Transatlantic Media

The European media have reacted cautiously, even skeptically, to reports that President-elect Barack Obama is considering offering the job of Secretary of State to Hillary Clinton, his bitter rival for the Presidential nomination in the lengthy Democratic primaries. As the reports below suggest, many European commentators believe that it would be a mistake for Obama to offer Clinton the job – and a mistake for her to accept it. Although they generally agree that her nomination would help heal deep political wounds inside the Democratic Party, they point to policy differences between Obama and Clinton and question whether Bill Clinton’s lucrative and not always transparent fund-raising activities would constitute a conflict of interest. Another point frequently made is that by appointing Clinton to such a high-level post, Obama would be flying in the face of his campaign promises to implement change, in his presidential appointments as well as in his policies. That would be particularly so in light of the number of other likely Obama appointees who served in Bill Clinton’s administration in the 1990s.

 Hillary is not the right woman for the job, The Times of London, November 19th 2008

Chief foreign commentator Bronwen Maddox argues that Barack Obama would be making a huge mistake if he appointed Hillary Clinton Secretary of State because the two would be likely to disagree, sometimes quite strongly, but he would be unable to fire her for political reasons. “There is an old principle that you shouldn’t hire someone you can’t fire.” Maddox says that Clinton would do an excellent job in the position, but “she wouldn’t help Mr. Obama as president. She wouldn’t flatter him; she wouldn’t really defer to him; she might challenge him, even though she couldn’t actually upstage him.” Nor would Clinton necessarily be happy in the job. What’s more, “the rapturous reception that Mr Obama has received in much of the world is based on his promise of change. He says that he is the face of a new America; does he really want to be represented by one of the most familiar faces of the past? Or by anyone who will compete with him (and eclipse Joe Biden, the Vice-President and a foreign affairs specialist)? “

 Why Obama is suddenly so close to Clinton, Der Spiegel, November 17th 2008

Gregor Peter Schmitz reports that Democrats are divided over the possible nomination of Hillary as Secretary of State. Some in the U.S. media argue that Clinton should not accept the post because she would simply be rushing from crisis to crisis. Others say the position would be a good springboard for a new presidential candidacy. What is clear is that Clinton would bring a new shine to a State Department that has for years been neglected. Schmitz also notes that the job would finally reconcile the party after its divisions during the primaries. There would be problems with the nomination, however, such as Bill Clinton’s questionable financial activities, policy differences between Hillary Clinton and Obama, and the question of whether Clinton really wants the job. Schmitz concludes by saying that the Obama campaign seems to have learned a lesson from the Carter administration’s failure to understand that, in order to conquer Washington, you need to have insiders such as the Clintons on your side.

 Obama wants Hillary, but is wary of her husband, Liberation, November 19th 2008

Philippe Grangereau reports that Barack Obama seems to want Hillary Clinton as his Secretary of State (or, much more improbably, Secretary of Defense), but that he is still wary of her husband. He cites U.S. media sources as saying that an important obstacle remains the desire of the President-elect’s transition team to be sure that Bill Clinton’s lucrative activities will not present a conflict of interest. The former President’s Clinton Foundation has raised more than $500 million, mainly from foreign donors, but Bill Clinton has always refused to divulge his list of donors. The Foundation has been criticized for lack of transparency and Bill Clinton has been suspected of “having acted without too many scruples.” Grangereau also questions the ‘newness’ of the Obama team, noting that several of its members are former Clinton advisors.

Hillary Clinton candidate for the job of Secretary of State, L’Express, November 14, 2008

L’Express, a leading French weekly magazines, says that that appointment of Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State could help to calm tensions inside the Democratic Party, following the anger that erupted among Clinton supporters after Obama did not offer her the vice presidency. But it adds that if Clinton took the job, she might conduct tougher foreign policies than those Obama promised during the election campaign, for example over the need to keep U.S. forces in Iraq.

With a flood of U.S. election-related reporting all over the world, it’s not often that particular pieces stand out from the mainstream. But, for German-speakers, it’s worth a look at this post ‘Obama Wins?’ from the weblog of Handelsblatt, the leading German business newspaper. While not the most brilliant example of European coverage of the American election, it does try to point out a difference between German and British/American election reporting.

Blog author Georg Watzlawek suggests that in German journalism there are ‘(at least) two taboos’ - endorsing political candidates and predicting election winners before the results are final.  He says that by endorsing Barack Obama, the Financial Times has compromised its journalistic independence. It seems, however, that when it comes to his own German blog, all rules are out the window as Watzlawek does indeed endorse Obama.

Research contributed by Transatlantic Media Network intern Cecily Boggs

In the past week, the New York Times and the Financial Times have run stories suggesting that the United States ought to look toward the Swedish bank bail out plan of the early 1990s.  Both articles suggest that the crisis in Sweden is comparable to the crisis roiling American financial markets, but fail to make their case convincingly.  In the United States the complex network of subprime mortgages and securitized packages of bad loans is much more far-reaching than the fall-out from the Swedish crisis.

While it is interesting to recall the successful steps that Sweden took to deal with its crisis, it’s not clear that the serve as a viable model for the United States.

‘Stopping a Financial Crisis, the Swedish Way’, The New York Times,’ September 23, 2008

‘Swedish model points the way’, The Financial Times, September 22, 2008

 The Sueddeutscher Zeitung published this interesting commentary, ‘Enemies, Vassals and Americans’ on September 12 by Russian playwright Yevgeny Grischkowez. Playing off an assertion made by George Kennan that Russia has only vassals or enemies as neighbors; Grischokwez argues that an American cannot possibly understand the complex relationship between Russia and its neighbors as America is only bordered by two countries.

He juxtaposes the American soldier in Georgia, who speaks only English and stays in luxurious hotels with the supposedly folksier Russians, who speak with the Georgian man on the street (in their own language, Russian) in order to demonstrate that Russians are better able to penetrate and understand the cultures of their neighbors. Because the histories of the countries are so intertwined, their religions the same and knowledge of Russian is widespread in Georgia, Grischokowez argues that the recent war is better characterized as a civil war.

Grischokowez, either by accident or design, fails to point out that the reason the peoples of Russia’s neighboring countries share so many cultural and linguistic similarities to Russia is not that they have cheerfully, and voluntarily embraced the culture of their much bigger neighbor, but rather that their countries were militarily impressed into the Soviet Union and the Tsarist empire before that.  As a playwright, Grischokowez travels throughout the Former Soviet Union, from the Baltics to Central Asia.  Certainly, he must have noticed the museums in Riga and Tallinn of the ‘Soviet Occupation.’   Those countries do not see Russia as a close friend but rather as a colonizing enemy.  In 2006, the Georgian government also opened a museum of the Soviet Occupation in Tblisi.

Museum of the Occupation, Riga, Latvia
Museum of Occupations, Tallinn, Estonia
Museum of the Soviet Occupation, Tblisi, Georgia

Finally, Grischowez expresses deep skepticism about American claims to support democracy in Georgia (and suggests many Americans confuse the country with the U.S. state).  He claims that Americans perceive Saakashvili as a character in a game called Georgia while Russians are involved, heart and soul.  The question remains, to what end are the Russians truly involved ‘heart and soul’ and do they understand the meaning of independent countries? It seems that Grischokowez makes an interesting point about the violence between places that share so many common features, but what he misses is the dangers posed to the international system by these kinds of wars.

By Reginald Dale and Eve Copeland
‘Greening the dream that drives America: The U.S. should put the same creativity that produced the car into tackling the energy crisis it has caused’ September 18, The Times of London

This short essay, part observation from a motel window, part finger-wagging at America, and part book review, maintains that there is bad news and good news about the alleged U.S. contribution to a global energy and environmental crisis. The bad news, writes columnist Ben Macintyre, is that Americans’ love affairs with their cars is heavily responsible for “a global ecological nightmare;” the good news that American expertise, ingenuity and cash can find solutions that make economic and business sense.

The first clue, however, that the author is not very familiar with America comes when he expresses surprise that “a diminutive, middle-aged woman” should be driving a bright-red pick-up truck, with a “Support our troops” bumper sticker, in military-friendly North Carolina. (Although columnist Macintyre describes the truck as a “monster,” it is actually classified as a compact, family-friendly vehicle.) So it is perhaps inevitable that the column conforms to typical European stereotypes of Americans as car-crazy, gas-guzzling polluters, who are also somehow responsible for the disgraceful boom in car sales in China, India, Russia and elsewhere.

Switching abruptly to the “good news,” Macintyre approvingly quotes the message of “Hot, Flat and Crowded,” a new book by Thomas L. Friedman, to the effect that the “raw power of American patriotism” can be harnessed to solve a problem that their cars have largely caused. But Macintyre seems unaware both of the huge amount of research already under way into energy-efficient cars in the United States and of the latest political developments. In claiming that environmental issues “have hardly touched the U.S. election,” he is apparently unaware that the bitter, highly publicized clashes been Democrats and Republicans over offshore oil drilling stem from differing views on protecting the environment.

It would have been more interesting and original (from the European point of view) to examine the mass flight of Americans from gas-guzzling Sports Utility Vehicles since oil prices went through the roof, the prospects for alternative fuel types and other forms of transport, and the reasons why Americans still need cars to traverse big distances in a way that inhabitants of a congested Europe do not.

The Times of London reported in this article as news that Sarah Palin has linked her electoral success to Kenyan pastor whom Palin ‘says helped her to become governor of Alaska founded his ministry with a witchhunt against a Kenyan woman who he accused of causing car accidents through demonic spells.’ While her connection to Muthee is far less significant than that of Barack Obama to Reverand Wright, its interesting to point out that the British papers have not only joined the American one’s in the muckracking expedition into Sarah Palin’s life, but have beaten them to the punch insofar as this story.  For now, it has not appeared in any major American media, exception the Comedy Central satirical ‘initiative’, ‘Indecision: 2008.’

The media in the two top Western financial centers, London and New York, differed in emphasis in their reporting of Sunday’s dramatic turmoil on Wall Street - including the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers - with the British media tending to highlight the human side, while their American counterparts stressed the enormity of the blow to the U.S. and global financial systems.

London

British newspapers paid particular attention to the sorry plight of the employees of Lehman Brothers and other faltering financial organizations, including two pieces in the Guardian.
‘Wall Street jobs cull begins as Lehman rescue bid fails’ The Guardian, September 15, 2008

‘Wall Street crisis: Lehman staff tell their stories: Lehman Brothers employees on both sides of the Atlantic describe their shock, anger and sadness at the collapse of the bank’ The Guardian, September 15, 2008

‘Shock and tears as staff sent home’ Times of London’, September 15, 2008

‘Meltdown Monday: Stock markets tumble and thousands lose jobs’ The Telegraph, September 15, 2008’
‘Shocked Lehman staff told to “move on”’, Financial Times, September 15, 2008

The Telegraph ran a human interest piece on how U.S. Treasury Hank Paulson had risen from farm-boy to the pinnacles of international finance while keeping his heart in the agricultural Mid-West. The piece included the following comment:

‘A comparison was recently drawn in the Telegraph between the ordinary Americans being saved in the Freddie-Fannie bail-out and the po-faced couple standing in front of their clapboard homestead of Grant Wood’s painting American Gothic. Actually, the analogy could be taken further. See Mr. Paulson, particularly when he’s wearing his glasses and looking especially solemn, and one is certainly reminded of Wood’s pitchfork-clutching farmer. The farmer would probably approve of the financier.’

The Times, in assessing the spreading impact of the financial upheaval, managed to find an Australian strategist who imaginatively compared the crisis to Lord Voldemort, the evil character in the Harry Potter novels who keeps returning from the dead.

‘Analysis: ‘Black Monday’ threatens London’, Times of London, September 15, 2008

As might be expected, the Financial Times devoted extensive coverage to the crisis and its global repercussions, including the following:

‘Kill or cure for Wall Street malaise’ Financial Times, September 16

‘Dragon of moral hazard is going to take some impaling’ Financial Times, September 17

New York/Washington

The most interesting feature of U.S. reporting was the Washington Post’s decision to lead its print edition with no fewer than three single-column stories under a large headline that simply announced “Massive Shifts on Wall Street.” This clearly reflected the changed priorities of the Post’s new Executive Editor, Marcus Brauchli, a former senior editor at the Wall Street Journal, who had only been a few days in his job. Under his predecessor, Len Downie, the Post tended to play down economic and financial stories, often relegating important developments to the business pages. The three headlines from that print edition are linked below.

‘Troubled Bank to File for Bankruptcy’, Washington Post, September 15

‘A New Architecture for the Financial World’, Washington Post, September 15

‘Weekend Merger Struck with Bank of America’ Washington, Post September 15
The New York Times did well with an interesting reaction piece from Europe, pointing that while Europeans often display schadenfreude at bad news from America, they found little cause for joy in the latest developments, because the Wall Street crisis so clearly threatened European prosperity as well.

‘In Europe, Concern on the Faces of Investors’ The New York Times, September 15, 2008

The Wall Street Journal echoed the concerns of British newspapers about the fate of Lehman Brothers’ employees, with a strong emphasis on human interest.

’25,000 People Worry About Their Futures’ Wall Street Journal, September 15, 2008

But the WSJ also took a broader look at the serious financial implications of the crisis with a report that began “The American financial system was shaken to its core on Sunday”

‘Lehman Files for Bankruptcy, Merrill Sold, AIG Seeks Cash’ Wall Street Journal, September 16, 2008

The financial crisis ousted reports on the devastating Hurricane Ike from the top headlines in most major American papers, except, understandably, in Texas, where Ike wrought the most havoc.

The Times of London is this week publishing excerpts from a book by its chief foreign commentator, Bronwen Maddox, In Defence of America, due for release September 11.  The first extract, ‘America is not an environmental villain,’ which appeared September 1, argues that although the United States emits the second highest amount of greenhouse gases per person after China, it is in fact a country that holds environmental values close to its heart.

The second excerpt, ‘Why America needs a post-Bush makeover,’ published September 2, offers a laundry list of suggestions aimed at helping the next U.S. administration improve America’s world standing and strengthen its alliances.  Maddox’s recommendations include, ‘give a nod to co-operation,’ ’stop demonizing China,’ ’stay engaged in Iraq and the region,’ ‘consider talking to Iran’ and ‘drop the phrase “War on Terror” and shut Guantanamo.’’

While the first excerpt gives a relatively fair shake to environmental regulations and the environmental movement in the United States, and to the misperceptions of this reality abroad, the second reads more like a standard European wish list for American reform. Many of her proposals are in fact already being advocated by the two leading Presidential candidates, although John McCain might not go as far as Maddox would like in talking to Iran, for example, and Barack Obama is less likely to “stay engaged in Iraq.”

Generally, however, Maddox believes that her suggestions are unlikely to be adopted and, even if they were, would produce demands that Europe would be reluctant to meet:

 ‘Any successor of George W. Bush will want to seem different.  But Europe is going to be disappointed if it expects all the things it has disliked about Bush to fall away at the same time.  That won’t happen – and shouldn’t.  Europe will no doubt get something of what it wants in a president who sounds keener on working with other countries - but that could bring Europe itself a new discomfort.  It would produce demands – for military spending, for trade concessions - which Europe, in turn, might not want to meet.’

The European media devoted heavy coverage to the relatively lenient prison sentence (five and half years) for terrorist offenses given to Salim Ahmed Hamdan, Osama Bin Laden’s former driver, by a military tribunal at Guantanamo Bay August 7. But while the European media has been virtually unanimous in denouncing Guantanamo and everything to do with it, interpretations of the sentence varied widely.

The British leftish daily the Guardian and the German conservative daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung both reported the argument that the verdict could help legitimize the military tribunal. From Washington, the Guardian’s Elena Schor reported that

“… supporters of the tribunal process asserted that Hamdan’s acquittal [on some charges] by the jury of six military officers immunized the Bush administration from criticism that Guantanamo defendants are deprived of basic legal rights.”

Similarly, Frankfurter Allgemeine Washington correspondent Katja Gelinsky cited both John McCain, who said that the verdict “shows that the jurors have carefully weighed the evidence for and against,” and prosecutor Lawrence Morris, who said it confirmed “the fairness and justice of the tribunal.”

The tone in the Guardian and the Frankfurter Allgemeine was similar to that of an August 8 article in The New York Times. While acknowledging that the trial had raised critical questions about the military tribunals, The New York Times reported that “military prosecutors here said the sentence proved that the Bush administration’s system for trying detainees was legitimate and fair.”

A different line was taken by the Times of London’s Washington correspondent Tim Reid, who concluded that Hamdan “will never be released” – because the Pentagon may hold enemy combatants indefinitely. This was not regarded as a foregone conclusion by the Guardian or the Frankfurter Allgemeine. The Guardian reported that

“The judge in his case, U.S. navy captain Keith Allred, told reporters at the prison camp that it is unclear what future Hamdan faces in six months but that he would likely be eligible for an administrative review of his status.”

Reid also characterized the verdict as “the latest blow to the Bush Administration’s efforts to justify its highly controversial military tribunal system at Guantanamo Bay.” Rather than legitimizing the court, as suggested by the Guardian, the Frankfurter Allgemeine, and the New York Times, Reid reported that the verdict would

“bolster the case made by civil rights groups, and much of the international community, that holding Guantanamo Bay detainees indefinitely is unjustifiable, particularly after they have been tried.”

In a commentary August 8, Reid went as far as to claim that “the five and a half year sentence was nothing short of a disaster for the Bush administration,” and that “the White House has made clear for months that whatever happened to Hamdan, he would still be held indefinitely.”

In a delightful series of articles from across the United States, Frankfurter Allgemeine’s Washington correspondent Matthias Rüb has been taking the pulse of the United States three months before the election. Rüb shows that not all reporting from rural America has to be marred by popular stereotypes and old clichés.

Starting from Washington D.C., Rüb spurned the main highway (I-95) and drove south on the smaller Route 29 to get a better sense of rural America. En route to Florida, Rüb filed reports on the rich history of Monticello, the Virginia home of Thomas Jefferson, on the rapid high-tech business expansion in Charlotte, North Carolina, and on the great human sacrifices on display at the Fort Stewart military base in Georgia where 414 flowers are planted to honor the 414 Georgians who have fallen in Iraq.

Rüb’s articles do a fine job of displaying America’s diversity, often neglected by Europeans who see the United States as a homogenous country. Take the stark contrast between Charlotte, where Rüb described the “amazing development” of the last two decades, and Fort Lauderdale, Florida, where he found one of the highest rates of financial foreclosures. In Fort Lauderdale, so-called Repo-Men, or repossession agents, are flourishing:

“Perhaps it’s no coincidence [given the high foreclosure rate] that a company is headquartered here, which according to its own data is not only the uncontested world market leader, but which has also tripled its operations in the past three years. The company is National Liquidators, which specializes in seizing and auctioning all kinds of water vessels from jet skis and sailboats to fishing boats, yachts, and small cruise ships. (…) In Florida alone, an average of five boats are seized every day.”

From Florida, Rüb travelled to Biloxi, Mississippi, and Kraemer, Louisiana where he filed a report August 6. You can follow Rüb’s tour on the website of the Frankfurter Allgemeine.

Rüb’s itinerary so far:
Undated: ‘Monticello (Virginia): On U.S. 29 through Virginia’
August 2: ‘Charlotte (North Carolina): Where the Crisis is still Distant’
August 3: ‘Fort Stewart (Georgia): Inexhaustible Stock of Flags’
August 4: ‘Fort Lauderdale (Florida): The Business of “Repo Men”‘
August 5: ‘Biloxi (Mississippi): Gambling is the Savior’
August 6: ‘Kraemer (Louisiana): Banana Republic in the River Delta’