Sarkozy is, as we say in the office, pretty PrObama these days. I've never taken French, but I think the correct term is "le gush." Similarly, folks in David Cameron's office -- Cameron being the Great Right Hope of the British Tories -- recently released a document showing the similarities between their candidate and Obama. A bit beneath him, a group of Tory MPs have expressed their preference for Obama. Meanwhile, in Israel, Netanyahu, Olmert, and Livni have all been jostling to get into Obama's photo ops and praise him in earshot of the press. These are all, mind you, right-leaning folk. As Adam Serwer points out, "Remember when the Right was all jubilant over Sarkozy being elected? I think that American conservatives often don’t realize how far right on the political spectrum they actually are." Right-leaning in France or Britain is virtually Stalinist here. But it's not necessarily an ideological thing. It's a political thing. When the social welfare state exists, it becomes, in effect, politically sacred. It can be reformed, modernized, and bettered, but rarely uprooted. This explains, in part, why Republicans are so aggressively opposed to issues like health reform, despite the fact that simply buying in would take a damaging issue off the table and net them some political plaudits: In general, large scale social programs are immensely popular. Once founded, there's really no going back. This is as true in America as it is in Europe: Just ask Gingrich how cutting Medicare went in the 1990s, or ask Bush how Social Security privatization played out in 2005. People talk often about the differing political cultures of Europe and America, and they bring up a lot of plausible hypotheses for the variance. There are cultural explanations, racial explanations, historical explanations, and many more. But one of the simple realities is that in parliamentary systems it's easier to pass large social programs. Large social programs, once passed, become immensely popular. Europe has more parliamentary systems and so more large social programs. And there's a whole lot less room to be an economic conservative if you can't touch -- either rhetorically or legislatively -- the national health care system, the pension structure, or the social welfare state, nor any of the taxes associated with those programs.
