VERY far away, in both geography and mindset) you see in Romney a very handsome guy with a wonderful wife, but we are not going to be governed by appearances, are we? In Romney, we see a guy who has made up his mind not to show us what is really on his mind. In other words, he says one thing now and another in the afternoon. All presidential candidates I have followed (starting with Ike) have taken positions that have now and then contradicted each other. More or less, of course. Romney is only different in so far that he rather openly shows that he wants to please his audiences no matter what – and darned be the consequences.
So, looked upon from afar, it is not a very satisfying choice that we are offered. If the election was in Sweden, Obama would win, hands down. This is because Sweden suffers from a curious kind of racism in reverse. A black guy (or girl) is seen to have suffered from discrimination and the good Swedes want to help him/her to overcome this. In an election most Swedes almost automatically go with the colored guy. He and his people have suffered at the hands of the beastly whites, right? He deserves to get elected as a kind of compensation. At the same time the whites should be punished for sins committed by their grandfathers. In other words the Swedes very often are both prejudiced and a bit misinformed. I might add that I was U.S. correspondent for the largest Swedish paper for 17 years, so I should know…
Now, Swedes don’t have a vote in the U.S. election. Also, I think it should be noted that it matters a lot who becomes the most powerful man on Earth. A lot! But it should also be noted that not even the U.S. president is able to change basic facts and circumstances all that much. We have had – to take but one thing – several years of lousy economic development. Unemployment is high all over and pessimism rules almost everywhere. This will undoubtedly change. Times will improve and so will tempers. The next president, weather his name is Obama or Romney will profit. He who sits in the White House gets the blame when times are bad and the credit when times are good – and this whatever he did or didn’t do. Which leads us to a basic rule:
One of the most important things for any president is to have good luck.
I’m not saying, of course, that luck is the only thing. But it is important. With this, I wish the next president, whoever he is the best of luck…
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World Reporter
Ulf Nilson, World reporter since his first assignments to Hungary in 1956. Correspondent and Sweden’s man in America for 20 years, Ulf Nilson is still a regular columnist in Sweden’s daily Expressen, and regular contributor in Nordstjernan. He has authored or co-authored over fifty books. He lives in southern France or at his beloved Värmdö, just 30 minutes north of Stockholm. He
• covered the US, including Vietnam during the war years
• marched in the civil rights marches
• interviewed Martin Luther King
• met presidents Johnson, Nixon, Reagan and George H. W. Bush
• and, as one of Sweden’s most well-known journalists, also met with every politician, industry leader or cultural personality—all the movers and shakers of Sweden through five decades of a proliferate professional life.
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