Obama's Romantic Revolution: Words Matter, Actions Don't

"Obama's Romantic Revolution" from Der Spiegel is a post speech review of Barack Obama's highly ballyhooed oration in Berlin's Tiergarten.  The author, Gabor Steingart, seems to have a cool eye as to Obama's orientation as a romantic rather than a pragmatist - and sees his speech with all its "optics" - as the mainstream US press would say - to render a coolly calculated speech meant to excite the passions of those looking for a place for their real or alleged discontents - but with no real solutions being offered.

Steingart notes that Obama divides people - but along different lines - of his choice and making.

The 200,000 onlookers who thronged to listen to Obama's speech should not deceive us. Listening is not the same as agreeing. Obama divides people, and not along traditional party lines.

It is, anyway, a great mistake to divide the voters in Western nations into left and right, aggressive and peace-loving, market orientated and critical of capitalism. In reality there are just two types of voters: the romantic democrats and the common-sense democrats.