For the extreme Left, he’s the President who is still fighting a war in Iraq, an escalating war in Afghanistan, and possibly thinking about taking out Iran’s nuclear capability. For the extreme Right, he’s a foreign born egomaniac who is getting ready to allow gays to serve in the military and planning to cut and run from all American military engagements. However, it is instructive to read the President’s Nobel Prize citation and see how Obama is being perceived abroad:

“Obama has as President created a new climate in international politics. Multilateral diplomacy has regained a central position, with emphasis on the role that the United Nations and other international institutions can play. Dialogue and negotiations are preferred as instruments for resolving even the most difficult international conflicts. The vision of a world free from nuclear arms has powerfully stimulated disarmament and arms control negotiations. Thanks to Obama’s initiative, the United States is now playing a more constructive role in meeting the great climatic challenges the world is confronting. Democracy and human rights are to be strengthened.”

“Only very rarely has a person to the same extent as Obama captured the world’s attention and given its people hope for a better future. His diplomacy is founded in the concept that those who are to lead the world must do so on the basis of values and attitudes that are shared by the majority of the world’s population,” 

My favorite part of the news stories about the Prize is the way the President was informed of this award. Due to time zone differences, American Nobelists are typically informed of their win in the middle of the night. Not this time.  According to Nobel Committee Chair Thorbjoern Jagland , the Committee decided not to inform Obama early because it didn't want to wake him up. "Waking up a president in the middle of the night, this isn't really something you do,"  Yes, he might think the nation was being attacked.. Deploying  the air force would not be the correct response to winning a peace prize.

Of course, Obama is not the first sitting American President to win the Prize. Teddy Roosevelt won in 1916 and Woodrow Wilson in 1919. The move by the Nobel committee serves to reinforce the central position of American diplomacy and the continued importance of the American Presidency. With Europe, China, India, and Russia emerging as world powers, the United States continues to retain its critical position, with the world’s most powerful military and a huge if struggling economy. Of equal importance is America’s central position in the world’s media, on the web and in the popular imagination. Images of America are communicated throughout the world and continue to dominate the world’s collective bandwith.

It matters what the American President does, how he does it and what he says. When President George W. Bush swaggers on to an aircraft carrier to declare “mission accomplished” it says one thing. When President Barack Obama goes to Cairo to hold out an olive branch to the Muslim world, it says something quite different. While being popular outside the United States may not be the main objective of the American President, Machiavelli aside, being feared and loathed is not always the best way to promote American interests in an interdependent global system.

A number of polls this summer show that the United States is more respected abroad than it was during the Bush Administration and it is clear that the Obama team sees diplomacy as well as the military as tools for advancing American interests. Obama is a masterful communicator and a compelling figure on the world stage. While it is too early to know if all of this promise will translate into performance, the Nobel Committee seems to be betting on our still new President. I admit that I am too. Obama has written his own story and termed it the Audacity of Hope. I think the Nobel committee has added its voice to that story- making the case for the persistence of hope. I think it is a wonderful gesture, worthy of the traditions of this important prize.

The media thrives on bad news and conflict, and there is no shortage of those things these days. People are suffering. But crises and tough times motivate heroism and selflessness too. In Iran, we see the hunger for self determination creating a movement that keeps changing its shape and form, but persists nonetheless. We are learning that the Iranian people and the regime that rules over them are not one and the same. Here in America, people are responding to the economic crisis by digging into their own pockets and savings to help neighbors and families in need.

In the modern world what unites us is this hunger for a safe haven where it is possible for the individual to achieve great things and where we can raise a family where our children have the chance to live up to their potential.  This hunger is what brings people into the streets of Tehran and was the force that led our founders to fight a war for independence. In this country these values shape the common ground we saw from time to time in the Presidential campaigns of John Mc Cain and Barack Obama. Despite the certainty claimed by our political rhetoric, it is not clear how we accomplish freedom and security in this world of imperfect human beings .

Walking on the beach among friends and families this July 4th, I couldn’t help but believe that the great majority of Americans have found a safe haven.  While too many Americans do without, and too many people around the world are without hope, the American dream of community and freedom endures.  Many continue to seek it. You see it in many places and in many forms. Early in the morning in Long Beach, you can watch dozens of teenage lifeguards train in a set of coordinated lifesaving exercises.  Like clock work they race into place and practice pulling a "drowning" swimmer back to shore.  Then only five hours later you see the same actions, only with greater intensity as a rip tide pulls two swimmers away from the beach.  If you think our country is falling apart, know that the spirit of public service is strong in our military, our police and fire departments, as well as in Americorps, the Peace Corps, and on the sands of Long Beach New York. Our ability to be free as individuals is built on a foundation of community.  Just like those teenage lifeguards carrying a line of rope  to those drowning in the sea, our community provides a lifeline for individuals whose life or security is threatened.

These days, there is a fair amount of consensus about what needs to be done when we see someone drowning. Economic and political life is a little more complicated, but there is actually more agreement than the cable news channels would like to admit. It was the Bush Administration that started the financial bailout in the fall of 2008. Right wing pundits may call President Obama a socialist, but he did not begin the expansion of government’s role in the banking industry- that was a policy he inherited. Similarly, it now seems clear that the Bush Administration was moving away from their initial pro-torture stance, as they had second thoughts about the wisdom and legality of their actions. And of course, we now see that while the Obama Administration has banned torture, it is struggling to find a place to imprison captured terrorists- the same dilemma faced by their predecessors. Our values as a nation, and the President's role as a global and national leader, push our Presidents to confront the same set of issues, from the same institutional vantage point. Even two Presidents as different as Bush and Obama end up seeing some issues through the same lens.

While our polarized politics seems committed to maintaining the veneer of unbridgeable differences, the reality of our common interest continues to reassert itself. This does not mean that our views are identical and there are not serious differences in how we might achieve our goals. Globally, there are clear distinctions in values and priorities. Within the United States these distinctions are far less pronounced, but real.  While President Obama seems to recognize these distinctions, he is, I believe correctly, focused on trying to find and build on the common ground that we share. He is trying to do this at home and abroad. In a complex, interconnected and dangerous world, this effort at communication and understanding is a welcome change.

Which brings us back to this issue of security.  President Obama is not considering dismantling or reducing our military. He is, like his predecessor, trying to figure out how to make it more effective. Unlike his predecessor he seems to have more interest in the other tools of national interest: diplomacy, economics, and communication. If we assume that we have nothing in common with the nations we oppose, these other tools are useless. If, however, we find out, as we have,  that the Iranian people are actually more opposed to their President than we are, then maybe our security can be served by building on those values we share, rather than those we do not.