時尚雙語:影響美國大選的外國人

Back in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, candidates for President of the United States didn’t have much truck with foreigners. They didn’t vote, they lived on the other side of the ocean, and they spoke funny, most of ’em. (If a Frenchman is a man, Jim points out to Huck Finn, “why doan’ he talk like a man?”) Even after America’s rise to global power, the only overseas travel seen as obligatory for a Presidential hopeful was to what pols called the Three-I League—Ireland, Italy, and Israel, venues that had more to do with the lingering tribal identities of big-city ethnics than with anything as highfalutin as foreign policy. (Let us note, in the currently fashionable spirit of joke-explaining, that the baseball allusion is to a long-defunct Class B circuit made up of teams from Illinois, Indiana, and Iowa.) Nor did the incumbent get around much during the first fifty-four years of his life. “Bush’s foreign travels,” the Associated Press reported a few days after the Supreme Court awarded him custody of Air Force One, “have been limited to three visits to Mexico, two trips to Israel, a three-day Thanksgiving visit in Rome with one of his daughters in 1998, and a six-week excursion to China with his parents in 1975.” Israel, check. Italy, check. He didn’t bother with the third I.

In our post-9/11, post-unipolar, and soon-to-be-post-Bush world, staying home is not an option—especially if you’re the “inexperienced” candidate and the opinion polls say that your war-hero opponent is better at foreign policy and national security than you are. Anyway, John McCain had spent months needling Barack Obama for not having lately visited the fourth I. So, last week, off to Iraq he went—and, while he was at it, he doubled and redoubled down, adding Afghanistan, Jordan, Israel, the West Bank, Germany, France, and Britain to his itinerary.

Just before the trip, a leading wire service summarized the prevailing view:
WASHINGTON (Reuters)—U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama’s overseas trip will be a high-risk debut on the world stage—with the potential pitfalls at least as numerous as the likely rewards.

“On a trip like this, on a stage like this, there is no room for error,” Tad Devine, a veteran Democratic operative, told ABC News. “He needs to make sure every word is right, every setting is proper, and that he makes absolutely no mistakes.” And Newsweek’s Richard Wolffe predicted that the trip would be “an extraordinarily public test of a Presidential contender’s mastery of world affairs.”

Whether or not it was that, it was certainly a test of his mastery of political theatrics, his sure-footedness, and his willingness to take a calculated risk. On the first leg of the trip, Obama found himself in a military gym in Kuwait, a major staging point for Americans going to the war zones. The bleachers were packed with soldiers wearing fatigues. A basketball materialized. “I may not make the first one,” he said, no doubt imagining what a metaphor-hungry press would make of a miss or, God forbid, a whole string of misses, “but I’ll make one eventually.” With a spring of his toes, he put the ball up. When it came down, swish.

It was the three-point shot heard round the world, and, for the Obama campaign, things only got better from there. As the candidate whirled through Afghanistan and Iraq—talking with troops, huddling with generals, conferring with presidents and prime ministers—the policy dominoes suddenly began toppling his way, flicked by unexpected fingers. Commanders on the ground in Afghanistan made known their belief that more NATO troops are badly needed there, as Obama has been arguing all along. The Bush Administration sent an Under-Secretary of State to a meeting in Geneva with Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator, thereby edging toward the kind of direct diplomatic engagement with Tehran that Obama has been urging all along. The White House announced that President Bush and the Iraqi Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki, had agreed on the idea of a “time horizon” for withdrawing American troops from Iraq, thus seeming to endorse the general approach that Obama has been advocating (and his opponent just as firmly rejecting) all along. In an interview with Der Spiegel, Maliki went stunningly further. Asked to predict when most of the American troops will leave Iraq, he replied:

As soon as possible, as far as we’re concerned. U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama talks about sixteen months. That, we think, would be the right time frame for a withdrawal, with the possibility of slight changes.

After four days of panicky spinning and backtracking from Washington and (at Washington’s prodding) Baghdad, an audio recording of the interview—the published text of which, in any case, had been provided to Maliki’s office in advance—surfaced, and its accuracy was confirmed. Maliki’s spokesman, Ali al-Dabbagh, had the final word: “We cannot give any timetables or dates, but the Iraqi government believes the end of 2010 is the appropriate time for the withdrawal.” By the time Obama’s plane touched down in Germany, an utterly unanticipated consensus seemed to have emerged: besides having been right about the Iraq war’s beginning (i.e., that it should not have had one), he is right, in broad outline, about the path to its ending.

There has been much discussion of whether it will prove politically advantageous for Obama to have addressed a mile-long crowd of two hundred thousand happy Berliners in the golden early-evening sunlight. Berliners are Germans, and Germans are foreigners, and since well before John Kerry was demonized for knowing how to speak French it has been axiomatic that heartland Americans don’t like foreigners piping up about our elections, however much brainland Americans may disagree. Obama gained nothing in the polls during his nearly flawless, arguably triumphant grand tour. Still, after seven years during which, even among our closest allies, contempt for Bush bled into resentment of the country that returned him to office, one would have to be an awful grouch not to be gratified by the sight of a sea of delighted Europeans waving American flags instead of burning them and cheering an American politician instead of demonstrating against one.

Back home, one such grouch had ample reason to be grouchy. McCain’s luck last week was as bad as Obama’s was good. McCain rode in a golf cart with Bush senior; Obama rode in a helicopter with General David Petraeus. Obama was hailed by the German multitudes; McCain, his planned photo op at an offshore rig preëmpted by an oil spill and rained out by Hurricane Dolly, held a press gaggle in front of Schmidt’s Fudge Haus, in Columbus, Ohio. Obama got a big kiss (“Obama? C’est mon copain!”) from the new President of France, a dashing conservative with an exotic background and an unusual name; McCain stood athwart the cheese aisle of a supermarket, complaining. The presumptive Republican nominee had a right to be irritated by what he was complaining about: Obama’s reluctance to admit that the surge in Iraq which he opposed has helped make the withdrawal from Iraq which he supports less problematic. But McCain had no right to accuse him, not once but repeatedly last week, of being willing to have his country “lose a war” if it would win him an election. That was shocking; that was unworthy. Obama drained a three-point shot; McCain committed a three-shot foul. The game is getting physical.

回首19和20世紀，美國總統候選人與外國的往來並不多。因爲外國人不參加選舉投票，他們住在遙遠的大洋對岸，他們中大多數人言談滑稽。甚至當美國後來成爲一支全球性力量，總統候選人的海外訪問也被認爲只需要去政客們所謂的“3I聯盟”——愛爾蘭、意大利和以色列。美國大城市中來自這些國家的少數族裔長期存在種族認同的問題，在去這些國家也是爲了解決這個問題，而不是去搞什麼外交政策之類的無謂之事。（讓我們用時下流行的玩笑式解釋來作說明，這好比棒球比賽中所說的，由伊利諾斯、印第安那和愛荷達三個州際隊組成的早就有名無實的B級聯賽）現任總統在他人生的前45年中也沒有去過多少國家。在最高法院宣佈布什當選合法幾天後，美聯社報道稱，“布什的海外旅行僅是去了三次墨西哥，兩次以色列，1998年感恩節期間和其女兒在羅馬的三天逗留，以及1975年與其父母在中國爲期6周的訪問”。以色列，去了，意大利，去了，但他連“3I聯盟”中第三個國家愛爾蘭都沒有去過。

當我們進入後9·11時代、後美國單極時代，以及即將到來的後布什時代，呆在家裏已經不是一種明智的選擇，尤其是當你“資歷淺薄”，而民調則顯示你崇尚戰爭的競爭對手在處理外交政策和國家安全方面更強。不管怎麼說，約翰·麥克萊恩最近幾個月一直抨擊巴拉克·奧巴馬不出訪第四個“I”字頭國家——伊拉克。爲此，奧巴馬去了伊拉克，他已於上週離開。在伊訪問期間，他一再增加訪問行程，將阿富汗、約旦、以色列、約旦河西岸（巴勒斯坦）、德國、法國和英國都列入他的行程。

就在奧巴馬起程前，一家有國際影響力的通迅社總結了人們對此行普遍的看法：

華盛頓消息（路透社）——美國民主黨總統候選人巴拉克·奧巴馬此行海外之行將是其一次冒險的國際亮相，潛在的風險不會少於可能的收穫。

民主黨資深人士泰德·戴文在接受美國廣播電視新聞採訪時說，“這樣的一次出行，在這樣一個舞臺上，是絕不允許有任何失誤的。他得確保每句話、每個行爲都正確、恰當，他絕不能犯任何錯誤。”《新聞週刊》的裏查德·沃爾夫聲稱，這次出訪將是“一次對候選總統處理國際事務能力的嚴峻、公開的考驗。”

不管是否真如沃爾夫所言，這次行程肯定是對他政治展現能力、穩定度和應對風險意志的考驗。奧巴馬中東之行的首站選擇在美軍在中東重要的軍事基地——科威特，他現身在當地的一個軍事體育館，看臺上擠滿了身穿軍裝的美國大兵。手拿籃球，他說：“我也許不是首次投中的，但我遲早都會投中”。不難想像，在場的那些唯恐遺漏任何精彩時刻的媒體都拭目以待。只見他雙腳一跳，將球投向空中，球嗖地一聲飛出。

這就是後來廣爲人知的三步上籃表演。對於奧巴馬的競選團隊而言，在那之後，整個局面纔開始打開。正當這位總統候選人在阿富汗和伊克拉斡旋時（與軍隊交談，與將軍磋商，與首腦們會晤），局勢突然出乎意料地開始向他傾斜。阿富汗駐軍司令官宣稱當地需要更多北約駐軍，這正是奧巴馬一直呼籲的。布什政府也派出副國務卿赴日納瓦與伊朗核事務代表進行會晤，從而在與伊朗展開直接外交談判做準備。而這也恰恰是奧巴馬一直以來的主張。白宮也宣佈布什總統與伊拉克總統努裏· 馬利基就美軍撤出伊拉軍的“時間表”方面已達成共識。這似乎與奧巴馬一直提倡的方針趨於吻合（而他的競選對巴則恰好堅決反對從伊拉克撤軍）。努裏·馬利基在接受德國《明鏡》雜誌採訪時，就有關美軍主體何時撤出伊拉克的問題，他回答說：“據我們所知，美國總統候選人巴拉克·奧巴馬說有可能是16個月之內，所以我們認爲美軍可能會盡快撤出。16個月對於平穩撤軍是妥當的。”

此消息在美國和伊拉克（受美國影響）引發熱烈討論，四天後，關於這次採訪的電視片斷被播出，證實了此消息。而且，努裏·馬利基接受採訪的文字內容也被事先提供給到馬利基的辦公室。馬利基的發言人阿里·阿杜馬最終表示：“雖然我們無法提供任何時間表或日程，但伊拉克政府相信2010年底是撤軍的恰當時機。”當奧巴馬的飛機抵達德國後，出乎意料的是，國際社會似乎已形成一致看法：奧巴馬不但正確地指出伊拉克戰爭本不應該發生，他還在更廣泛的意義上，正確地指出了結束伊拉克戰爭的途徑。

很多人開始討論這是否有利於奧巴馬在德國的演說，他將在夕陽的餘輝中面對由兩萬高興的柏林人組成的一英里長的人羣。柏林人是德國人，德國人則是外國人。自此很久這前約翰·克里（上次大選中美國民主黨總統候選人）因爲會說法語而被妖魔化，就說明激情的美國人不喜歡外國人對我們的總統大選指手畫腳，儘管理性的美國人對此並不贊同。奧巴馬此次完美無暇、大獲全勝的外交之行並沒有爲他的選情加分。情形和七年前一樣，即便在我們親密的盟友國家中，對於布什的厭惡都會激化爲對那個推選他出任總統的國家的厭惡。當看到外國人手搖而不是焚燒美國旗，他們對一個美國政客是歡呼擁戴而不是示威抗議時，某人也許會滿腹牢騷、深感不滿。

當奧巴馬回國後，這個滿腹牢騷的人就更有理由進行抱怨。麥肯恩上週幸運之差如同奧巴馬運氣之好一般。麥肯恩與小布什同乘一臺高爾夫球車；奧巴馬則與大衛·佩特斯將軍共搭一架直升機。奧巴馬受到德國羣衆熱烈歡迎；麥肯恩原本計劃在一個海上油井與媒體見面，但由於發生石油泄漏和颶風多莉給而落空。他只好在俄亥俄州首府哥倫布XXX（Schmidt's Fudge Haus）前接受媒體（CNN）採訪。奧巴馬贏得那位既傳統又另類的、擁有獨特姓名的法國新任總統的祝福，麥肯恩則站在超市奶酪貨架對面抱怨着。這位民主黨總統候選人正如他所抱怨的那樣有權利生氣，因爲他對伊拉克撤軍的反對使得奧巴軍所主張的從伊撤軍變得不那麼棘手，而奧巴馬對此並不情願承認。但麥肯恩沒有權利在上週一而再、再而三地指責奧巴馬爲了讓自己贏得競選，而不惜讓美國輸掉一場戰爭。這番言論讓人震驚，對麥肯恩而言也是得不償失的。奧巴馬取得了三步上籃的勝利，麥肯恩則犯下了三步下籃的錯誤。這場對決變得越來越激烈。